Where do we stand at midseason?
 

Listening to Kevin Bowen, this morning, he, once again, pronounced that the Colts are in the midst of a rebuilding effort. I'm not sure how he defines rebuilding, but I thought that looking at the state of the roster at the midpoint of the season might be worthwhile.

QB) Even though he only played parts of 4 games, I'm pretty much convinced that, in Anthony Richardson, the Colts have found their franchise Quarterback of the future. Every time he takes the snap from Center, you expect magic to happen.

RB). Simply put, there isn't a better RB in the National Football League than Jonathan Taylor. Given the prospect that Zack Moss will depart for greener pastures, the Colts will probably find themselves in a position of shopping for a running mate for him come next year’s draft.

WR). In Pittman and Downs, the Colts have two quality pieces at Wide Receiver, The third WR, Pierce remains something of a mystery largely because he has a Quarterback who A...isn't able to buy time enough for vertical passing routes to develop and B)...doesn't have the arm talent to task a Defense. The bottom line is that the team has no one who can stretch a Defense, get open deep, and make opposing Defensive Coordinators lose sleep, searching for ways to stop him. It's a major need, and one you'd hope to see Ballard address before the end of the draft.

TE). Granson, Ogletree, Mallory, and Woods are all intriguing players, but somewhere down the line, one of them needs to step up and prove that he can be more than a complementary piece of the puzzle. Finding the next Travis Kelce or Rob Gronkowski might not be at the top of Ballard's to do list; but, if no one on the current roster shows signs of breaking out, it has to be a priority.

OL). In Raimann and Braden Smith, the Colts have a pair of solid bookend Tackles. If you're into analytics, Ryan Kelly is the best Center in the game. Q is an elite Guard...when healthy, and Will Fries is settling very nicely intp the RG slot.

DL). While I'm not sure that Buckner and Stewart are the absolute best DT combo in the league, I am pretty sure that there are few better. At DE, Paye, Odeyingbo, and Ebukam would each be a nice piece if they were lined up at the other end of a line anchored by Nick Bosa or Micah Parsons. All three of those guys are work hard, plug away types who are never going to remind you of a Dwight Freeney or Robert Mathis. As far as I'm concerned, when Draft Day 2024 opens, there is no higher priority than a quick twitch, high intensity DE like Jared Verse of FSU.

LB). The trio of Leonard, Franklin, and Speed aren't going to embarrass you, and none of them can be described as a weak link. Zaire Franklin is a prolific defender when healthy. Ej Speed can be dynamic, but you wonder if his pass rushing skills aren't wasted in Gus Bradley's scheme. And, for whatever reason...recovery from injury or a change of scheme...Shaq Leonard isn't the same player who came into the league. I can't be sure of the reason, buy maybe he should think about going back to being Darius.

DB). Going into this season, Ballard was determined to throw a group of young Corners into the fire and see how they held up. On some level, it was a solid plan. Unfortunately, suspensions and injury have left Kenny Moore adrift on a sea of mediocrity. The good news is that Ballard got good results from Dalis Flowers, Kenny Moore, and Juju Brents. Taken together, they should provide a good foundation to build on. At Safety, Blackmon is solid.

So what your almost saying is, we are in rebuilding year 7.

When I think of rebuilding teams, I think of tearing the roster down to the beams and foundation and starting over from scratch. that’s not the Colts. I think that, with a healthy Richardson, this team would have made the playoffs. I think that, with 2 or 3 more players, they’re a legit championship contender.

The biggest issues are pass rush and CB. I know people want MHJ or some other freak WR, but the three we have would work with AR, but the defense has to be able to get off the field. They started the season off looking like they would be able to, but the CB room has been decimated, and Grover went and drank from the stupid fountain. I am hopeful that they return to form when they are all back on the field together, and we have a solid group to build on in the draft. i am thinking we get the BPA on defense, unless teams do something dumb like passing on MHJ. Like was said above, we need a stud pass rusher added, or a shutdown corner to add to the mix with out first pick. Depth with BPA the rest of the draft. The future looks brighter today than any time since the Rivers year.

I agree 100%. Great teams can rush the passer. Which in turn makes your secondary not as susceptible. Fix the trenches and we’re a legit contender.


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right on

defense needs some fucking juice to it. we have buckner and that is it. grover is a really good nt. depth on the dline is bad. we need a dynamic de to get the pass rush going. paye and ebukam are good pieces but not great. need a couple more corners. Moore is not under contract after this year i believe. our safeties are just guys.

we clearly need a dude that is elite at wr. and i would say fuck the defense to get that guy in rd 1 if he is there. making sure AR has the tools to be great should be top priority.

outside of an elite wr, this draft can be all defense imo. late round interior line help is always a good idea but other than that, this defense needs a lot of attention.

The list reads like a wishlist. Sure its great to have a franchise QB and the best RB in the league, and a solid o-line, but now we also want a star deep threat receiver and the next Kelce at TE and the next Freeney at DE?

It's really just not realistic to expect a HoF level player in each sub group.

The offense is largely fine, though of course continuing to add bodies to the RB and WR group will be a need, but it likely won't be a high investment type need unless we end up in a position to get Marv Jr (most likely we won't).

The defense needs the investment.

Its starting to shape up that the strength of this class is WR, CB and DE. Although DE and CB do not have high end guys at the top like usual. I mean guys that have to go in the top five. Why a lot of team are trading for assets. Either to try and move for for a QB or stock up at those positions. Especially CB which has been a little dry the past five years except for last year.

Year 7 of Ballard, year one of Richardson. Funny how Bowen just figured this out. People been saying it all off season.

I think he did it on purpose because he knows its a rebuilding year. Jim wants MHj, there is to much kismet involved for Jim not thinking it needs to happen. And he knew they needed to restock on corners so throw them to the fire, see what comes out and build off it. Problem is injuries and morons making it even worse.

This is somewhat contradictory. We don't know what the Colts have in Pierce because Minshew can't throw a deep ball, but also the Colts don't have anyone who can stretch the field deep? How can you declaritively state the second statement after the first? Wouldn't you need to at least question the capabilities of the WRs if you don't think it's an assessable thing due to limitations at the QB position?

I also have to disagree with your assessment that the Colts don't have anyone who can stretch the field deep. With the right QB, I think the Colts actually have 3 WRs who can stretch the field deep. Pierce has elite deep speed, and IMO Pittman and Downs have shown at least functional deep speed, as evidenced by long TDs by each that were mostly RAC yards. Then there's the other important part of the deep passing game: winning 50/50 balls. I believe both Pittman and Downs were at least top 5, and possibly each best in their draft class at contested catch rate, and it was also one of Pierce's most touted skillsets coming out of college, though it has yet to fully translate to the NFL for him.

WR is a position that could be upgraded for this team, Pierce could be improved upon, but the upgrade there, even by getting an elite player, would be marginal compared to a comparable upgrade at DE or CB.

I think everyone here agrees with that sentiment. Yes, MHJ would be a nice addition, but that position is not as bad as pass rusher and CB.

As of halfway though the season, my off season dream plan would include:

- Re-sign Colts UFAs to starter level contracts: MPJ, Stwart, K Moore, Sanchez.

- Talk to Moss and offer a solid RB2 contact in the $5-6m a year range. If he takes it then great but at least it is a marker on the table before he explores free agency.

- Go all in on signing Chase Young. If achieved, D-Line is good to go.

- Continue to build solid depth across the team with decisions on offering contracts to more Colts UFAs: Pinter, Blackmon, Minshew, Tyquan Lewis, Isaiah McKenzie and Troy Brown.

- Draft BPA for the entire draft with emphasis on defense over offense.

we just paid taylor. in no fucking scenario do we give a 5 mil a year contract to his backup. that is a stupid way to spend money

Do we just let Moss walk? I think this is what we will do but if we really think we could be a playoff team I think it is a good use of money to pay him. Moss is more than a back up, even with JT on the team. Steichen should be able to scheme a way to get them both on the field so we have our best weapons available at all times. Otherwise it will be a draft choice and we have so many holes on defense....

fuck yeah you just let him walk. you don't tie up 20 mil a year to rb's.

I would draft a mid round replacement. Also have the northwestern kid coming back and he looked solid. Moss is making himself money and good for him. I think we got great mileage out of that trade.

Agree completely, this year it is nice having them both, but we can't afford to resign Moss to a contract commensurate to his performance this year. You can get quality RB's in the 3rd round and beyond who can be very good RB's, that's the main reason for the devaluation of the position to begin with, RB's are pretty much plug and play.

I would also say as much as Sanchez has been great, you can also find good punters fairly easily, and they should be saving some money there as well. But i am not going to be complaining if we did resign him, he has consistently performed at a relatively high level, without outkicking his coverage teams. Having a big leg is not the way to measure how good a punter is, distance and hangtime are the crucial elements of a quality punter, along with directional punting ability. In my experience as a teenager (many years ago) messing around with friends (in the UK, there were very few opportunities to play anything remotely organised back then), punting was something i just couldn't do well, i could kick field goals from 40 yards etc. I could punt it 30 or 40 yards sometimes, but rarely with any real knowledge of where it was actually going to go, mostly off the side of my foot!

o


Looking at things with my EXTREMELY-SHADED royal-blue sunglasses, I have a feeling that Zack Moss will be a little less demanding than was Jonathan Taylor in his contract negotiations in the upcoming off-season ...... for no good reason, I sense that Moss is a little less conceited than Taylor, and that he also sees the larger picture of having a potentially all-time great backfield.

There have been 7 times in the history of the NFL in which teams had two 1,000-yard rushers, 5 of which consisted of 2 running backs (Michael Vick and Lamar Jackson were both quarterbacks that had 1,000-yard rushing seasons in which one of their running backs also broke that barrier.) Maybe ...... just, maybe ...... Jonathan Taylor and Zack Moss will wind up being the first duo ever to accomplish that rare feat in 2 separate seasons.

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I agree that you let Moss walk unless he agrees to come back cheap, which unless he gets hurt won't happen. I'm kind of surprised we didn't try to move him at the deadline.