K.S. “Bud” Adams, the second-generation oil magnate who brought professional football to Houston in 1960 and, three decades later, spirited it away to Tennessee, has died. He was 90.
The passing was first reported by Brent Zwerneman of Hearst News Services. A source said early indications are Adams’ death was of natural causes, but the source stressed the “early indications” aspect.
Adams will be remembered as one of the city’s earliest sports magnates as owner of the Oilers and a member of the so-called “Foolish Club” that, along with Dallas millionaire Lamar Hunt, created the upstart American Football League, and as one of the early investors in the Houston Sports Association group that brought the Colt .45s to Houston in 1962. His Oilers won the first two AFL titles in 1960 and 1961 and lost to Hunt’s Dallas Texans for the 1962 title.
But he also became in the minds of many a controversial, divisive figure who battled with city officials and fellow owners from the 1960s through the 1990s and, eventually, took his team and left town.
He was preceded in death by less than 72 hours by the man with whom he will be linked forever in Houston sports annals, former Oilers coach Bum Phillips. Adams fired Phillips as Oilers coach in December 1980, ending the Oilers’ “Luv Ya Blue” and earning, among some Houston sports fans, everlasting enmity.
That enmity among some was enforced in the 1980s when he threatened to move the Oilers to Jacksonville, Fla., unless Harris County officials increased seating in the Astrodome, which they did by ripping out the stadium’s signature scoreboard.
In the 1990s, still chaffing at his tenant’s status at the Astrodome, he campaigned for a city-funded stadium but was opposed by Mayor Bob Lanier. With that, he turned to Nashville Mayor Phil Bredesen, who crafted a city-supported stadium plan that led to the Oilers’ departure from Houston after the 1997 season. The Oilers became the Tennessee Titans and advanced to Super Bowl XXXIV in January 2000, accomplishing in their third season in Tennessee what they could never accomplish in Houston.
