Jim Speros, the owner of Baltimore's CFL team, said he has abandoned hopes of getting his trademark case against the NFL heard in Maryland and will decide in the next 10 days whether to drop the matter altogether.

Speros wants to name his team the Baltimore CFL Colts, harking back to the days when the NFL Colts played in Baltimore. But the NFL and its now-Indianapolis Colts say they own the name.

A Baltimore-based federal judge turned down his request to hear the matter and ordered it merged with a court action initiated by the NFL in Indianapolis. Speros has thus far fared poorly in that case: The NFL won a temporary order earlier this summer barring the CFL team from using Colts, a decision that was upheld on appeal.

"I'm not encouraged about going back to Indiana," Speros said pTC yesterday at a Memorial Stadium news conference.

He said he and CFL officials would be meeting shortly to decide whether to go through with the trial in Indianapolis, now scheduled for Dec. 5.

"We're at the point now with our last stand," Speros said.