The 1977

Baltimore Colts The Baltimore Colts were a professional American football team that played in Baltimore from its founding in 1953 to 1984. The team now plays in Indianapolis, as the Indianapolis Colts. The team was named for Baltimore's history of horse breed ...

season A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...

was the 25th season for the team in the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...

(NFL). Led by third-year head coach

Ted Marchibroda Theodore Joseph Marchibroda (March 15, 1931 – January 16, 2016) was an American football quarterback and head coach in the National Football League (NFL). He spent his four years as an active player with the Pittsburgh Steelers (1953, 1955&nd ...

, the Colts finished with 10 wins and 4 losses, tied for first in the AFC

East East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fa ...

division with the

Miami Dolphins The Miami Dolphins are a professional American football team based in the Miami metropolitan area. They compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member team of the league's American Football Conference (AFC) East division. The team pla ...

. The Colts had the tiebreaker over Miami based on better conference record (9–3 to 8–4), and the Dolphins missed the

playoffs The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...

. This was the final playoff appearance for the Colts as a Baltimore-based franchise (their next came ten years later in

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, k ...

, by which time the team moved to

Indianapolis Indianapolis (), colloquially known as Indy, is the state capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the seat of Marion County. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the consolidated population of Indianapolis and Marion ...

). Baltimore's next playoff team was the

Ravens Ravens may refer to: * Raven, a species of the genus ''Corvus'' Sports * Anderson Ravens, the intercollegiate athletic program of Anderson University in Indiana * Baltimore Ravens, a professional American football franchise * Benedictine Ravens, ...

2000 File:2000 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Protests against Bush v. Gore after the 2000 United States presidential election; Heads of state meet for the Millennium Summit; The International Space Station in its infant form as seen from ...

, winners of

Super Bowl XXXV Super Bowl XXXV was an American football game between the American Football Conference (AFC) champion Baltimore Ravens and the National Football Conference (NFC) champion New York Giants to decide the National Football League (NFL) champion for ...

Offseason

Colts' owner

Robert Irsay Robert Irsay (March 5, 1923 – January 14, 1997) was an American professional football team owner. He owned the National Football League's Baltimore/Indianapolis Colts franchise from 1972 until his death in 1997. Early life and education Irsay ...

fired general manager Joe Thomas in January 1977, due to a power struggle he was having with head coach

. The new general manager was former Colts center

Dick Szymanski Richard Frank Szymanski aka “Dick" Szymanski(October 7, 1932 – October 28, 2021) was an American professional American football, football player who was a Center (American football), center for thirteen seasons with the History of the Indian ...

, who was the personnel director and a former scout.

NFL draft

Personnel

Staff

Roster

Regular season

Schedule

Week 1

Lydell Mitchell Lydell Douglas Mitchell (born May 30, 1949) is an American former professional football player who was a running back in the National Football League (NFL) with the Baltimore Colts, San Diego Chargers and Los Angeles Rams from 1972 to 1980. ...

32 Rush, 114 Yds

Week 2 at Jets

Week 3

Week 4

Week 5

Week 6

Week 7

Week 8

Week 9

Week 10

Pro-Football-Reference.com
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Week 11

Week 12

Week 13

Week 14

Standings

Playoffs

Baltimore made it to the AFC playoffs as a No. 2 seed and hosted the defending

Super Bowl The Super Bowl is the annual final playoff game of the National Football League (NFL) to determine the league champion. It has served as the final game of every NFL season since 1966, replacing the NFL Championship Game. Since 2022, the game ...

champion

Oakland Raiders The Oakland Raiders were a professional American football team that played in Oakland from its founding in 1960 to 1981 and again from 1995 to 2019 before relocating to the Las Vegas metropolitan area where they now play as the Las Vegas Raide ...

in the divisional round. The Colts held a 31–28 lead with time running out, when the famous “

Ghost to the Post Ghost to the Post is a significant play in National Football League, NFL history. It refers to a 42-yard pass from Ken Stabler to Dave Casper, nicknamed "The Ghost" after Casper the Friendly Ghost, that set up a game-tying field goal in the final ...

” play to tight end

Dave Casper David John Casper (born February 2, 1952) nicknamed "the Ghost", is an American former football player best known for being a prominent member of the Oakland Raiders in the National Football League (NFL). He was a tight end and also played as ...

advanced the Raiders to the Baltimore 14-yard line, where

Errol Mann Errol Denis Mann (June 27, 1941 – April 11, 2013) was an American football placekicker. He played in the National Football League from 1968 to 1978, and was a member of the Oakland Raiders' Super Bowl XI winning team. When attempting kicks, M ...

kicked the tying field goal to send the contest into overtime. After the first overtime went scoreless, Casper caught a 10-yard touchdown pass 43 seconds into the period to win the game for the Raiders.