Speaker 1: Hm, take a lived here. It was like a minimum security.
Speaker 2: David Letterman, an Indianapolis Natives, spent some time riffing on
Speaker 2: his hometown during the dedication ceremony for Peyton Manning statue
Speaker 2: outside Luke Soil Stadium a few years ago.
Speaker 1: Indianapol years ago, I said.
Speaker 3: I go to Indiana Chicago.
Speaker 4: We truly were napped out, and I draw the comparison
Speaker 4: with Louisville.
Speaker 2: That's Bill Benner, a longtime reporter for the Indianapolis Star
Speaker 2: who now works for the Indiana Pacers. We spoke at
Speaker 2: length about the history of Indianapolis, and you'll hear plenty
Speaker 2: of our conversation on this podcast, But toward the end
Speaker 2: of our chat, he brought up a point that drove
Speaker 2: home just how important sports have been to the growth
Speaker 2: of our city.
Speaker 4: In nineteen sixty seven, Louisville and the Pacers both got
Speaker 4: ABA franchises, but other than that, we were at one
Speaker 4: event in town. They had the Kentucky Derby, We had
Speaker 4: the Indy five hunder and they had UK and we
Speaker 4: had IU. And by sustaining the Pacers and moving into
Speaker 4: the NBA and then attracting the Colts and building the facilities.
Speaker 4: We became Indianapolis the amateur sports capital of the world,
Speaker 4: did all the downtown development along with that. Louisville didn't
Speaker 4: sustain the colonels when they into the NBA, and it
Speaker 4: took him forever to really get into downtown development. And
Speaker 4: a big reason for that, the comparison to two cities
Speaker 4: was the fact that we made the investments and and
Speaker 4: made kept the Pacers here and built the facilities, and
Speaker 4: Louisville didn't. And Louisville has yet to catch up, in
Speaker 4: my humble opinion, but it's a it's a good comparison
Speaker 4: of two cities that were very similar back in the
Speaker 4: late sixties and how one did this and the other one?
Speaker 2: Gaggle think about Indianapolis now as we know it, This
Speaker 2: city still is known for the Indy five hundred.
Speaker 5: He's making a book, No Pipe.
Speaker 3: Indianapolis.
Speaker 2: He wanted parlight and for its rich basketball tradition from
Speaker 2: high school hoops to Hinklefield House to the Fever and
Speaker 2: the Pacers.
Speaker 4: Welcome Indiana, Baca.
Speaker 2: But Indianapolis is elevated not just on a local scale,
Speaker 2: but a national scale and a worldwide scale. For one
Speaker 2: big reason. Richardson can i take off on a quarterback drawl.
Speaker 2: He said that ten he's at the foot untouched in
Speaker 2: the end to.
Speaker 6: Touchdown by ind why Anthony Richardson.
Speaker 2: Forty years ago, a fleet of Mayflower moving vans arrived
Speaker 2: in America's heartland, bringing the Colts to Indianapolis after thirty
Speaker 2: one years in Baltimore. The Colts have now been in
Speaker 2: Indianapolis for four decades, fair or not. Because Indianapolis has
Speaker 2: the Colts, it's thought of as a major American city.
Speaker 7: Louisville's a really full little city, but I call it little.
Speaker 2: Debbie Knox began reporting and anchoring at WISH TV in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty.
Speaker 8: Indianapolis now is I just seized as a major league
Speaker 8: city because we've got this NFL franchise and we got
Speaker 8: an eight basketball team as well, So that's that's a
Speaker 8: very good comparison.
Speaker 7: I've also heard us compared to Columbus, Ohio, but that's
Speaker 7: where we could be today. We'd have the five hundred
Speaker 7: and maybe we'd.
Speaker 8: Have an NBA team, you know, and then what you
Speaker 8: got to compete and you got God loved the risk takers,
Speaker 8: you know, who have the vision and can see things
Speaker 8: in how they could be and they they've got the
Speaker 8: knowledge to look out at the horizon and see other
Speaker 8: cities and what they're doing and how it's impacting.
Speaker 7: The look at the NFL, it's a mass. I mean,
Speaker 7: just what a business.
Speaker 2: Knox hits on something here. The Colts transformed and are
Speaker 2: still transforming Indianapolis. How we feel about our city and
Speaker 2: how we're perceived both nationally and internationally is unquestionably tied
Speaker 2: to having our pro football team. But the story of
Speaker 2: how the Colts got here isn't exactly straightforward. It took
Speaker 2: two mayors sticking their political necks out to use sports
Speaker 2: to develop a mid sized Midwestern metropolis downtown. It took
Speaker 2: a Jerry Lewis style telethon to save the city's pro
Speaker 2: basketball team, and it took building a state of the
Speaker 2: art sixty thousand seat stadium despite not having a tenant
Speaker 2: to even get Indianapolis a lottery ticket to become an
Speaker 2: NFL city. And then it took a cascade of serendipitous
Speaker 2: events and a bit of good fortune for those Mayflower
Speaker 2: trucks to roll into Indianapolis on March twenty ninth, nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty four, carrying in them an NFL team. This is
Speaker 2: episode two of the Move Indianapolis. Indianapolis was established in
Speaker 2: the eighteen hundreds, but our story begins in the late
Speaker 2: nineteen sixties. Richard Lueger was elected mayor of Indianapolis in
Speaker 2: November of nineteen sixty seven, and he took office with
Speaker 2: an ambitious vision for the circle city. His plan was
Speaker 2: called Unigov, and Luger wanted to merge the governments of
Speaker 2: Indianapolis and Marion County into one single municipal government. Ultimately,
Speaker 2: that meant ten suburban towns were absorbed into that singular government,
Speaker 2: which boosted the population of Indianapolis to nearly seven hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty thousand residents by nineteen seventy. Luger, who died
Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen, recalled the goal and impact of Yunigov
Speaker 2: during a press conference in twenty fourteen in.
Speaker 9: Annapolis and through the Unigov experience, because we really did
Speaker 9: have a desire for greatness, for a city that was
Speaker 9: well beyond anything we had ever seen before in terms
Speaker 9: of our imagination.
Speaker 8: Of what could occur now.
Speaker 3: Not everybody feared that.
Speaker 9: Some people provedly satisfied with life as it was, but
Speaker 9: ultimately a majority of people. We're very excited about being
Speaker 9: the best or vying to be the best.
Speaker 2: While UNIGOV was not met with universal praise, it did
Speaker 2: set Indianapolis down a different path as a city.
Speaker 10: UNIGOV was the most significant municipal government reform in the
Speaker 10: United States in the last hundred years that was not
Speaker 10: inspired by corruption or bad behavior.
Speaker 2: Jim Morris was Luger's deputy mayor until nineteen seventy three,
Speaker 2: and he's one of the key players in the growth
Speaker 2: of Indianapolis over the last fifty years.
Speaker 10: So when UNIGOV took place, overnight, Annapolis went from being
Speaker 10: in terms of population, went from being the thirtieth largest
Speaker 10: city in America to the ninth largest city. And now
Speaker 10: it was a bit of a fiction, but we went
Speaker 10: from eighty square miles to four hundred and two square miles.
Speaker 10: We became the ninth largest city in America between Baltimore
Speaker 10: and San Diego. So suddenly, when a list of the
Speaker 10: top ten cities was published in the Almanac or any publication,
Speaker 10: Indianapolis was on that list.
Speaker 2: After Yunikov, Luger, Morris, and the local government set their
Speaker 2: sites on revitalizing and growing downtown Indianapolis, even with adding
Speaker 2: all those outlying Marion County communities and neighborhoods, Luger's administration
Speaker 2: understood downtown was the one area of the city everybody
Speaker 2: could use. It was the center of a vibrant city's
Speaker 2: tax base, and it could be the engine for the
Speaker 2: growth of an entire city. And one of the major
Speaker 2: catalysts for setting Indianapolis on that upward trajectory was its
Speaker 2: pro basketball team, the Indiana Pacers.
Speaker 5: A second point year had a third time his Hobby
Speaker 5: Leonard five year tenure. The Indiana Pacers not won it.
Speaker 2: The same year Luger was elected mayor, the Indiana Pacers
Speaker 2: began playing as a charter member of the American Basketball Association,
Speaker 2: that old upstar challenger to the NBA with its trademark Red, White,
Speaker 2: and Blue Basketball. The Pacers dominated the early years of
Speaker 2: the ABA, winning three championships in the league's first six
Speaker 2: years of existence. But the Pacers played at the Indiana
Speaker 2: State Fairgrounds Coliseum, a small arena located on thirty eighth
Speaker 2: Street north of downtown. That's where not only the Pacers played,
Speaker 2: but most events that came through Indianapolis took place.
Speaker 11: The coliseum was big, but downtown not quite so much.
Speaker 2: Jimmy Batis is a local native and a long time
Speaker 2: Indianapolis radio host.
Speaker 11: It was a little sleepier, not as much going on downtown,
Speaker 11: but there were still lots going on, and the Pacers
Speaker 11: were a big part of that. But back then I
Speaker 11: used to go to their games at the Coliseum. As
Speaker 11: a matter of fact, the very first concert I ever
Speaker 11: went to I think I was fourteen, and it was
Speaker 11: at the Coliseum and it was the Jackson Five and
Speaker 11: their opening act were the Commodoors.
Speaker 2: Around the same time as the Pacers were thriving, though,
Speaker 2: the Indiana High School Basketball Tournament moved from Butler's hinklefield
Speaker 2: House in Indianapolis to i Use Assembly Hall about an
Speaker 2: hour south in Bloomington. Ticket demand had outgrown hinklefield House's capacity,
Speaker 2: and for the nineteen seventy one seventy two season, the
Speaker 2: tournament left Indianapolis and Luger, he just like about everyone
Speaker 2: else in this state, was a huge basketball fan. He
Speaker 2: wanted to build a proper venue not only to house
Speaker 2: the Pacers, but to bring the state's fabled high school
Speaker 2: basketball tournament back to Indianapolis.
Speaker 4: When the idea of an Arena was in the sleep flow.
Speaker 4: Some people wanted to put it out off of I
Speaker 4: sixty fivener where Lafayette Square is today, and that's when
Speaker 4: Dick Licker said, no, no, no, If we're going to
Speaker 4: do this, it has to be downtown because it has
Speaker 4: to be that catalyst for future downtown development.
Speaker 2: Luger got his way on October twentieth, nineteen seventy one,
Speaker 2: with a nine figure contribution from the city, ground was
Speaker 2: broken on a sixteen thousand seat arena on Market Street
Speaker 2: in downtown Indianapolis. Three years later, Market Square Arena opened
Speaker 2: its doors as one of the largest arenas of its
Speaker 2: kind in the United States, and it gave Indianapolis its
Speaker 2: first top tier venue for sports, concerts, and events, and
Speaker 2: it gave folks a reason to be in downtown Indianapolis.
Speaker 4: Dick Licker was the first one to recognize that downtown
Speaker 4: needed to be far more vibrant than it was. Quite honestly,
Speaker 4: we only had two or three restaurants people At five o'clock,
Speaker 4: downtown shut down and people scattered to their homes in
Speaker 4: the suburbs.
Speaker 2: From nineteen seventy four, when Market Square Arena opened through
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six, more than one point six billion dollars
Speaker 2: were poured into downtown construction projects in Indianapolis. According to
Speaker 2: a nineteen eighty six article in the Los Angeles Times,
Speaker 2: office buildings, hotels, restaurants, and shops sprung up. The one
Speaker 2: hundred and sixty thousand square foot Indiana Convention Center was
Speaker 2: also completed in nineteen seventy two, and that's another key
Speaker 2: part of the vision for Indianapolis. Market Square Arena would
Speaker 2: host Elvis Presley's final concert in nineteen seventy seven, and
Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy eight, the owner of Indianapolis's professional hockey team,
Speaker 2: the Racers, who also played at Market Square Arena, made
Speaker 2: an audacious move. For a remarkable fee at the time
Speaker 2: of one point seventy five million dollars, he signed the
Speaker 2: top junior player in Canada, a seventeen year old by
Speaker 2: the name of Wayne Gretzky. Gretzky played eight games for
Speaker 2: the Indianapolis and he took classes at Broad Ripple High
Speaker 2: School before the team's financial situation led him to be
Speaker 2: sold to the Edmonton Oilers. But all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: downtown Indianapolis was a destination for locals and out of
Speaker 2: towners alike, and for a city previously known for just
Speaker 2: its five hundred mile race, it was fitting that the
Speaker 2: government and business community's vision to build around sports was
Speaker 2: at the center of those efforts.
Speaker 4: It was controversial, people said, and why are you throwing
Speaker 4: tax bunny public subsidies at this basketball arena? But it
Speaker 4: turned out to be the first domino to fall the
Speaker 4: redevelopment of downtown.
Speaker 2: But the progress Indianapolis made after building Market Square Arena
Speaker 2: was not guaranteed. The Pacers had to sustain the success
Speaker 2: they had at the State Fairgrounds after moving downtown. Under
Speaker 2: legendary head coach Slick Leonard, the Pacers made the ABA
Speaker 2: Finals in their first year at Marcus Square Arena. But
Speaker 2: the Pacers, a few months after moved into their brand
Speaker 2: new digs, were in deep financial trouble. They asked the
Speaker 2: ABA for a financial assistance just after Christmas in nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy four, and though ownership vowed to keep the team
Speaker 2: in Indianapolis, not even half a year after setting up
Speaker 2: shop at Market Square Arena, there were already rumors the
Speaker 2: Pacers may skip town. Still, two years later, the Indiana
Speaker 2: Pacers made the Big show.
Speaker 3: Four teams will be absorbed into the NBA next year.
Speaker 3: The rest of the league will terminate operations exactly.
Speaker 12: You know it.
Speaker 6: Wait, wait, what did you say?
Speaker 4: The Nets, the Spurs, the Pacers, and the Nuggets are
Speaker 4: going to play in the NBA next season.
Speaker 3: The rest of us are going to dissolve.
Speaker 2: The terms of the ABA's merger with the NBA, though,
Speaker 2: were not favorable to those four teams. The NBA tree
Speaker 2: to the Pacers like an expansion team, meaning they had
Speaker 2: to pay the league's expansion fee of three point two
Speaker 2: million dollars, which back then was quite a bit of
Speaker 2: money to put up. The Pacers were also not allowed
Speaker 2: to participate in the nineteen seventy six NBA Draft, and
Speaker 2: for the first few years in the NBA, they weren't
Speaker 2: even allowed to share in the league's TV revenue. Still,
Speaker 2: the Pacers were Indiana's pro basketball team. They moved to
Speaker 2: the NBA maybe with a little help from the Chicago Bulls,
Speaker 2: made sense both locally and nationally.
Speaker 4: They were very, very popular.
Speaker 2: Bill Benner began covering the Pacers for the Indianapolis Star
Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy four, their first season at Market Square Arena, but.
Speaker 4: Then once they went into the NBA, George McGinnis left
Speaker 4: for the seventy six ers. Roger Brown got old, Bell
Speaker 4: Daniels got old, and so they As they were moving
Speaker 4: into the NBA, the roster changed. They weren't successful, and
Speaker 4: crowds dwindled and they became less popular. You know, we
Speaker 4: all love a winner. And because of the financial hardships
Speaker 4: that the ownership as encountering, it was difficult to attract
Speaker 4: talent to the early NBA Pacers.
Speaker 2: The Pacers went thirty six and forty six in their
Speaker 2: first year the NBA, and their financial realities began to
Speaker 2: set in for the team's ownership. The top players from
Speaker 2: their ABA days were one by one sold off. Rumors
Speaker 2: the team would pick up and leave for greener financial
Speaker 2: pastures began to pick up steam Arena Sports. A group
Speaker 2: of local investors who owned the Pacers made it known
Speaker 2: that without an influx of cash, they would either have
Speaker 2: to move the team or sell the team with no
Speaker 2: guarantee the new owner would keep the Pacers in Indianapolis.
Speaker 2: In fact, the Pacers ownership group didn't even have enough
Speaker 2: money to meet payroll. In the summer of nineteen seventy seven,
Speaker 2: the Indiana Pacers were on the verge of collapse. And
Speaker 2: this wasn't just a threat that the city would lose
Speaker 2: its basketball team. The threat was that if the Pacers left,
Speaker 2: a lot of the downtown momentum created by Mayor Luger
Speaker 2: that new Mayor Bill Hudnutt hoped to push forward would
Speaker 2: be halted.
Speaker 4: The Pacers after they moved into Marcus Square Arena, they
Speaker 4: struggled when they moved into the NBA, and they had
Speaker 4: to have a telethon to sustain support for the franchise.
Speaker 2: With their sources for money dried up, the Pacers were
Speaker 2: all but out of options. Nancy Leonard, the team's general
Speaker 2: manager and the wife of coach Slick Leonard, proposed a
Speaker 2: last ditch option, a Jerry Lewis style telethon with the
Speaker 2: goal of selling eight thousand season tickets, which would give
Speaker 2: the team the influx of cash it needed to stay afloat.
Speaker 2: The telethon was called, in stark terms, the Save the
Speaker 2: Pacers Telethon. As Benner wrote in the Indianapolis Star on
Speaker 2: July third, nineteen seventy seven, quote, either they sell eight
Speaker 2: thousand season tickets and survive, or they don't. This was
Speaker 2: quite literally a doer die moment for the Pacers, and
Speaker 2: in reality, it was a doer die moment for professional
Speaker 2: sports in the city of Indianapolis. Miraculously it worked. Nancy
Speaker 2: Leonard grabbed the mic with tears in her eyes just
Speaker 2: as the clock was about to strike midnight on the
Speaker 2: Indiana Pacers. They were at eight twenty eight tickets sold.
Speaker 2: The Pacers were saved. They would stay in Indianapolis for now.
Speaker 2: And the importance of that moment, when the Pacers were
Speaker 2: financially viable enough to stay in Indianapolis should not be
Speaker 2: lost on anyone who knows what the city is like today.
Speaker 1: The Pacers were really the hub.
Speaker 11: They had great success, right ABA championship, beloved players. If
Speaker 11: that would have happened, I don't know that you build
Speaker 11: the convention business that you have built, and the hotels
Speaker 11: and the restaurants and all that sort of thing, the jobs, Yeah,
Speaker 11: that was mado.
Speaker 2: Think about it. If Indianapolis, the biggest city in the
Speaker 2: most hoops crazy state in the Union, couldn't support its
Speaker 2: pro basketball team, how the hell could it support anything
Speaker 2: else when it comes to professional sports.
Speaker 4: I think this very very possible, if not likely, that
Speaker 4: had the Pacers ended up moving, that the public would
Speaker 4: have shipped their ahead and said no to further investment
Speaker 4: in sport. That would that was a big, big thing
Speaker 4: that occurred that kind of cleared the way for the
Speaker 4: Colts still eventually come here.
Speaker 2: Rumors would still persist about the pacers potential to skip town, though.
Speaker 2: In nineteen seventy nine, that local group of investors who
Speaker 2: owned the team sold the Pacers to Sam Nassy, a
Speaker 2: Beverly Hills businessman who had close ties to doctor Jerry Buss,
Speaker 2: the architect of the showtime Los Angeles Lakers. Nassy pledged
Speaker 2: to keep the Pacers in Indianapolis, touting a ten year
Speaker 2: agreement to play at Market Square Arena upon buying the
Speaker 2: team that year, But in the early nineteen eighties, chatter
Speaker 2: persisted that the California based Nassy had his eyes on
Speaker 2: getting out of Indianapolis and turning the franchise into the
Speaker 2: Sacramento Pacers, and there.
Speaker 4: Was a lot of speculation that Sam Nassy wanted to
Speaker 4: move the Indiana Pacers to the West coast, Sacramento, San Diego,
Speaker 4: maybe another team in LA who knows.
Speaker 2: Nassy made clear his intention to sell the Pacers in
Speaker 2: the early nineteen eighties, but Indianapolis was not a community
Speaker 2: stocked with multimillionaires willing to own a major professional sports franchise.
Speaker 2: The threat of an outside investor buying the Pacers and
Speaker 2: ripping them out of downtown Indianapolis was very real. At
Speaker 2: the eleventh hour, though, two brothers and shopping mall magnets
Speaker 2: stepped in to purchase the Pacers in nineteen eighty three,
Speaker 2: Herb and Mel Simon. They were Indianapolis natives, and they
Speaker 2: bought the Pacers more out of civic pride than anything else.
Speaker 2: Without the Simon brothers, Indianapolis could have lost the Pacers,
Speaker 2: and without the Pacers, would Indianapolis even have had a
Speaker 2: shot at luring the Colts from Baltimore. Mike Chappel, in
Speaker 2: Indianapolis native and the dean of the Colts Speed, has
Speaker 2: covered every minute of the team since they arrived in
Speaker 2: nineteen four, and he pondered that very same question.
Speaker 13: Had the Pacers left, I mean, I can't imagine what
Speaker 13: the city would have done. Would they have been able
Speaker 13: to get up an NFL franchise, I don't know.
Speaker 2: The Indiana Pacers were absolutely a central figure in bringing
Speaker 2: professional football to Indianapolis.
Speaker 3: Well, we had the Pacers. They were successful.
Speaker 10: They had been successful in the ABA, and I think
Speaker 10: the success of the Pacers sort of helped the community
Speaker 10: think that an NFL football team was a possibility.
Speaker 2: But they're just one part of this story. Toward the
Speaker 2: end of his second term as mayor, Richard Lueger announced
Speaker 2: he'd run for a US Senate seat in the nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy six election. He won that race, by the way,
Speaker 2: and he represented Indiana in the Senate all the way
Speaker 2: until twenty thirty. That left a decision for Indianapolis voters
Speaker 2: in the nineteen seventy five mayoral election between Robert Welch
Speaker 2: and Bill Hudnutt, the six foot sixth former pastor at
Speaker 2: Second Presbyterian Church at seventy seven hundred North Meridian Street.
Speaker 2: Hudnut's vision for the city was not only aligned with Lugers,
Speaker 2: he was even more ambitious. He prevailed, defeating Welch by
Speaker 2: a margin of about twelve thousand votes. Welch was himself
Speaker 2: on board with Indianapolis using sports to revitalize its downtown.
Speaker 2: We'll get back to him later. Hudnutt, though, saw an
Speaker 2: opportunity for Indianapolis to put itself on the map nationally
Speaker 2: outside of one weekend in May for the Indy five hundred.
Speaker 8: He was really a visionary, you know. I mean, he
Speaker 8: had heard enough of indian ill place and you know,
Speaker 8: with a sleepy downtown, he wanted to push the city forward.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 4: Bill Hudnut's great line was, you can't be a suburb
Speaker 4: of nothing.
Speaker 2: With the Pacers stability insured. In nineteen seventy seven, Hudnut,
Speaker 2: in tandem with the local government and business community, turned
Speaker 2: Indianapolis as attention to the city's next step in building
Speaker 2: around sports. In nineteen seventy eight, Congress passed the Amateur
Speaker 2: Sports Act, which created the US Olympic Committee. The US
Speaker 2: Olympic Committee then was able to charter national governing bodies
Speaker 2: for each sport, such as USA Track and Field and
Speaker 2: USA Swimming, and Indianapolis saw an opportunity to become a
Speaker 2: destination for those sports specific governing bodies.
Speaker 4: The Amateur Sports Act, which was kind of the impetus
Speaker 4: for this, was pasted, and shortly thereafter this group of
Speaker 4: community leaders formed the Indiana Sports Corporation nonprofit with the
Speaker 4: mission of attracting both sports feder amateur sports federations and
Speaker 4: amateur sports competitions, national championships, you'd have it.
Speaker 2: But just because Indianapolis wanted to become a destination for
Speaker 2: amateur sports governing bodies and tournaments didn't guarantee that vision
Speaker 2: would come to life. The city had to construct state
Speaker 2: of the art facilities to become as as that desired,
Speaker 2: the amateur sports capital of the world.
Speaker 4: They also had again to invest in facilities, and so
Speaker 4: they built the Auditorium, They built the Michael Carroll Track
Speaker 4: and Field stateum at Iupoi. They built a velodrome off
Speaker 4: of thirty eighth in cold Spring. They turned Eagle Creek
Speaker 4: into a world class rowing course.
Speaker 2: The investment on those facilities culminated with Indianapolis hosting the
Speaker 2: US National Olympic Festival, a showcase tournament for athletes between
Speaker 2: summer Olympics years, in nineteen eighty two. Later, in nineteen
Speaker 2: eighty seven, Indianapolis hosted the Pan American Games, becoming just
Speaker 2: the second US city to host the tournament, along with
Speaker 2: Chicago in nineteen fifty nine. Nowadays, Indianapolis is home base
Speaker 2: for several major amateur sports governing bodies like USA Gymnastics,
Speaker 2: USA Track and Field, USA Diving, and the NCAA Lucas
Speaker 2: Oil Stadium even hosted the US Swimming Trials this year.
Speaker 2: But at some point, as Hudnut and the movers and
Speaker 2: shakers in Indianapolis were eyeing becoming the amateur sports capital
Speaker 2: of the world, a greater ambition took hold. How about we,
Speaker 2: Indianapolis take the momentum we've created by investing in sports
Speaker 2: and become an NFL city.
Speaker 13: You could just see it was on an upper course
Speaker 13: because they had people back then, the David Fricks and
Speaker 13: mayorhad net that they realized that the drawing power and
Speaker 13: again the national clout that that sports can give can
Speaker 13: give a city, can give an area community.
Speaker 2: In the late nineteen seventies, Indianapolis had plenty of football fans.
Speaker 2: They were just fans primarily of the Cincinnati Bengals, who
Speaker 2: played two hours to the southeast, or the Chicago Bears,
Speaker 2: who played three hours to the northwest. It was similar
Speaker 2: to the mix of Reds and Cubs fans the city
Speaker 2: still has.
Speaker 13: To this day.
Speaker 11: There was a climber for people wanted it that this
Speaker 11: was a football town, just didn't have a football team.
Speaker 2: Indianapolis was known to the NFL back then too. Robert
Speaker 2: Welch who lost the nineteen seventy five mayoral election to
Speaker 2: Bill Hudnutt, was on then bistioner Pete Rosell's radar by
Speaker 2: the late nineteen seventies. The Indianapolis Star reported in April
Speaker 2: of nineteen seventy eight that Welch, along with a handful
Speaker 2: of other businessmen, were in contact with the NFL. Sources
Speaker 2: told the Star that if a stadium were built in Indianapolis,
Speaker 2: the chances the city would get an NFL franchise would
Speaker 2: be very good, and quote a bubbletop stadium would make
Speaker 2: them nearly one hundred percent. In May nineteen seventy eight,
Speaker 2: Welch hosted several NFL owners, team presidents, and general managers
Speaker 2: at the Indy five hundred. Among the league's dignitaries were
Speaker 2: the Chicago Bears George Hallis and the Dallas Cowboys Tech Shram,
Speaker 2: both of whom rode in the pre race celebrity parade
Speaker 2: around the track. Shram told The Indie Star after the race,
Speaker 2: quote Indianapolis certainly exhibits all the ingredients for an NFL
Speaker 2: franchise city. It's a great sports town with great leadership.
Speaker 2: But those ingredients had to come together in the form
Speaker 2: of a new stadium. Indianapolis in nineteen seventy eight didn't
Speaker 2: have anything close to the kind of venue required to
Speaker 2: house an NFL team, and.
Speaker 4: You had to make the investment. You couldn't have him playing.
Speaker 2: Butler bull rubbing elbows and making grand promises with some
Speaker 2: of the NFL's most influential decision makers. Was not going
Speaker 2: to get Indianapolis an NFL team. More importantly, for Indianapolis
Speaker 2: to build a stadium that could attract a franchise, someone
Speaker 2: or Someone's had to secure the funding. That meant getting
Speaker 2: some money from private investors, of course, but it also
Speaker 2: meant needing funding from the two words every citizen and
Speaker 2: politician dreads, new taxes. And this is where the stories
Speaker 2: of the Indiana Pacers and Bill Hudnut's vision for the
Speaker 2: city converged to create an environment where the city of
Speaker 2: Indianapolis could build a domed stadium without any guarantee of
Speaker 2: having an NFL tenant. Hudnut in nineteen seventy nine was
Speaker 2: re elected in a landslide, winning just under seventy five
Speaker 2: percent of the vote to earn a second term as
Speaker 2: mayor of Indianapolis, with the city not only supporting its
Speaker 2: low own top flight sports team, the Pacers, but also
Speaker 2: its mayor. Hudnutt embarked on his most aggressive initiative as mayor, and.
Speaker 6: I'm elected to the second term in nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 2: Hudnutt, who died in twenty sixteen, did an interview in
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen with WFYI, Indianapolis's NPR and PBS station.
Speaker 6: Right after that election, I convened a small group of people,
Speaker 6: movers and shaker types from the Chamber of Commerce basically
Speaker 6: and said we're on We're on a trail for a
Speaker 6: football team, and in order to do that, we've got
Speaker 6: to get a stadium. And in order to get a stadium,
Speaker 6: we've got to get the money.
Speaker 2: After directing investments into facilities with the goal of making
Speaker 2: Indianapolis the amateur sports capital of the world, Hudnutt turned
Speaker 2: his sites to building another world class facility, a sixty
Speaker 2: thousand seat domed stadium built as an extension of the
Speaker 2: Indiana Convention Center, but really as a way to attract
Speaker 2: an NFL franchise. The plan was not universally well received.
Speaker 2: Debbie Knox, the longtime Indianapolis news reporter for WISH TV,
Speaker 2: arrived in nineteen eighty, right as the plan to build
Speaker 2: a Hoosier Dome was being hatched.
Speaker 7: When they first started talked about building the dome and
Speaker 7: and all that sort of thing, and you're.
Speaker 8: Kind of like, yeah, right, okay, you don't have a team.
Speaker 7: Really, you know, what's this going to look like.
Speaker 8: There was some resistance to that because it was going
Speaker 8: to cost money and people were going to have to contribute,
Speaker 8: you know, tax dollars and things like that.
Speaker 2: So here's what Hudnut and the movers and shakers were
Speaker 2: up against. They wanted to build a stadium using public money,
Speaker 2: with the goal, but not the guarantee, of attracting an
Speaker 2: NFL team. Imagine if Indianapolis never wound up getting the
Speaker 2: Colts and then got passed over when the NFL expanded
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety five, the Hoosier Dome would have hosted stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah's sure, but it would have been a political disaster
Speaker 2: for Hudnut team.
Speaker 6: Of course, if we hadn't gotten a team, this was
Speaker 6: the big risk for me politically. It would have been
Speaker 6: Hudnut's white elephant and what an idiot spending eighty million
Speaker 6: dollars of taxpayer money, which was not true, in order
Speaker 6: to build a giant taj Mahal where nobody was doing anything.
Speaker 6: As we used to say at the time, I didn't
Speaker 6: think about the political risk too much then because I
Speaker 6: thought it was just a great idea and no guts,
Speaker 6: no glory.
Speaker 2: The plan was hatched to fund the stadium through an
Speaker 2: eight figure donation from the Lilliandowment, as well as five
Speaker 2: million dollars from the Kranart Foundation, and crucially, a one
Speaker 2: percent tax on food and beverages sold in Marion County.
Speaker 2: Think back to the early days of the Luger administration
Speaker 2: before UNIGOV, when downtown Indianapolis had just a couple of restaurants.
Speaker 2: Fifteen years later, the investment in downtown, headlined by Market
Speaker 2: Square Arena and the Convention Center, led to restaurants and
Speaker 2: bars opening up all over downtown Indianapolis. Those establishments then
Speaker 2: could become a vehicle for the city's most ambitious downtown project.
Speaker 4: Yet we had a reason to come downtown again. There
Speaker 4: was activity downtown, and with the building of Market Square Arena,
Speaker 4: guess what happened. People were coming downtown for concerts and
Speaker 4: patience games and the rodeo and hockey, and they needed
Speaker 4: a place to eat, and suddenly we had restaurants.
Speaker 2: The city was able to raise the requisite funds about
Speaker 2: eighty million dollars, and in the spring of nineteen eighty
Speaker 2: two broke ground on construction of the Hoosier Dome. Crucially,
Speaker 2: the Hoosier Dome would be located in downtown Indianapolis, just
Speaker 2: like Market Square Arena and the Convention Center, and not
Speaker 2: in some farmland out by the IFO sixty five loop.
Speaker 2: At a time when plenty of professional sports teams and
Speaker 2: major American cities were eyeing expansive stadium locations outside their
Speaker 2: city center, Indianapolis squeezed their dome into a parcel of
Speaker 2: land between the existing Convention Center to the west and
Speaker 2: north and train tracks to the south.
Speaker 11: Mayor hut Nut and the movers and shakers were very
Speaker 11: smart by getting the state eump downtown. It would have
Speaker 11: been so much different if they would moved it like
Speaker 11: many other cities forty five minutes away or thirty minutes away.
Speaker 11: By putting it downtown and betting on the comm that
Speaker 11: something was going to happen, really, without that forethought, I
Speaker 11: don't know if any of this happened.
Speaker 2: And by connecting the Hoosier Dome to the Convention Center.
Speaker 2: Hudnutt was able to pitch the stadium not just as
Speaker 2: a destination for the NFL, but as a way for
Speaker 2: Indianapolis to attract bigger conventions, bigger events, and ultimately more
Speaker 2: people to its rapidly growing downtown.
Speaker 6: And at the end of the day, we'd raised eighty
Speaker 6: million dollars. So we embarked on an eighty million dollar
Speaker 6: project not as a freestanding facility out in the cornfields,
Speaker 6: but as an expansion of the convention Center, and we
Speaker 6: were able to book a lot of new convention business
Speaker 6: in and enhance our competitive position there. Regardless of whether
Speaker 6: we've gotten the team.
Speaker 2: Hudnut in the business community were always confident they would
Speaker 2: be able to get an NFL team. The expectation was
Speaker 2: the NFL would view Indianapolis as an ideal destination for
Speaker 2: an expansion franchise. Late in nineteen eighty one, hudnut in
Speaker 2: Indianapolis Chamber of Commerce chairman Thomas Moses formed a civic
Speaker 2: committee to pitch the NFL on expanding to Indy. The
Speaker 2: Indianapolis Star report on the committee included this line, which read,
Speaker 2: quote NFL expansion is expected in nineteen eighty two, probably
Speaker 2: by two teams. Hud Nutt emphasized Indianapolis had to put
Speaker 2: forth a strong bid to beat out several other cities,
Speaker 2: including Memphis, Jacksonville, Phoenix, Birmingham, Alabama, Portland, Oregon, and Honolulu.
Speaker 2: What those cities didn't have, though, was a state of
Speaker 2: the art facility for a team to move into Indianapolis
Speaker 2: by building the Hoosier Dome. Before getting a team would
Speaker 2: have that. They already pushed a new tax through, meaning
Speaker 2: there wouldn't have to be any political wrangling for a
Speaker 2: new facility to be built. That put Indianapolis at an advantage.
Speaker 2: But NFL expansion was complicated by an ongoing anti trust
Speaker 2: suit between the NFL and the Raiders, who moved from
Speaker 2: from Oakland to Los Angeles against the league's wishes in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty two. That litigation had to be put to
Speaker 2: bed before the NFL would consider adding any more teams. Eventually,
Speaker 2: the Raiders did prevail in court they could move to
Speaker 2: Los Angeles. That would turn out to eventually be good
Speaker 2: news for the city of Indianapolis, as it cleared a
Speaker 2: barrier for teams looking to relocate, like a few years later,
Speaker 2: the Baltimore Colts, but in that moment, it changed the
Speaker 2: NFL's tune about expansion, throwing cold water on Indianapolis's hopes
Speaker 2: of getting a team in the near future. When ground
Speaker 2: was broken on the Hoosier Dome in the spring of
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty two, the city of Indianapolis absolutely anticipated the
Speaker 2: NFL would expand in the next few years. But on
Speaker 2: January twenty ninth, nineteen eighty three, the Indianapolis News reported
Speaker 2: that NFL Commissioner Pete rosell said, quote expansion because of
Speaker 2: the legal uncertainty and today's climate is not paramount with
Speaker 2: the NFL today. Roselle's reasoning for putting expansion on hold,
Speaker 2: the Indianapolis News reported, was the prospect of Congress passing
Speaker 2: legislation that would prevent another Raiders situation, where a club
Speaker 2: relocates without the league's authorization. Roselle said, quote, we have
Speaker 2: to be sure that the teams we award to expansion
Speaker 2: cities stay put. In June of nineteen eighty three, Dan Rooney,
Speaker 2: the president of the Pittsburgh Steelers and a member of
Speaker 2: one of the league's most influential ownership groups, came to
Speaker 2: Indianapolis to tour the Hoosierdom. He told the Indianapolis News
Speaker 2: the city's bid for an expansion NFL franchise was quote
Speaker 2: on hold, pointing again to the ongoing Raiders suit. He
Speaker 2: praised Indianapolis's efforts, though, but he mentioned five other cities
Speaker 2: that were also vuying for a team, Phoenix, Memphis, Birmingham, Jacksonville,
Speaker 2: and Montreal, Canada.
Speaker 3: We knew we were taking a bit of a risk.
Speaker 10: I don't remember very well though, exact conversations about BT
Speaker 10: Roselle's decision, but Bob Welch had been encouraged by all.
Speaker 3: The owners of the Bears, the owners of.
Speaker 10: Pittsburgh and several other franchises, that we will get this done.
Speaker 10: But you know, it was never over until it was
Speaker 10: we had a deal.
Speaker 2: In the same news article, Robert Welch expressed confidence Indianapolis
Speaker 2: would still get an NFL team, maybe as soon as
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty five, but he also pitched the Hoosier Dome
Speaker 2: as a host to big time college football games as
Speaker 2: well as the home of the Indiana high school football playoffs.
Speaker 2: By the summer of nineteen eighty three, the Hoosier Dome,
Speaker 2: which was still under construction, had already booked two big
Speaker 2: time games, a preseason NFL game between the Chicago Bears
Speaker 2: and Buffalo Bills in August of nineteen eighty four and
Speaker 2: a Notre Dame versus Purdue College contest that September. And
Speaker 2: to be fair, the Hoosier Dome's ability to host things
Speaker 2: other than an NFL team was part of its appeal.
Speaker 2: That multipurpose use was a significant part of the pitch
Speaker 2: to citizens from cities leadership.
Speaker 7: It was sold, it was sold hard, it was sold effectively.
Speaker 7: That was all part of it.
Speaker 8: Look at we've got this big extra space we're going
Speaker 8: to have and the firefighters are going to come in
Speaker 8: and you know, different groups, and this is going to
Speaker 8: be great for the convention center.
Speaker 7: And that was obviously part of the whole selling point too.
Speaker 7: And it was true.
Speaker 8: I mean, they could use that space for that sort
Speaker 8: of thing. So they think they knew that was what
Speaker 8: they had to say, and it was true. You know,
Speaker 8: that's how that space could be used. It made it
Speaker 8: easier to swallow because people were being asked. I mean,
Speaker 8: there was a tax that was put into place, and
Speaker 8: people you know eating out was going to have to,
Speaker 8: you know, pay.
Speaker 7: For the building of this thing. But yeah, that's exactly
Speaker 7: how it came down.
Speaker 8: And as you sat back, you thought, okay, well that
Speaker 8: makes sense because the football team wasn't there at that point.
Speaker 2: Still, from a political standpoint, you don't build a massive
Speaker 2: dome stadium with public money just to host conventions and
Speaker 2: concerts and events and the occasional novelty of a college
Speaker 2: football or NFL preseason game. While publicly the stadium was
Speaker 2: sold as an expansion of the Convention Center, privately hud
Speaker 2: Nutt knew just how big of a risk he was taking.
Speaker 4: People question, why are you building a stadium when you
Speaker 4: don't have a guarantee of a team to play in it.
Speaker 4: The biggest thing was, you guys are building the state.
Speaker 4: You don't have a team. You don't have a team?
Speaker 3: Are you nuts?
Speaker 4: They were nuts today, very sharp way.
Speaker 13: You don't have so many tractor pulls and concerts for that.
Speaker 13: But it showed you the foresight of the city movers
Speaker 13: and shakers to say, we're going to do whatever we
Speaker 13: can to get a team here.
Speaker 2: While some residents may have grumbled about the construction of
Speaker 2: the who you're doing with public money? This is where
Speaker 2: Hudnut's popularity and politicking skills came into play.
Speaker 7: They just moved ahead. They were bound and determined. So,
Speaker 7: you know, the few voices that there were, you know,
Speaker 7: to stand up to that was pretty tough.
Speaker 8: Because Nut had lined up the business community, Frick cib
Speaker 8: everybody was on board, and I think I think the
Speaker 8: rest of the city was.
Speaker 3: I mean I was.
Speaker 7: I was stunned that that we were going to build
Speaker 7: a who's you're done without? Without a football team? Really,
Speaker 7: you know, what what does that mean? I mean, how
Speaker 7: does that happen?
Speaker 8: He wanted Indianapolis to be on the map. You know,
Speaker 8: it was time for us to do something other than
Speaker 8: you know, a few of our our little, our little
Speaker 8: hotels and you know, we had the Convention Center as
Speaker 8: it was. And he had been around enough, he had
Speaker 8: traveled enough, he had been around, you know, with other
Speaker 8: mayors around the city. He could see what was happening
Speaker 8: and it's like, you know, put up or shut up, folks.
Speaker 8: And he just had that energy, you know, he just
Speaker 8: he was He just embraced people.
Speaker 7: Got he could do that. He could he could manage
Speaker 7: people to get on his side.
Speaker 8: And I think that's what he did because people were
Speaker 8: on board and once that Who's Your Dome was built?
Speaker 3: Man, it was.
Speaker 4: We were cool.
Speaker 2: Even as the city's hopes of landing an NFL team
Speaker 2: in the near future it looked to be diminishing. Construction
Speaker 2: of the Hoosier Dome continued.
Speaker 12: When Bob and I first came down to interview for
Speaker 12: this job, it was probably February of eighty three.
Speaker 2: Tom Griswold is the longtime host of The Bob and
Speaker 2: Tom Show, which has been broadcast from Indianapolis for over
Speaker 2: forty years.
Speaker 12: And we were stating at the Downtown Hyatt and I
Speaker 12: didn't know anything about the city, and I remember looking
Speaker 12: on my window and there was this big hole in
Speaker 12: the ground and the walls were going up on this
Speaker 12: big thing that would of course become the Hoosier Dome.
Speaker 12: And we, of course had no idea that behind the scenes,
Speaker 12: some very very clever and smart people were putting together
Speaker 12: a situation that would make it appealing to a team
Speaker 12: like the Coals to move here.
Speaker 2: The pillowy roof of the Hoosier Dome was inflated in
Speaker 2: August of nineteen eighty three. Construction of the interior of
Speaker 2: the stadium continued that fall and into nineteen eighty four
Speaker 2: the East coast, there was chatter that the Baltimore Colts,
Speaker 2: who had been rumored to be on their way out
Speaker 2: of Baltimore for years by this point, could consider Indianapolis
Speaker 2: as a destination to relocate. Jim irsay Now, the owner
Speaker 2: and CEO of the Colts, remembers admiring the city's bold
Speaker 2: play from afar.
Speaker 14: And Indy just did something which is unheard of. Is
Speaker 14: they built a new stadium and back then a dome stadium,
Speaker 14: which there are very few of. Ah, and they didn't
Speaker 14: have a team, you know, I mean, it's like what But.
Speaker 2: While Indianapolis was known to the NFL for years prior
Speaker 2: to the construction of the Hoosier Dome, there was still
Speaker 2: this thought of Indianapolis, really that's an NFL city. Rick
Speaker 2: Venturrey was an assistant coach on the Baltimore Colts in
Speaker 2: the summer of nineteen eighty three when he drove his
Speaker 2: family from Baltimore back to his hometown of Pekin, Illinois.
Speaker 15: And of course, you know, we came right through Indianapolis
Speaker 15: on seventy We came right through it. And I remember
Speaker 15: turning around to my eleven year old son Jason and
Speaker 15: pointing to the Hoosier Dome, which was vacant, and I said, man,
Speaker 15: would this be a great place for a USFL team.
Speaker 2: Even locally, the thought of actually becoming an NFL city
Speaker 2: was a bit disorienting for Indianapolis residents.
Speaker 8: What they were selling hard is how great a thing
Speaker 8: this was going to be for the city of Indianapolis.
Speaker 8: I think a lot of people were just kind of
Speaker 8: like stunned. It's like, we're going to.
Speaker 7: Be an NFL city.
Speaker 8: I mean, we don't even have a Major League baseball team.
Speaker 8: I mean we did have the pacers and stuff, but it.
Speaker 7: Was kind of like stunned.
Speaker 2: This is all a backdrop, though, to just how gutsy
Speaker 2: the plan was to build the Hoosier Dome. Maybe it
Speaker 2: could have succeeded financially by hosting conventions, concerts, and a
Speaker 2: few neutral psych college football games, but politically, for Hudnut,
Speaker 2: if the Hoosier Dome sat vacant on fall Sundays, he
Speaker 2: and everyone else knew it would have been a disaster.
Speaker 2: But the venture to build the Hoosier Dome wasn't just
Speaker 2: a risky thing to do, as the cities movers and
Speaker 2: shakers saw it, It was the right thing to do
Speaker 2: in tandem with the rest of the growth of downtown Indianapolis.
Speaker 3: You know, we knew we had to create this because
Speaker 3: we didn't have seashore, we didn't have mountains. But we had.
Speaker 10: An incredible work ethic to an incredible group of folks
Speaker 10: that said, we're going to build a city that will
Speaker 10: will be attractive and that people will respect and want
Speaker 10: to come be a part of.
Speaker 3: And that's happened.
Speaker 2: And so as the Hoosier Dome neared its completion early
Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty four, Indianapolis went on the offensive. Specifically,
Speaker 2: they went on the offensive with Robert Arsay, the owner
Speaker 2: of the Baltimore Colts, who had a clandestine visit to
Speaker 2: Indianapolis earlier in the decade about moving his team to
Speaker 2: America's heartland. The only problem, all those cities that like
Speaker 2: Indianapolis were vying for an NFL expansion team, Well, they're
Speaker 2: also trying and to lure the Colts out of Baltimore.
Speaker 2: In January of nineteen eighty four, the Associated Press reported
Speaker 2: the Colts had a handshake deal with state officials in
Speaker 2: Arizona to move out west. Within the Colts offices in
Speaker 2: Owens Mills, Maryland. For at least a couple hours, it
Speaker 2: looked like the team, after years of rumors, was on
Speaker 2: its way to Phoenix. But shortly after the report hit,
Speaker 2: Robert or Say called off the deal. He hopped on
Speaker 2: his private jet and flew from Las Vegas to Baltimore,
Speaker 2: where he called a press conference blasting the report. We'll
Speaker 2: get into that moment in next week's episode. For Indianapolis.
Speaker 2: Though the door was open, the city of Baltimore and
Speaker 2: the entire NFL were resigned to the Colts relocating at
Speaker 2: some point in the near future.
Speaker 13: It's not like Indy was the number one choice of
Speaker 13: Bob Ursa. I think they were close to going to
Speaker 13: Arizona to Phoenix. I really do. Indy became playan B
Speaker 13: when Plan A didn't work. But I still believe that
Speaker 13: had certain things fallen together, then a Indy wouldn't have
Speaker 13: gotten a team.
Speaker 2: According to The Indie Star, two days after Ursay's infamous
Speaker 2: press conference, Herb Simon, who had purchased the Indiana Pacers
Speaker 2: a year prior, along with businessman Tom Shine, overheard NFL
Speaker 2: owners discussing the possibility of the Colts moving while turning
Speaker 2: down Arizona's overtures Simon and Shine pitched, according to the paper,
Speaker 2: Baltimore people on the Hoosier Dome and the rapid growth
Speaker 2: of Indianapolis, which boasted a vibrant downtown and over seven
Speaker 2: hundred thousand residents within the city's borders. A few weeks later,
Speaker 2: Shine confirmed that the Colts would not be going to Phoenix,
Speaker 2: and according to The Star, on February eighth, nineteen eighty four,
Speaker 2: Mayor Hudnut committed to getting the Colts to move to
Speaker 2: his city. Two weeks later, he directed his deputy mayor
Speaker 2: and chief negotiator, David Frick, to quote, go for it
Speaker 2: with gusto.
Speaker 13: Yeah, that's why I said. I don't think there was
Speaker 13: a lot of build up to this. It was sort
Speaker 13: of like, Okay, all of a sudden, a late comer
Speaker 13: to the dance is Indianapolis. And again, fortunately they had
Speaker 13: done the groundwork to be ready for that day when
Speaker 13: it came.
Speaker 2: Frick and Nick Franzel, a local banking executive and former
Speaker 2: owner of the NHL's Pittsburgh Penguins, began negotiations with the Colts.
Speaker 2: Hunn Up began working with his neighbor John B. Smith,
Speaker 2: who happened to be the CEO of Mayflower to make
Speaker 2: arrangements on how to move the Colts if Robert Ursay
Speaker 2: decided to pack up for Indianapolis. On February twenty third,
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty four, Frick flew Robert or Say to Indianapolis
Speaker 2: for another clandestine visit. This time, he was ushered to
Speaker 2: the brand new facility the city hoped his team could
Speaker 2: call home.
Speaker 4: They brought him in for a secret tour of the
Speaker 4: Hoosier Dome and guess what had just been installed? The
Speaker 4: blue seats, and Barber Say walked in and went, you
Speaker 4: did this for me. I've used this word so many times.
Speaker 4: It characterizes that moment, and a Karen characterizes the Indianapolis
Speaker 4: Sports Initiative serendipity. It was serendipity that the Colts, that
Speaker 4: Bob Ursay would walk in and see Colts blue seats
Speaker 4: that had been ordered long before the Colts ever knew
Speaker 4: that they were going to be in Indianapolis.
Speaker 2: Frick told The Indianapolis Star in twenty fourteen that it
Speaker 2: was in that moment he realized Indianapolis was not just
Speaker 2: a bargaining chip for the Colts to get a better
Speaker 2: deal in Baltimore or somewhere else they were a real
Speaker 2: player to land the team. On March sixth, the Colts
Speaker 2: sent another delegation to Indianapolis. This time it was jim
Speaker 2: Irsay and then head coach Frank Kush.
Speaker 14: And you know, frank'syche God Jimmy for you know, well,
Speaker 14: for a hell's sake, we got and moved to Arizona
Speaker 14: because Frank was from Arizona. You call your mom and
Speaker 14: let her convince. I go, Frank, my mom's not going
Speaker 14: to decide this. I mean, for God's sakes. I mean, yeah,
Speaker 14: it's ridiculous. It's just she has nothing to do with
Speaker 14: it is his decision, you know.
Speaker 4: Oh, come on, ja man, we gotta move here.
Speaker 6: So I called my dad in the morning. Dad, Frank
Speaker 6: and I are in Indianapolis.
Speaker 15: What do we do?
Speaker 12: Now?
Speaker 4: What are you doing in Indianapolis?
Speaker 6: What the hell is going on? I go, you told
Speaker 6: me to go to.
Speaker 14: Indianapolis with Frank Kush right around five o'clock in the afternoon.
Speaker 4: And he goes, oh, okay, I'll call you.
Speaker 13: Back, Hudnut.
Speaker 2: That spring, flew to Honolulu for the NFL owners meetings,
Speaker 2: where Ursa was not in attendance, but he did pitch
Speaker 2: other league owners on Indianapolis as a destination for the NFL.
Speaker 2: But when Hudnaut arrived back in Indianapolis on March twenty first,
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty four, he saw a wire report that the
Speaker 2: Colts would stay in Baltimore for nineteen eighty four. It
Speaker 2: wasn't true. Robert Ursay told him the next day. The
Speaker 2: Colts were still willing to move. Specifically, they were still
Speaker 2: willing to move to Indianapolis. But the Colts had been
Speaker 2: willing to move before, and this situation was incredibly volatile.
Speaker 2: They had been on the edge of their cliff in
Speaker 2: Baltimore for a while. Now what they and the city
Speaker 2: of Indianapolis needed was someone or something to make them
Speaker 2: take the leap. Which brings us to the night of
Speaker 2: March twenty eighth, nineteen eighty four. We'll tell the story
Speaker 2: of that fateful night, a knight that made an indelible
Speaker 2: mark on two cities. On episode three of The Move
Speaker 2: May Fly, Skim.
Speaker 15: Clears his throat like you always did in those days.
Speaker 15: He always cleared his throat before he delivered. And I'll
Speaker 15: never forget it what he said. He said, Okay, man,
Speaker 15: he goes. The deal has been done. We're moving to
Speaker 15: Indianapolis tonight. The trucks will be here at eleven.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're stealing stuff, right, and lew because it was
Speaker 3: mass Chao.
Speaker 11: The last person out, the very last person that was
Speaker 11: gentleman by the name of Walter Kotasking.
Speaker 4: Walter was the p architector and he out and I'm
Speaker 4: paraphrase and.
Speaker 11: Said, guys, don't stay that a cold They're gone and
Speaker 11: anything closed again, and that was it.
Speaker 16: If you pick a city outside the NFL San Antonio,
Speaker 16: you tend to think less because they don't have an
Speaker 16: NFL team. Now that's completely irrational, it's completely ridiculous, but
Speaker 16: we all do it. And so when Indianapolis shows up,
Speaker 16: you're like, how can they They're not an NFL city,
Speaker 16: how can they? How can they take this team?
Speaker 17: The story of how the Colts picked up and moved
Speaker 17: in the middle of the night will be told on
Speaker 17: episode three of The Move. The episode will be released
Speaker 17: on July eighth. Subscribe to the Colts Audio Network to
Speaker 17: download episode one of The Move, which was released last week.
Speaker 17: Episode two of The Move was written and narrated by
Speaker 17: JJ Stankowitz and produced by Casey Valier amber Daro Dave
Speaker 17: Knickerbocker and Matt Taylor contributed with research and editing.
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