Go Colts!

I'm trying to make this more of a morning habit. We'll see if it sticks.

For those of you (all two of you who still come here), I'm based in Indianapolis, and for anyone who pays attention, then you know the Indianapolis Colts are in the Super Bowl this weekend. This will be the second time the Colts have made it (well, the Indianapolis Colts anyway), and it is still quite a big deal for the city. I'm not sure what it is like for a city like Chicago or New York to reach the Super Bowl, but even though Indianapolis is the 13th largest city in the country, it still feels small enough that it appears that nearly everyone is wearing blue and cheering on the Colts.

Now, football and I have a weird relationship. I was a marching band nerd all through high school and three years of college, and while that means I spent many fall days occupied "watching" football games, I was always socializing with my friends and waiting until we had to play the fight song or go on for half time. I never got a feeling for the game, and while I know enough to cheer at the proper times, I've just never really been a "fan." Now, there are certain players that I am a fan of, but it has nothing to do with their playing (Tim Tebow, Austin Collie, Brandon Stokley...rawr).

Anyway, so for me, I'm viewing the Colts making the Super Bowl from a different perspective, and it is one that I spew out whenever one of my friends on Facebook decides to do the "I couldn't care less about the game, and you're an idiot if you do" status updates. The fact of the matter is that going to the Super Bowl is great for Indianapolis. You can argue until you're blue (ha) in the face about player salaries and the tax increases we've endured to pay for Lucas Oil Stadium (and the RCA Dome before it), but the fact is that without the Colts, the faltering Pacers, and even the AAA Indianapolis Indians baseball team, Indianapolis might as well be Dayton, OH.

Indianapolis used to be known as NapTown, and frankly, it is one of those monikers that have been hard to shake off. Even when I came here for college in 1993, the downtown was pretty much a ghost town after the business people went home. In the early 80's, Mayor Bill Hudnut, who is one of the few Republicans I really truly respect, pushed through the building of the Hoosier Dome and Convention Center, even though Indianapolis did not have the need for a stadium that size. The goal was to get an NFL team to compliment the Pacers, who were playing in Market Square Arena. The Dome opened in 1984, and oddly, the first event to be held there was the graduation ceremony for IUPUI, which I attended at the age of 9 because my mother was graduating.

Most people who follow sports know what happened next. Bill Hudnut lured the Baltimore Colts to Indianapolis in the middle of the night in the fall of 1984, thus leading to the eternal hatred of Marylanders. Besides all that, the building of the Dome and Convention Center and the Colts arriving in town, really put Indianapolis on the map, and it is then that we started to shake off the NapTown label, which continued through the opening of Circle Center Mall, Conseco Fieldhouse (to replace Market Square Arena), the eventual demolition of the Dome to make way for Lucas Oil Stadium and MORE convention space, and the current building of a Marriott hotel complex that will have more than 1000 rooms when it fully opens in 2011.

All of this comes back to the Colts.

Sure, they pretty much sucked until Peyton Manning was drafted, but I don't think anyone can argue the point that Indianapolis would not be where it is now if Bill Hudnut hadn't take the risk on building the Dome and getting the Colts here (even though the Convention Center is really the jewel). Doubly, it is not too much of a stretch to surmise if that Manning hadn't been drafted, the Colts would have continued to stagnate, and the City and State would not have stuck their necks out to build a new stadium, which would mean we would probably be watching the LA Colts right now. Lucas Oil Stadium lead to more convention space, the Marriott hotel complex, and the 2012 Super Bowl, something we never could have had without all of those pieces in place.

You may hate sports. You may totally hate player salaries. You may hope for a day that people fill stadiums to witness artistic endeavors, but you cannot deny that without the Indianapolis Colts, we would not be at the point that there are art installations all over downtown, the Indianapolis Cultural Trail, and many other burgeoning art possibilities. Indianapolis revived its downtown beginning in 1984, and this is why I have my Colts jersey on today. This is why I am interested in the outcome of Sunday's game. Sure, I can appreciate that the rest of the country is cheering for New Orleans for sentimental reasons, but even if the Colts lose, I will be happy that they made it this far and continue to make people realize that Indianapolis is not NapTown anymore.