Rest in peace, and thank you, Jim!
Like many of you, longtime Indianapolis Colts team owner Jim Irsay, who passed away earlier this week at the age of 65-years-old, was the only owner I’ve ever really known for my favorite team—having assumed ownership of the franchise back in 1997.
As such, I wanted to take a bit of time to reflect on his saddening passing before writing.
Jim Irsay had his fair share of personal demons, especially having battled addiction earlier in this life, but by all accounts, he was a kind, generous, and quirky soul, who preferred to be regarded as more of a ‘steward’ of the Colts franchise than some sort of snooty owner.
He came with his own eccentricities, especially as it related to collecting rare musical artifacts or even more recently, starting his own band, ‘The Jim Irsay Band,’ that made him a bit of a ‘rock star’ compared to some of his fellow team owner colleagues. His goal was to help share these historic musical pieces and his band’s music, featuring legendary rock ‘n roll icons, with the general public through traveling showings and concerts.
(As a random aside, I was interning with the Indiana Sports Corp during Super Bowl XLVI and volunteered as an ‘usher’ for the Jim Irsay rock ‘n roll collection at the Indiana State Museum, I held a door open for Jim Irsay, and he said thank you!)
When you hear all of the heartfelt stories since his passing about his giving—and giving when he wasn’t even obligated to, and it’s easy to understand that what Irsay gave to the Indianapolis community and state of Indiana was far more than just a pro football team.
Former Colts All-Pro punter, turned mainstream ESPN personality Pat McAfee estimated it was around $100 million, but given that Irsay preferred to remain anonymous from paying for hospital stays to paying for funerals to assisting with education tuitions, and who really knows what that total charitable number is for sure. I’m guessing potentially a lot more.
Not to mention, his franchise’s ‘Kicking the Stigma’ initiative has raised funding and awareness for mental health, which has saved lives for an issue that’s far too often overlooked.
I’ll say this much, I didn’t know him personally, but I’ll still miss him greatly.
He wasn’t perfect, and admittedly made his fair share of mistakes as Colts owner (the ‘Star Wars numbers’ post-Peyton Manning comments; sticking with former general manager Ryan Grigson and head coach Chuck Pagano arguably too long out of a sense of loyalty, trying to be the furthest thing from his father, who previously made brash, impulse fires; and most recently, hiring former All-Pro center Jeff Saturday as an interim head coach).
However, he was incredibly passionate about this franchise and its fans—and wanted to win.
There’s some NFL owners who operate their squads more like a revenue generating business than a football franchise trying to consistently win Super Bowls.
I never got that sense from Jim Irsay.
Ordinarily, he would let his football guys run the show whether it was Bill Tobin or Hall of Famer Bill Polian, and it was only recently, when those football guys weren’t getting the winning results that he so desperately wanted, that Irsay began intervening a bit more.
I don’t know of any other NFL owner who has weekly Twitter cash and ticket giveaways in-season, a one million dollar annual regular season schedule predicting contest, and tried his damned near best to endear himself to the ‘every-fan.’ I didn’t even get to his musical lyrics!
With billionaire colleagues like Bob Kraft, Arthur Blank, and Jerry Jones, etc., he was one of the OGs of the modernized NFL owners. He was incredibly well known and respected league-wide. He was also the first NFL owner to publicly admonish former Washington Commanders embattled team owner Dan Snyder to concede ownership of his team—which took some obvious courage.
He kept the Colts in Indianapolis, even when there was national speculation that the franchise could move to Los Angeles before the Rams and Chargers eventually moved many years later—if Indianapolis could not agree to build a new NFL stadium to transition from the RCA Dome.
That insistence on keeping the Colts home in Indianapolis led to the eventual building of world-class Lucas Oil Stadium, which has hosted a Super Bowl, NCAA Final Fours, U.S. Olympic Swimming Trials, and musical stars such as Taylor Swift and Billy Joel. Raising hundreds of millions of revenue for the city long-term. That doesn’t happen without him.
It’s not that Jim Irsay didn’t know football either. He grew up around the game because his father owned the Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts. He served as a locker room attendant and worked his way up the latter, so that he could understand every level of the organization.
He brought in Hall of Fame general manager Bill Polian in 1998.
He insisted on drafting future Hall of Famer Peyton Manning that same year, despite the arguably flashier top QB prospect regarding Ryan Leaf at the time.
When Indianapolis needed to get defensive, he made a ‘big boy’ hire by bringing in yet another future Hall of Famer, former Tampa Bay Bucs ‘Cover 2’ maestro Tony Dungy, which all three men were instrumental in bringing the Colts to a 2006 Super Bowl Championship.
Honestly, one of my most saddening thoughts (although much less than the void his family members and close friends will assuredly feel) is that Jim Irsay wasn’t able to win another Lombardi Trophy before passing away peacefully earlier in his sleep last week.
He wanted to win so bad again.
Although he was noticeably diminished in his physical appearance, having battled a number of recent lingering health issues, it still feels like Irsay was taken away as Colts team owner too soon. His passing wasn’t by any means shocking, but it hits just the same.
That being said, he lived more than a lifetime in those 65 years on this Earth, and his lasting legacy will still be felt for Colts fans long after he’s gone. Rest in peace and thank you, Jim.
