AAFC COLTS | bmoresportsnest

1947-1950 AAFC BALTIMORE COLTS

Baltimore's First Pro Football Team Was Meager at Best

by Rick Benson

When most think of the history of the Baltimore Colts, the team that held that moniker in the old All-American Football Conference from 1947 to 1951 is largely forgotten. Other than the beginning of future Hall of Fame quarterback Y.A. Tittle’s career, the AAFC Colts were largely forgettable; even though Baltimore was not a city home to major league teams. But football—and especially the AAFC---was anything but major league. Football wouldn’t surface as a true national major league sport until the second iteration of the Baltimore Colts won The Greatest Game Ever Played in 1958.

On December 28, 1946 the city of Baltimore was awarded with a professional football team when the bankrupt AAFC franchise, the Miami Seahawks, was purchased and relocated to Baltimore. As the result of a fan contest in Baltimore, won by Charles Evans of Middle River, the team was renamed the "Baltimore Colts". On September 7, 1947, wearing the green and silver uniforms, the Colts, under Head Coach Cecil Isbell, won their initial All-America Football Conference game 16–7, over the Brooklyn Dodgers. Home site for the new AAFC games was the old 1922 Municipal Stadium (also known as Baltimore Stadium or Venable Stadium) on the north side of 33rd Street which would later have an upper deck added in 1954 and become Memorial Stadium.

After giving hope to the newly born Baltimore Colts fan base by winning their first game, the Colts proceeded to lose the next 4 games. The next week the Colts tied the San Francisco 49ers 28-28. A horrific first season was about get worse, as the Colts lost the next 7 games. Hosting Chicago the next week, with a 1-10-1 record hanging over their heads, the Colts earned their second and last win of the 1947 season by beating the Chicago Rockets 14-7. The next week in the season finale at Memorial Stadium, the Colts got shutout by the Cleveland Browns 42-0.

The Colts fared much better in their second season; winning three of their first four games before dropping five of their next six. Victories over the Brooklyn Dodgers and Buffalo Bills to end the season gave Baltimore a 7-8 record and their one and only playoff game—a rematch with the Bills. Despite two touchdown runs by Bus Mertes and 217 passing yards by Tittle, Buffalo scored 21 unanswered points in the fourth quarter and overcame a 17-7 deficit to win 28-17. The Colts regressed in 1949 by starting the season 0-5 before avenging their playoff loss the previous year to Buffalo 35-28 on two fourth quarter Y.A. Tittle touchdown passes. Baltimore then lost their last six games to finish a dismal 1-11 season.

After four years marked by failing franchises and player raids as rival leagues, the AAFC merged with the NFL in 1950. Under new head coach Clem Crowe, Baltimore set league records for defensive futility; allowing 50 or more points in four different games—including a 70-27 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. After finishing 1–11 for the second consecutive year, the Baltimore Colts were dissolved by the league on January 18, 1951, because of its failing financial condition. Many Baltimore fans protested the loss of their team and continued to support the marching band that was trying to re-establish a football team in Baltimore for the next two years, an ironic foreshadowing of what the “Band That Never Died” would be doing for the 12 years that Baltimore would again be without an NFL franchise from 1984-1996.