Horseshoe Huddle

#BringTYHome Helped Bring T.Y. Hilton Home

Wide receiver T.Y. Hilton saw the hashtag #BringTYHome trending on Twitter, and it influenced his decisions to return to the Colts.
Jake Arthur|
#BringTYHome Helped Bring T.Y. Hilton Home
#BringTYHome Helped Bring T.Y. Hilton Home

It's easy for fans to feel helpless when their favorite players are in danger of leaving their team in free agency.

After all, you have no influence. What can you do?

Start a movement, apparently.

Last weekend, the hashtag #BringTYHome began trending over Twitter among Indianapolis Colts fans and even Hilton's Colts teammates in an effort to convince the Colts brass to do whatever it took to make sure that free-agent wide receiver T.Y. Hilton did not leave the team.

Within a few days, the fans' plea worked, and Hilton agreed to return to the Colts on a one-year deal.

"Oh, absolutely," Hilton told The Pat McAfee Show on Thursday about if the hashtag influenced his decision to accept the Colts' contract offer to return to the team.

"That played a big factor, man," Hilton continued. "Just seeing it, seeing the songs, seeing the tweets. I mean, it was awesome. I listened to every last one of 'em, and it just was incredible, the love that this city has for me, man. It definitely touched me in a major way."

Hilton told McAfee just how close he was to accepting a different offer from the Baltimore Ravens, which literally came down to the final minutes.

"True story, no bull," Hilton said. "I prayed about it about 12 o'clock (Wednesday afternoon). I'd been texting Chris Ballard the whole. By 2:30, I'm like, 'Man, by 3 o'clock I'm signing somewhere. Wherever it's at, I'm signing.' (At) 2:55 I got off the phone with Chris and I'm like, 'Are we gonna get this done? How can we get this done?' He came up with a number and I'm like, 'Alright, it's alright. I guess it's meant for me to go to this next team.'

"As soon as I close his (Ballard) message, Irsay texted me," Hilton continued. "I said, 'There goes my sign right there.' When he texted me, that's when we got it done. When he texted me, we got it done... It was awesome. He just told me that it was a great deal and hopefully, we could get it done. I told him the number that I wanted, and they got to it, right then and there, and the deal got done."

This isn't the first time that Colts fans and players used a Twitter hashtag to let their feelings be known about bringing back one of their own.

Following the 2016 season when then-head coach Chuck Pagano's contract was up, the hashtag #ChuckStay circulated and Pagano was ultimately signed to a contract extension.

Did the hashtag have anything to do with it? Who knows, but those in charge were given a clear, loud message about how many fans and players felt.

As for Hilton and #BringTYHome, whether or not he plays beyond this one-year contract and finishes his career in Indianapolis, he knows just how much he and the fans mean to each other.

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Jake Arthur
JAKE ARTHUR

Jake Arthur is the co-deputy editor of Indianapolis Colts on SI and has covered the NFL and the Indianapolis Colts for a decade. He is a member of the Professional Football Writers of America (PFWA), and his works have been featured on SBNation, MSN, Yahoo, and Bleacher Report. He has also contributed to multiple NFL Draft guides and co-hosts the Locked On Colts podcast.

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