RAMS GO FOR GOLD : 11 Years After Losing the Colts, Baltimore Remains on the Sidelines : Franchises: Expansion teams went elsewhere, and the Rams and Buccaneers said no thanks. Some blame NFL Commissioner Tagliabue and Redskins owner Cooke.

This city, which has been wooing the National Football League and team owners since being jilted by its beloved Colts 11 years ago, has been forsaken once more.

Baltimore Buccaneers? Baltimore Rams? Both had a nice ring.

But Malcolm Glazer, who once tried to buy a team for Baltimore, purchased the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Monday and is keeping them in Florida.

Tuesday, the Rams announced they are moving to St. Louis, leaving Baltimore as an also-ran in that race as well.

Baltimore Oriole owner Peter Angelos put in bids of close to $200 million for each team. But the group in charge of selling the Buccaneers ultimately decided to go with an offer that would keep the team in Florida for at least two years and probably beyond. Angelos was unable to make a deal with Ram owner Georgia Frontiere in part because of his desire to eventually gain a controlling interest in the team.

So Baltimore, which was willing to build a state-of-the-art stadium for an NFL tenant, is left on the outside again. It’s another slap in the face to a city where the Baltimore Colts Marching Band still exists even though the team doesn’t.

“At this point, I’ve conditioned myself not to get my hopes up, no matter what I hear,” said Bill Hooper, 39, owner of a Baltimore moving company. “On the surface, no matter how optimistic I was, I braced for the inevitable shaft.”

“If the NFL chooses to slam the door on Baltimore, I will never buy an NFL ticket again,” said Chuck Williams, a Baltimore harbor marine supervisor. “I’d rather watch Dunbar High School play.”

Said George Marcel, a sales trainer: “Some people say they wouldn’t want to take somebody else’s team because they know how it feels. That’s noble, but I’d take the team.”

Gov. William Donald Schaefer, who had made landing an NFL team a mission, had warned Baltimoreans against getting their hopes up this time. His have been dashed before.

Since the Colts left for Indianapolis in the dead of night in March, 1984, the city has repeatedly been denied.

At the end of the 1987 season, Bill Bidwill talked about moving his St. Louis Cardinals to Baltimore. He ended up going to Phoenix.

In August, 1992, Baltimore tried to prove it was worthy of a franchise by filling Memorial Stadium for an exhibition game between Miami and New Orleans. That was the last NFL game held there.

Then came the 1993 expansion sweepstakes, when Glazer and a group led by Angelos both put together impressive bids.

Lo and behold, the NFL chose Jacksonville, Fla., and Charlotte, N.C.

It was a snub Schaefer won’t soon forget.

“There were two sets of rules--one for Baltimore and one for everyone else,” Schaefer said in the days after the decision. “I just wish they would have been honest and told us we didn’t have a chance right from the beginning, instead of having us work really hard for nothing.”

Schaefer has said he believes NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue and Washington Redskins owner Jack Kent Cooke have conspired to keep the league out of Baltimore because Cooke believes a team there would intrude on his market. Both the lack of a completed stadium and the possibility of a conflict with Cooke contributed to the Rams’ decision to look elsewhere.

“As long as Tagliabue is in there, and as long as Jack Kent Cooke is alive, we won’t get a team,” said Tom Goeller, 35, a high school teacher from Ellicott City. “I don’t know what Tagliabue has against Baltimore, but it seems like he just doesn’t want us to have a team.”

“I’m disappointed in the whole scheme of things--that Baltimore wasn’t given a chance and that there’s a conspiracy among the owners and the commissioners,” Jack Giles said Monday as he sipped beer in a downtown bar.

“I don’t believe the theory that only one team can be in the Baltimore-Washington area,” Giles said. “Baltimore can support a team.”

The double failure to land the Rams or Bucs is sure to add to political pressure in Annapolis to de-authorize the bonds and lottery funds set aside to build a stadium, said Maryland Senate President Thomas V. Miller Jr.

“My initial reaction is sorrow,” he said. “It’s a lost opportunity for the state of Maryland to acquire an NFL franchise.”

Sen. John A. Pica Jr., chairman of Baltimore’s delegation in the state Senate, said he would fight any efforts to take the funding away, including mounting a filibuster.

“We shouldn’t give up. We’re not a minor league town. We helped create modern football,” said Pica, an associate in Angelos’ law firm.

But on the eve of his inauguration Tuesday, incoming Gov. Parris N. Glendening declined to say whether he would keep the stadium funds in place.

“We’ll have to decide whether or not there’s a chance for a team,” he said a pre-inaugural reception. “That will be the difference. We’re going to have to sit down and make an assessment whether or not we’re going to get a team.”

Angelos said he was disappointed but held out hope that the Glazer deal for the Buccaneers may not close.

“I’m disappointed and puzzled. We made a better offer than Glazer’s offer, and if there was a slight differential, they knew we could adjust it,” Angelos said.

Closing the sale will require a number of factors, including successful financing and NFL approval.

The Associated Press and Baltimore Sun contributed to this story.