It has been four decades since the Colts got out of Baltimore virtually overnight and relocated to Indianapolis.
The whole ordeal moved along so quickly. Just like that, the Baltimore Colts were no longer as they made their way to the team’s new home with 15 semi-trucks, dubbed the ‘Midnight Mayflower’ move.
Lead Up to Move
Then-owner of the Colts, Robert ‘Bob’ Irsay, was looking at relocation options after the city of Baltimore refused to replace Memorial Stadium, which was deemed inadequate for both the Colts and the baseball franchise the Baltimore Orioles.
Despite having found some success there since their inaugural NFL season in 1953, the Colts were struggling in the mid-to-late 1970s, having suffered three straight divisional-round losses from 1975-1977.
In the years following, the Colts would suffer a six-season losing skid, and consequently, their home-game attendance numbers plummeted.
With a winless 1982 campaign, in which they went 0-8-1 after a 57-day players’ strike, the Colts were the recipients of the No. 1 overall draft pick in the 1983 NFL Draft.
With that pick, they selected Stanford quarterback John Elway, who was also a serious MLB prospect and had announced that he would rather play baseball than play for the Colts.
Having drafted a player that did not want to play for them, and with some concerns over their location, the Colts were forced into a trade in which they dealt the elite prospect to the Denver Broncos.
Elway would, of course, go on to be named a nine-time Pro Bowler, and win two Super Bowls with the Broncos.
The ‘Midnight Mayflower’ controversy
With no franchise quarterback, and an inadequate stadium, Irsay had already been looking for a new home, having explored Memphis, Los Angeles and Phoenix as possibilities.
According to then-Colts chief operating officer Pete Ward, a move to Phoenix was very close.
“This was January 19 of 1984,” Ward recalled in Episode 3 of The Move. “I was an administrative assistant. I was down the hall from the general manager, Ernie Accorsi. Jim Irsay was in Tampa for the Super Bowl that year. I was delivering a document to our general manager at the time, into his office, and he was on the phone with Mr. (Robert) Irsay.
“And he hung up, and it was me and one other person, and it was me and one other person, the director of marketing, who was a close friend of Ernie’s back then. And he said, we’re moving to Phoenix. We’re moving.”
However, a few hours later, the deal fell through and Irsay was forced to look elsewhere.
Indianapolis had previously made it known that they wanted to house an NFL team, and the city had both funded, and built, the 61,000 seat Hoosier Dome.
Their intent to bring the Colts to Indy was clear with the seats of the stadium being blue and white, something that pleased Irsay.
“He was quite smitten by the fact that even though it hadn’t been finished yet, the seats were blue and white which were the Colts colors,” then-Indianapolis Mayor William Hudnut told WRTV in 2014.
Although Indiana was – and still is – a relatively small market, business and city leaders were intrigued by the opportunity for economic growth, especially from sports.
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Just a few months after the move to Phoenix fell through, on March 28, 1984, Irsay ordered moving crews to pack everything up and move it to Indianapolis.
Many ever believed that it would actually happen, but not one person could envision it happening in 24 hours.
Hudnut had called a close friend who owned the Mayflower Transit moving company, and deployed 15 trucks to Maryland in the dead of night, thus giving it the name of ‘Midnight Mayflower.’
“The reason for the stealth, the reason for the immediacy – Baltimore was going to try to block Bob from leaving,” former Colts assistant coach Rick Venturi explained. “And they were going to try to block him with the legal concept of eminent domain. Which essentially says that the community owns the franchise and you can’t move it.
“And he, I guess felt, and his legal people felt that maybe they could do that. And so he was going to get out of dodge before it was going to get to the house. So that was the reason for the stealth and immediacy of it.”
Fans were distraught
The midnight move sparked huge controversy amongst the Baltimore Colts faithful, who were left both devastated, and angered by the manner in which Irsay did it.
Back on that fateful night in 1984, The Baltimore Evening Sun reporter Ken Murray received a call at 7 p.m. with a report that Mayflower vans were heading towards the Colts’ complex. He then called Colts coach Frank Kush to confirm the team were moving.
“It was a surreal scene,” said Murray, via ESPN. “I remember feeling a numbness, not from the cold, but from the realization it was actually happening. “I was standing in on history, watching the physical dismantling of one of the NFL’s greatest franchises. A handful of people had gathered, as much in curiosity as anything else. It was solemn and funeral-like.”
It would be 12 years before Baltimore had another NFL team. Ironically, the original Cleveland Browns’ move to Maryland in 1996, where they became the Ravens, was just as controversial as the Colts’ move to Indianapolis.
During that time, the city tended to root for any team that played the Colts.
“Fans here generally rooted for whichever team played the Colts on any given Sunday,” Murray said. “The emotion was almost tangible. There was also real anger directed at the league and its owners, because they had allowed Bob Irsay to get away with his dastardly deed. Those owners didn’t appear to have any remorse about it, either.”
Colts and Ravens have experienced different levels of success since
The newly-named Indianapolis Colts took four seasons to acclimate themselves to their new city and reach the playoffs, and would eventually go on to win the Super Bowl in 2006, with Hall of Famer and all-time great Peyton Manning under center.
The Ravens, though, enjoyed success much quicker, winning the Super Bowl in 2000, in the first season they reached the playoffs as a franchise.
They would repeat that feat in 2012, winning the infamous ‘Blackout Bowl’ against the San Francisco 49ers, with the two opposing head coaches being brothers John and Jim Harbaugh.
Fast-forward to today, and the Ravens are a bona fide playoff contender, with a star-studded backfield duo of two-time NFL MVP Lamar Jackson and running back Derrick Henry.
On the other hand, the Colts are stuck in mediocrity, having not won a playoff game since 2018, with an ongoing battle between Anthony Richardson and Daniel Jones for the starting quarterback spot.
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