Football IndyStar The Colts have no idea what they're doing - Page 7

oaklandhater · 09-10-2017, 09:23 PM

http://www.indystar.com/story/sports...ing/645793001/

The Colts have no idea what they're doing by Gregg Doyel,

LOS ANGELES – The Indianapolis Colts stink, and not just the players on the field for that 46-9 loss Sunday to the Los Angeles Rams in their 2017 NFL opener. The whole damn franchise stinks, starting with the owner and oozing downhill, as this sort of excrement tends to do.

The front office stinks. The coaching staff. The scouting department. The players? Bless their hearts, yes. The players stink, too.

A loss like this, it goes looking for people to blame and it does not go wanting. The difficulty is deciding where to start. Quarterback Scott Tolzien was terrible, but you don’t start there. Tolzien has been something less than an NFL quarterback for years, and he stayed in character Sunday from his first pass of the game: an interception the Rams returned for a touchdown. He threw a second pick-six, and flirted with a third and a fourth, before being benched for Jacoby Brissett.

Tolzien’s amateurish play Sunday – quarterback rating: 33.8 – was as predictable, if not as uncommon, as a lunar eclipse. Where were General Manager Chris Ballard and coach Chuck Pagano looking this summer when they chose Tolzien over Stephen Morris? Directly into the sun.

OK, that’s not the real answer. The real answer is even dumber.

While Morris was fabulous for a second consecutive year of preseason games, Ballard said last week that the job went to Tolzien because he was better than Morris in offseason OTAs and again in the early practices of training camp. And Pagano on Sunday said he “would never second-guess” that decision, because Chuck Pagano is nothing if not reliably prone to say things that sound blatantly untrue.

No, this loss wasn’t Tolzien’s fault, though he did try to take the blame for it. To his credit, he acknowledged that football “is a team effort, but I certainly want to own this” defeat. To Pagano’s credit, he accepted blame for this loss on multiple occasions, even as he referred to the Rams as "the 49ers." To the credit of star receiver T.Y. Hilton, who fumbled his first catch of the season as he was diving to avoid contact – read that again – he tried to take the blame as well, saying: “I fumbled. It started with me.”

Tolzien’s amateurish play Sunday – quarterback rating: 33.8 – was as predictable, if not as uncommon, as a lunar eclipse. Where were General Manager Chris Ballard and coach Chuck Pagano looking this summer when they chose Tolzien over Stephen Morris? Directly into the sun.

OK, that’s not the real answer. The real answer is even dumber.

While Morris was fabulous for a second consecutive year of preseason games, Ballard said last week that the job went to Tolzien because he was better than Morris in offseason OTAs and again in the early practices of training camp. And Pagano on Sunday said he “would never second-guess” that decision, because Chuck Pagano is nothing if not reliably prone to say things that sound blatantly untrue.

No, this loss wasn’t Tolzien’s fault, though he did try to take the blame for it. To his credit, he acknowledged that football “is a team effort, but I certainly want to own this” defeat. To Pagano’s credit, he accepted blame for this loss on multiple occasions, even as he referred to the Rams as "the 49ers." To the credit of star receiver T.Y. Hilton, who fumbled his first catch of the season as he was diving to avoid contact – read that again – he tried to take the blame as well, saying: “I fumbled. It started with me.”

Colts QBs Scott Tolzien and Jacoby Brissett talk to the media after the team's 46-9 loss to the Rams. Matt Kryger/IndyStar

Who’s right? They’re all right. A loss like this, a loss in need of a mercy rule given that one team belonged in Little League, it’s too heavy for any single set of shoulders. It falls on offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski, who called two goal-line rushes, power running plays, with his power back – Robert Turbin – on the sideline. And after those two carries by home-run threat Marlon Mack resulted in a loss of 1 yard, Chud put in Turbin … and called for Tolzien to throw it. Rams cornerback Trumaine Johnson, who delivered the pick-six on the Colts’ first pass of the game, might’ve had another had he hung onto this amateurish toss by Tolzien.

This loss also falls on defensive coordinator Ted Monachino, who either chose converted safety T.J. Green to start and play most of the game at cornerback – or yielded that decision to Pagano, when what Monachino should have done was offer to resign before letting someone as lousy as T.J. Green undermine his defense.

And make no mistake: T.J. Green is lousy. Moved from safety midway through the preseason because all he'd consistently done there since last season was miss tackles and deliver cheap shots, Green missed a tackle early in the second quarter when Rams running back Todd Gurley was fighting for extra yardage near the goal line. With Gurley’s entire body as a target, Green went for a cheap shot – he targeted Gurley’s head – but glanced off Gurley’s helmet, allowing the Rams running back to fall forward, into the end zone for a touchdown.

Oh, and Green was in coverage on Rams receiver Cooper Kupp’s 18-yard TD catch that gave the Rams a 24-3 lead. At the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Kupp ran the 40-yard dash in 4.62 seconds. Green ran it in 4.34 seconds. On the touchdown in question, Kupp was wide open because he was running away from Green.

Don’t ask me to explain that. Still can’t believe I saw it.

Can’t believe what happened on the Colts’ second series, either, after Tolzien completed a short pass to Marlon Mack and Mack sprinted toward the end zone. When 5-8, 190-pound Rams safety Lamarcus Joyner approached near the goal line, he nudged the 5-11, 210-pound Mack pushed out of bounds. It was a soft play by Mack, a play the Colts have become famous for in recent years as their blowout losses have mounted – and then it became something much worse.

Because Chuck Pagano didn’t challenge the official ruling that Mack was pushed out of bounds before reaching the end zone.

No, Pagano was too busy hurrying his next play onto the field – a power rush that Chudzinski gave to speed back Marlon Mack, who had just demonstrated that power is not his thing. With the Rams unable to substitute, Pagano was looking for a personnel mismatch, and he found one: His personnel was outmatched.

Pagano outsmarted himself, the only NFL coach I’ve ever seen him outsmart, and afterward said that whole sequence was on him.

And it was. But other sequences were on the defense, which put almost no pressure on Rams quarterback Jared Goff (career-best 117.9 quarterback rating) and allowed multiple Rams receivers to run wide open. The defense has been completely remade from the Colts’ 2016 opener, literally 11 new starters, which means that’s on the general manger who put the unit together. And his name isn’t Ryan Grigson.

The Colts offensive line, meanwhile, allowed four sacks and nine quarterback hits in a game where they attempted just 21 passes. It was this past week when Pagano had decided “I’ve never felt better about an offensive line,” but again, that’s what he does: He says things that simply don’t sound honest. Pushed on that piece of Pollyanna a few days ago, Pagano doubled down:

“Never felt better,” he said again. “You guys can write it. You can put it on the record and hold it to me.”

Done. And now let's move on and remember what Colts owner Jim Irsay had said this summer about the biggest problem of the Andrew Luck era: his lack of protection.

“I’m telling you,” Irsay said in June, “the offensive line is fixed.”

I'm telling you something else: The people who run this team, from the owner on down, have no idea what they’re seeing, saying or doing.

Pasta Little Brioni · 09-12-2017, 07:22 AM

Ballard has proven nothing so far....yet CP was frightened by him going to the Colts

crashcourse · 09-12-2017, 07:35 AM

45-44

LaDexter · 09-12-2017, 08:12 AM

It all starts with pass protection. The Colt OL was wonderful for the beginning of Peyton's career. It has been lacking for Luck.

**RealSNR** · 09-12-2017, 01:15 PM

Oh hey. Look what time it is!

It's time for a much-heralded QB draft class next spring as proclaimed by draft gurus.

Oh... that sucks you were really bad this year, Colts! Bummer, man! Well, here's the #1 overall pick. I'll bet a TON of teams would pay a lot to get their hands on that. Well isn't that just splendid for you!

Oh, you had the #1 overall in 2012? That featured a pretty good QB, didn't it?

And 1998?

Well, I guess you're just lucky!

**RealSNR** · 09-12-2017, 01:18 PM

If the Colts get the #1 overall this year, the NFL should just make them forfeit that pick. Everybody moves up a slot. Colts can begin drafting when they reach the 2nd round.

That's some mother****ing bullshit if they get it.

**kysirsoze** · 09-12-2017, 01:31 PM

Shoulda signed Kaep. Still should judging by what we're hearing about Luck's status.

ChiefsCountry · 09-12-2017, 01:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RealSNR

Oh hey. Look what time it is!

It's time for a much-heralded QB draft class next spring as proclaimed by draft gurus.

Oh... that sucks you were really bad this year, Colts! Bummer, man! Well, here's the #1 overall pick. I'll bet a TON of teams would pay a lot to get their hands on that. Well isn't that just splendid for you!

Oh, you had the #1 overall in 2012? That featured a pretty good QB, didn't it?

And 1998?

Well, I guess you're just lucky!

And 1983.

tredadda · 09-12-2017, 03:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RealSNR

Oh hey. Look what time it is!

It's time for a much-heralded QB draft class next spring as proclaimed by draft gurus.

Oh... that sucks you were really bad this year, Colts! Bummer, man! Well, here's the #1 overall pick. I'll bet a TON of teams would pay a lot to get their hands on that. Well isn't that just splendid for you!

Oh, you had the #1 overall in 2012? That featured a pretty good QB, didn't it?

And 1998?

Well, I guess you're just lucky!

Don't forget 1983 as well.

Hoover · 09-12-2017, 03:21 PM

Hey, lets not forget 1983

Hoopsdoc · 09-12-2017, 05:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kysirsoze

Shoulda signed Kaep. Still should judging by what we're hearing about Luck's status.

Kap can be good if he has a coach like Harbaugh who will Taylor his offense to Kaps strengths. He needs a team with a good run blocking O-line.

Colts have neither the coaching or the personnel to succeed with Kap.

He would be no better than Tolzien, IMO.

Hoopsdoc · 09-12-2017, 05:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Pueblo Chieftan

I think Andrew Luck is good, but overated, I'd like to know in what world you think he's the "Nexxt Great One" lmao

31 td's, 4200 yards, 96 qb rating last year.

He's not overrated. He may be broken due to injury but when he plays he's a top 10 quarterback, if not top 5.

RunKC · 09-12-2017, 06:03 PM

It wouldn't shock me at all to see Jim Harbaugh come back to the NFL and coach Luck again.

**notorious** · 09-12-2017, 06:06 PM

What are the odds of Indy just luckily being bad when there is a huge draft coming the following year?

Will this be the 3rd time in a row that just happens to coincide with a generational QB talent?

**** them. I hope Irsay gets a bad hit of heroin.

**wazu** · 09-12-2017, 06:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hoopsdoc

Kap can be good if he has a coach like Harbaugh who will Taylor his offense to Kaps strengths. He needs a team with a good run blocking O-line.

Colts have neither the coaching or the personnel to succeed with Kap.

He would be no better than Tolzien, IMO.

Kaep was good last year with garbage coaching, surrounded by garbage players.

BryanBusby · 09-12-2017, 07:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hoopsdoc

Kap can be good if he has a coach like Harbaugh who will Taylor his offense to Kaps strengths. He needs a team with a good run blocking O-line.

Colts have neither the coaching or the personnel to succeed with Kap.

He would be no better than Tolzien, IMO.

That's reeruned. Kaep is absolutely better than Tolzien and Chud is smart enough to retool the Offense around him.

The Colts are a stupid franchise.

09-10-2017, 09:23 PM
oaklandhater future chiefs fans Join Date: Jan 2004 Location: oakland california Casino cash: $7598993	IndyStar The Colts have no idea what they're doing http://www.indystar.com/story/sports...ing/645793001/ The Colts have no idea what they're doing by Gregg Doyel, LOS ANGELES – The Indianapolis Colts stink, and not just the players on the field for that 46-9 loss Sunday to the Los Angeles Rams in their 2017 NFL opener. The whole damn franchise stinks, starting with the owner and oozing downhill, as this sort of excrement tends to do. The front office stinks. The coaching staff. The scouting department. The players? Bless their hearts, yes. The players stink, too. A loss like this, it goes looking for people to blame and it does not go wanting. The difficulty is deciding where to start. Quarterback Scott Tolzien was terrible, but you don’t start there. Tolzien has been something less than an NFL quarterback for years, and he stayed in character Sunday from his first pass of the game: an interception the Rams returned for a touchdown. He threw a second pick-six, and flirted with a third and a fourth, before being benched for Jacoby Brissett. Tolzien’s amateurish play Sunday – quarterback rating: 33.8 – was as predictable, if not as uncommon, as a lunar eclipse. Where were General Manager Chris Ballard and coach Chuck Pagano looking this summer when they chose Tolzien over Stephen Morris? Directly into the sun. OK, that’s not the real answer. The real answer is even dumber. While Morris was fabulous for a second consecutive year of preseason games, Ballard said last week that the job went to Tolzien because he was better than Morris in offseason OTAs and again in the early practices of training camp. And Pagano on Sunday said he “would never second-guess” that decision, because Chuck Pagano is nothing if not reliably prone to say things that sound blatantly untrue. No, this loss wasn’t Tolzien’s fault, though he did try to take the blame for it. To his credit, he acknowledged that football “is a team effort, but I certainly want to own this” defeat. To Pagano’s credit, he accepted blame for this loss on multiple occasions, even as he referred to the Rams as "the 49ers." To the credit of star receiver T.Y. Hilton, who fumbled his first catch of the season as he was diving to avoid contact – read that again – he tried to take the blame as well, saying: “I fumbled. It started with me.” Tolzien’s amateurish play Sunday – quarterback rating: 33.8 – was as predictable, if not as uncommon, as a lunar eclipse. Where were General Manager Chris Ballard and coach Chuck Pagano looking this summer when they chose Tolzien over Stephen Morris? Directly into the sun. OK, that’s not the real answer. The real answer is even dumber. While Morris was fabulous for a second consecutive year of preseason games, Ballard said last week that the job went to Tolzien because he was better than Morris in offseason OTAs and again in the early practices of training camp. And Pagano on Sunday said he “would never second-guess” that decision, because Chuck Pagano is nothing if not reliably prone to say things that sound blatantly untrue. No, this loss wasn’t Tolzien’s fault, though he did try to take the blame for it. To his credit, he acknowledged that football “is a team effort, but I certainly want to own this” defeat. To Pagano’s credit, he accepted blame for this loss on multiple occasions, even as he referred to the Rams as "the 49ers." To the credit of star receiver T.Y. Hilton, who fumbled his first catch of the season as he was diving to avoid contact – read that again – he tried to take the blame as well, saying: “I fumbled. It started with me.” Colts QBs Scott Tolzien and Jacoby Brissett talk to the media after the team's 46-9 loss to the Rams. Matt Kryger/IndyStar Who’s right? They’re all right. A loss like this, a loss in need of a mercy rule given that one team belonged in Little League, it’s too heavy for any single set of shoulders. It falls on offensive coordinator Rob Chudzinski, who called two goal-line rushes, power running plays, with his power back – Robert Turbin – on the sideline. And after those two carries by home-run threat Marlon Mack resulted in a loss of 1 yard, Chud put in Turbin … and called for Tolzien to throw it. Rams cornerback Trumaine Johnson, who delivered the pick-six on the Colts’ first pass of the game, might’ve had another had he hung onto this amateurish toss by Tolzien. This loss also falls on defensive coordinator Ted Monachino, who either chose converted safety T.J. Green to start and play most of the game at cornerback – or yielded that decision to Pagano, when what Monachino should have done was offer to resign before letting someone as lousy as T.J. Green undermine his defense. And make no mistake: T.J. Green is lousy. Moved from safety midway through the preseason because all he'd consistently done there since last season was miss tackles and deliver cheap shots, Green missed a tackle early in the second quarter when Rams running back Todd Gurley was fighting for extra yardage near the goal line. With Gurley’s entire body as a target, Green went for a cheap shot – he targeted Gurley’s head – but glanced off Gurley’s helmet, allowing the Rams running back to fall forward, into the end zone for a touchdown. Oh, and Green was in coverage on Rams receiver Cooper Kupp’s 18-yard TD catch that gave the Rams a 24-3 lead. At the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Kupp ran the 40-yard dash in 4.62 seconds. Green ran it in 4.34 seconds. On the touchdown in question, Kupp was wide open because he was running away from Green. Don’t ask me to explain that. Still can’t believe I saw it. Can’t believe what happened on the Colts’ second series, either, after Tolzien completed a short pass to Marlon Mack and Mack sprinted toward the end zone. When 5-8, 190-pound Rams safety Lamarcus Joyner approached near the goal line, he nudged the 5-11, 210-pound Mack pushed out of bounds. It was a soft play by Mack, a play the Colts have become famous for in recent years as their blowout losses have mounted – and then it became something much worse. Because Chuck Pagano didn’t challenge the official ruling that Mack was pushed out of bounds before reaching the end zone. No, Pagano was too busy hurrying his next play onto the field – a power rush that Chudzinski gave to speed back Marlon Mack, who had just demonstrated that power is not his thing. With the Rams unable to substitute, Pagano was looking for a personnel mismatch, and he found one: His personnel was outmatched. Pagano outsmarted himself, the only NFL coach I’ve ever seen him outsmart, and afterward said that whole sequence was on him. And it was. But other sequences were on the defense, which put almost no pressure on Rams quarterback Jared Goff (career-best 117.9 quarterback rating) and allowed multiple Rams receivers to run wide open. The defense has been completely remade from the Colts’ 2016 opener, literally 11 new starters, which means that’s on the general manger who put the unit together. And his name isn’t Ryan Grigson. The Colts offensive line, meanwhile, allowed four sacks and nine quarterback hits in a game where they attempted just 21 passes. It was this past week when Pagano had decided “I’ve never felt better about an offensive line,” but again, that’s what he does: He says things that simply don’t sound honest. Pushed on that piece of Pollyanna a few days ago, Pagano doubled down: “Never felt better,” he said again. “You guys can write it. You can put it on the record and hold it to me.” Done. And now let's move on and remember what Colts owner Jim Irsay had said this summer about the biggest problem of the Andrew Luck era: his lack of protection. “I’m telling you,” Irsay said in June, “the offensive line is fixed.” I'm telling you something else: The people who run this team, from the owner on down, have no idea what they’re seeing, saying or doing.
Posts: 23,762

09-12-2017, 07:22 AM	#91
Pasta Little Brioni Consuming CP souls Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: U.S.A. Casino cash: $3968880	Ballard has proven nothing so far....yet CP was frightened by him going to the Colts __________________ **Official TFWdemB Trivia Commisioner**
Posts: 68,554

09-12-2017, 07:35 AM	#92
crashcourse Starter Join Date: Sep 2016 Location: tucson Casino cash: $7860400	45-44
Posts: 529

09-12-2017, 08:12 AM	#93
LaDexter Starter Join Date: Jun 2016 Casino cash: $10000400	It all starts with pass protection. The Colt OL was wonderful for the beginning of Peyton's career. It has been lacking for Luck.
Posts: 722

09-12-2017, 01:31 PM	#96
kysirsoze SNAP THE ****ING BALL!!! Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: KCMO Casino cash: $3746946	Shoulda signed Kaep. Still should judging by what we're hearing about Luck's status.
Posts: 11,295

09-12-2017, 03:21 PM	#99
Hoover Rufus Dawes Jr. Join Date: Aug 2000 Casino cash: $1648179	Hey, lets not forget 1983
Posts: 17,353

09-12-2017, 06:03 PM	#102
RunKC Andy Reid Supporter Join Date: Apr 2012 Casino cash: $2239611	It wouldn't shock me at all to see Jim Harbaugh come back to the NFL and coach Luck again. __________________ Mike Greenberg@Espngreeny I can’t fathom what it must be like to be a fan of the #Chiefs. Adopt a Chief: Noah Gray
Posts: 46,085

09-12-2017, 06:06 PM	#103
notorious Supporter Join Date: May 2005 Location: Who knows? Casino cash: $2915884	What are the odds of Indy just luckily being bad when there is a huge draft coming the following year? Will this be the 3rd time in a row that just happens to coincide with a generational QB talent? **** them. I hope Irsay gets a bad hit of heroin.
Posts: 83,382