INDIANAPOLIS — Shane Steichen has been the head coach of the Colts for three weeks.
His new city hasn’t had much of a chance to get to know him yet.
With good reason. Steichen spent most of the first two weeks of his Indianapolis tenure holed up in his office, interviewing assistant coaches in a “grueling,” extensive interview process to fill out his staff, the first task he has to complete as a head coach.
The people who’ve gotten a chance to know him better, who’ve been in the building with him, have all come away with the same impression of Steichen.
“He is all ball,” Colts general manager Chris Ballard said.
All football. All the time.
“He’s very thorough, he’s very detailed,” Ballard said. “And there’s not a stone he’s not going to turn to try to get the thing right, so that’s been fun to see.”
A hundred or so Indianapolis football fans got a chance to see a little more of Steichen on Friday night. The new Colts head coach took roughly a half hour out of his busy Combine schedule to head on over to Sun King Brewing for NFL writer Peter King’s annual fundraiser for Teachers’ Treasures of Indianapolis, an organization devoted to helping teachers pay the out-of-pocket expenses they often need to get classroom supplies.
Indianapolis owner Jim Irsay sent a $10,000 donation to Teachers’ Treasures along with Steichen.
And in roughly 20 or so minutes of answering questions from King or fans in attendance, Steichen got a chance to show Colts fans exactly what Ballard has seen so far.
The new Colts coach is all ball.
Ask Steichen for a story, for an anecdote, and the new Colts coach often responds with a play.
Even if the play happened a couple of decades ago.
His best game as a player
King opened up by asking Steichen about the best game he ever played as a quarterback, a five-touchdown performance for UNLV in a losing effort against New Mexico as a senior.
Steichen’s playing career at UNLV was full of ups and downs, full of chances to be the starter that never panned out fully, including an injury as a junior that cost him the starting job and left him a backup as a senior.
The game, King told Steichen, had to feel like his moment in the sun.
“Honestly, the only thing I really remember was we were running a three-by-one, stick route tight end, the F was in the flat and we had our back out wide,” Steichen said. “I remember studying tape, and the corner, on tape, always fell off. He never paid attention to the tailback.”
UNLV called a timeout.
“I said, hey guys, who’s the running back in the game, you come over here,” Steichen said. “I go, ‘You run, if this corner falls off, I’m going to send it.’ Sure enough, the corner fell off, and I threw a touchdown.”
What Philip Rivers taught him about quarterbacks
The relationship between Rivers and Steichen has been well-documented.
The shared love of the game, of the work, the penchant for staying late at the facility talking football, the impact Rivers’ example is going to have on Steichen’s evaluation of the quarterbacks in this draft class.
Rivers knew the offense so well, Steichen remembered, that he no longer had to think about the play call after relaying it to the rest of the offense in the huddle.
“I remember a play in 2012, my second year in the NFL, and the protection call was to the slot side, and he turned it back to the safety in the deep middle,” Steichen said. “(Chargers center) Nick Hardwick turned around and was like, ‘You sure you want to do that?’ and (Rivers) was like, ’Trust me!’”
The Chargers snapped the ball.
“Sure enough, the guy blitzed, and he turned right into it, threw a seven-cut for a huge gain,” Steichen said. “It was like, ‘How did you know?’ And he said, ‘Well, when we broke the huddle, the safety said, ‘I’m going.’”
Evaluating young quarterbacks
Steichen’s already said plenty in two interviews about the qualities he has to have in the Colts’ next quarterback.
From a football standpoint, he wants accuracy, decision-making and an ability to create. Even more than any of those things, he wants a quarterback who’s obsessive — a word Steichen repeated a half-dozen times in his Combine interview — about his craft, the way Rivers and Justin Herbert and Jalen Hurts have been.
King got a little bit more out of the new Colts head coach on how he scouts college quarterbacks.
“I have a process, obviously, I have a sheet that I have a grading scale on each guy,” Steichen said. “I have critical factors that I look at, my summary. Watch every throw, watch critical situations. The rivalry game is a big one for me, how do they play in cold weather, all those different things.”
Then there’s that word again.
“It really comes down to the obsession at that position,” Steichen said. “The best ones are obsessed with what they do. If you can find that in a quarterback, I think they can be pretty special.”
His best Rivers story
A fan wanted Steichen’s favorite story on Rivers, a quarterback who went from a hated enemy to a beloved former Colt for most of the fan base in just a single season.
Rivers has a remarkable personality, an easy sense of humor and a legendary penchant for trash talk.
But Steichen, as his general manager said, went back to the film room.
“We’re playing the Pittsburgh Steelers, I want to say, 2017, Sunday Night Football, and they had a little blitz package, they would bring either the Sam or the Mike (linebacker), some teams do it off the center,” Steichen said. “And we were scouting it like crazy, and he was like, ‘Goshdangit, they’re not going off the turn, they’re just firing one of these two guys.’”
Rivers kept studying the front, kept looking for an answer, and finally found a tell that he liked.
“He’s looking at the two tackles inside, and he says, ’You know what I think it is, I think it’s the stripe of the helmet,’” Steichen remembers Rivers telling him. “‘If it’s inside this guard, it’s that ‘backer coming. If it’s out there, it’s the other guy.’”
Steichen couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“You’re going off the stripe?” Steichen asked Rivers, who shot back. “I got nothing else.”
The game kicks off, the Chargers have the ball, the Steelers are bringing the blitz and Rivers is turning right into it every time, riddling Pittsburgh’s secondary.
Steichen couldn’t believe it. He thought Rivers’ stripe theory was right, and he told him so when the quarterback came off the field.
“He comes off, and he goes, ‘Yeah, I’m hearing all their calls,’” Steichen remembers Rivers saying. “‘I got it.’”
Fans in Indianapolis have a lot more time to get to know Steichen.
Plenty is going to come up at one point or the other.
But Ballard wasn’t kidding.
Steichen’s all ball
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03-05-2023, 02:14 PM
Four stories that reveal what Colts coach Shane Steichen wants in a quarterback
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