1953 Baltimore Colts season

The 1953 Baltimore Colts season was the first season for the second Colts franchise as a member club of the National Football League (NFL). The Colts had a record of 3 wins and 9 losses and finished fifth in the Western Conference for the year.

The Baltimore Colts of the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) were one of three teams merged with the NFL in 1950, despite having suffered a woeful 1–11 season in 1949. Adding complexity to the prospects of a team with an obvious talent shortage, as the odd 13th team in the league the Colts were given a round-robin schedule in 1950, meeting every team but the Chicago Bears one time and allowed a standard home-and-away relationship only with the neighboring Washington Redskins.

A predictable debacle ensued, with the Colts again going 1–11 in 1950. Amidst a sea of red ink, the original AAFC Colts shut down operations, with the team's players distributed to the other 12 teams of the league via the 1951 NFL draft.

There would be no professional football in Baltimore during the 1951 and 1952 seasons.

With the original Dallas Texans franchise a major financial failure in their one and only season in Dallas, by the end of 1952 it became clear that a new 12th team would be needed by the NFL. On December 8, 1952, a drive to "Bring Back the Colts" was launched in Baltimore, with headquarters located at Baltimore Memorial Stadium. Doors were thrown open at 9 am and by midnight more than $25,000 towards the purchase of season tickets was pledged. This amount was matched on Day 2 and again on Day 3; at the end of six weeks more than $300,000 for 15,0000 season tickets was pledged, with over 99% of this figure ultimately collected.

This show of enthusiasm drew attention around the country and proved decisive. In January 1953, a Baltimore-based group led by Carroll Rosenbloom won the rights to a new Baltimore franchise to begin play later that year.

Rosenbloom's group was awarded the remains of the Texans organization, including the rights to its players. Among these players were future Hall of Fame defensive linemen Gino Marchetti and Art Donovan, who would comprise a nucleus for the new Colts franchise. Rosenbloom chose the blue and white color scheme used by the original Dallas Texans, while appropriating the bucking-horse-with-football logo used by the original AAFC Baltimore Colts franchise.

Despite using the Texans' colors and many of their players, the Colts did not and never have reckoned themselves as a continuation of the Texans franchise or their predecessors, the Boston/New York Yanks/Bulldogs. Likewise, the NFL reckons the Colts as a 1953 expansion team.