St. Louis Cardinals (NFL)
From 1960 to 1987, the professional American football team now known as the Arizona Cardinals played in St. Louis, Missouri, as the St. Louis Cardinals.
The team moved from Chicago to St. Louis in 1960, and played their first home game there on October 2 at Busch Stadium against the New York Giants. Their last home game in St. Louis, played at Busch Memorial Stadium on December 13, 1987, was also against the Giants. Their last game as a St. Louis–based club was on December 27, 1987, at the Dallas Cowboys.
During the Cardinals' 28 years in St. Louis, they advanced to the playoffs just four times, and never hosted a playoff game. Their only postseason win came in the 1964 Playoff Bowl.
Their winning percentage of during their time in St. Louis—187 victories, 202 losses, and 13 ties—is better than those in the other two cities the Cardinals have called home.
The team moved to Tempe, Arizona, in 1988.
1947–1973
In 1947, Chicago Cardinals owner Charles Bidwill died, leaving the team to his wife Violet. Two years later, she married St. Louis businessman Walter Wolfner.The Cardinals won the NFL championship in 1947, and narrowly missed defending it in 1948. However, they would have only two more winning seasons in the next 11 years. By the end of the 1959 season, the Cardinals barely even registered on Chicago's sports scene, and were seemingly on an irreversible slide toward bankruptcy. The Wolfners reluctantly decided to cede Chicago to their bitter rivals, the Bears, and move elsewhere.
A move to Walter's hometown of St. Louis appeared to make sense. The NFL examined St. Louis, and concluded that it could support a team. However, it insisted that the Wolfners pay a stiff relocation fee. Needing cash for the fee, and additional capital in any event, the Wolfners considered offers from various out-of-town investors. Among the suitors were Texas oil magnates Lamar Hunt and Bud Adams, Denver minor league baseball owner Bob Howsam, and Minneapolis Lakers part-owner Max Winter. In every case, negotiations foundered when the Wolfners insisted on maintaining controlling interest.
In response, Hunt and Adams joined forces with several other businessmen, including Howsam and Winter, to found the American Football League. Suddenly faced with a serious rival, the NFL quickly came to terms with the Wolfners, engineering a deal that allowed them to move to St. Louis for the 1960 season. This not only avoided the embarrassment of losing one of the NFL's oldest franchises, but locked the upstart league out of St. Louis.
1960s
On March 13, 1960, the league's 12 owners unanimously approved the Cardinals' move to St. Louis, ending the team's 62-year history and 40 NFL seasons in Chicago. In addition to the NFL's blessing, the Bidwills sought permission from the long-established baseball team in their new city to share the "Cardinals" nickname. Other cities had hosted football teams that copied the local baseball team's name, but the Cardinals were the only American team with a long-established nickname that moved to a city where another major sports franchise coincidentally had the same long-established name and kept it.During the Cardinals' tenure in St. Louis, they were locally called the "Big Red", the "Football Cardinals", or "the Gridbirds" in order to avoid confusion with the baseball team.
The Cardinals played in the original Busch Stadium as tenants of the baseball team. St. Louis had not had a professional football team since the early days of the NFL. For decades, the NFL had demanded a modern stadium as a condition for returning to the city. Busch Stadium had been built in its final form in 1909, and had not been well maintained from the 1930s until the baseball Cardinals bought it in 1953z However, the prospect of competition with the AFL compelled them to approve the Cardinals' move in exchange for a pledge to eventually build a new venue. In the meantime, the football Cardinals would be playing for at least a few years in a stadium that was barely suitable even for temporary use. Busch Stadium was not designed for football, and had poor and outdated infrastructure. In particular, parking was virtually nonexistent. It was also located in a neighborhood that had already gone to seed. Moreover, the baseball team had priority for scheduling. Under these circumstances, tickets proved difficult to sell. The Cardinals initially held practices in the city park. In 1961, they finished.500 at 7–7, but after the NFL had expanded to a 14-game season to compete with the upstart AFL, the team fell to 4–9–1 in 1962. Although improving to 9–5–0 in 1963, the Cardinals failed to reach the playoffs, a loss to the Giants kept them out of the NFL title game.
The Cardinals were competitive for much of the 1960s. New stars emerged in Larry Wilson, Charley Johnson, Jim Bakken, Sonny Randle, and Jim Hart. Violet Bidwill Wolfner died in 1962, and her sons, Bill and Charles, Jr. took control. Although the Cardinals made a good account of themselves in their first decade in St. Louis, they never won their conference, a prerequisite for playing in the NFL championship game during this decade. In those days, the conference champions advanced directly to the championship game, with no playoff round.
In 1964, the Cardinals got off to a good start, going undefeated in their first four games, their only blemish being a 33-33 tie against the Cleveland Browns. However, the Cardinals were then forced to play what was supposed to be their home opener against the Baltimore Colts at Memorial Stadium when their landlords reached the World Series. Under the terms of their lease, the football Cardinals could not use Busch Stadium until the baseball Cardinals' season was finished. They lost to the Colts 47-27 in Baltimore. The defeat in the extra road game proved painfully decisive as while St. Louis finished 9–4–1 and second in the Eastern Conference a victory by the Browns over the New York Giants denied them a championship berth by a mere half game. The team finished the year with a Playoff Bowl win over the Packers by a score of 24-17 to finish third place. At the time, it was the franchise's only postseason win in St. Louis; it has since been retconned as an exhibition game.
By 1964, the Bidwills were disappointed with the progress of the new downtown stadium and considered moving the team to Atlanta. St. Louis city leaders provided some incentives, which combined with groundbreaking at a new stadium later that year persuaded them to stay. While the football team would continue to be tenants in the new facility, they received better lease terms. Furthermore, the new venue was a "cookie-cutter" multipurpose stadium, considered state-of-the-art at the time and designed from the outset to readily accommodate both baseball and football. The new stadium would eventually be completed in 1966 and be named Busch Memorial Stadium after the owner of the baseball team. A new expansion team, the Falcons of the NFL, was eventually created for Atlanta and began play in 1966, while a different St. Louis team would move to Atlanta: the NBA Hawks in 1968.
A 4–1–0 start to the 1965 season evaporated into a 5–9–0 finish. Starting quarterback Charley Johnson struggled most of the season with a shoulder injury and defensive leader Larry Wilson missed games with broken hands.
In 1966, the Cardinals had a new head coach in Charley Winner. They were in first place in the Eastern Conference with a 7-1–1 record, but Johnson suffered a season-ending injury against the Giants and the Cardinals lost four of their last five games leaving them out of the playoffs. The 1966 season saw the debut of first-round draft pick Johnny Roland who gained 908 yards from scrimmage and was named NFL Rookie of the Year.
In 1967, Johnson was summoned to active duty in the Army. This opened the door for Jim Hart who was signed as an undrafted free agent out of Southern Illinois University the previous season. Hart threw for over 3000 yards and 19 touchdowns in 1967, but the team finished with six wins, seven losses, and one tie.
Meanwhile, the NFL expanded to four divisions. It also eschewed one-game playoffs as tiebreakers in favor of pro football's first guaranteed multi-game postseason scheme. Under the second season of the new format, the Cardinals won on the road against the Cleveland Browns to give them a critical advantage under the newly-devised tiebreakers. However, a tie against the woeful Pittsburgh Steelers eventually ensured the Cardinals would miss the playoffs. St. Louis still beat Cleveland at home to complete the season sweep and end the year with a 9–4–1 mark, which was better than two other NFL playoff teams but a half game behind the Browns.
St. Louis fell back to 4–9–1 in 1969, but that season saw the debut of Roger Wehrli, a star safety at the University of Missouri who played 14 seasons for the Cardinals and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2007.
Early 1970s
In 1970, the NFL and AFL completed their merger, and the Cardinals were placed in the new NFC East division. They posted three consecutive shutouts in November, blanking the Oilers, Patriots, and the Cowboys, the latter a 38–0 victory on Monday Night Football in the Cotton Bowl. But St. Louis collapsed down the stretch, losing December games to the New York Giants, Detroit Lions, and Washington Redskins to finish 8–5–1 and out of the playoffs. The Cardinals then regressed to three consecutive 4–9–1 seasons from 1971 to 1973. Bill Bidwill became sole owner in 1972; he would own the team until his death in 2019. Only the New York Giants and Chicago Bears have been in the hands of one family longer than the Cardinals.Head Coach Bob Hollway was fired after consecutive 4-9-1 seasons in 1971 and 1972. 1972 season; he was replaced the following year by Don Coryell, who had built a powerhouse program at San Diego State.