Ballard's scapegoat

Jamarcus Russell
Akili Smith
Anthony Richardson

Abundant talent from the neck down.

This is why the Colts should have drafted Dillion Gabriel or Will Howard! AR is a bust and the sooner they accept it the sooner we can get out of the cellar of the AFC South.

They *should* have taken Baker Mayfield when Cleveland dumped him and we got Matt Ryan instead. Baker wanted to come to the Colts, too. And here we are now...

He’s done, Trey Lance 2.0

Agreed. With Indiana Jones at QB, the 2025 Colts will win 7-9 games, miss the playoffs or get in and be 1 and done.

The year to tank for Arch is NEXT season in 2026. Clean house, new GM, new HC, sell on veterans so the new managment can start roster construction how they think they need to in order to support a 2027 rookie QB.

As I stated in another post:

2026 SELL:

Pittman - $24.0m cap savings - 29 years old - 1 year left on contract
Buckner - $15.8m cap savings - 32 years old - 1 year left on contract
Nelson - $18.0m cap savings - 30 years old - 1 year left on contract
Taylor - $13.0m cap savings - 27 years old - 1 year left on contract
Stewart - $12.3m cap savings - 33 years old - 1 year left on contract
Moore - $10.0m cap savings - 31 years old - 1 year left on contract

By trading the above folks, we increase the Colts 2026 free cap space from $71.6m to $164.7m in order for the new GM to start shaping a younger team to help a new rookie QB in 2027 plus able to use the draft picks trading those players would bring.

This is actually a really good comparison. Minimal experience in college, all world talent, but unable to stay healthy enough to develop that talent.

AR's injury definitely sucks. Was hoping (as I'm sure we all were) that AR would make some significant strides w/ a healthy offseason. Suppose we'll be finding out whether or not Jones' immense struggles at NYG was mainly due to surrounding talent or not.

As far as drafting Arch:

- He has 3 years of eligibility remaining, no monetary needs for himself or his family, plenty of NIL money coming in even if that weren't the case, and a family history of not leaving college early. So it's unlikely he'll be in the draft until at least 2027 if not 2028. Maybe if he wins a national championship and the Heisman in '25 and/or '26 then he comes out early, but anything short of that then my guess is he doesn't.

- Even if Arch does leave for the draft in '26 the Colts will probably not be bad enough to be in position to draft him. I suppose another 2022 implosion could happen, but that's pretty unlikely.

Definitely interesting. I wonder if there's been a rift between Ballard and Brown w/ Ballard shifting to drafting more based on performance rather than solely based on physical traits.

That’s true but if I remember correctly, no one here wanted Baker at the time.

o


This reminds me of a prediction that I made for the Orioles in a 3-game series that they had with the Boston Red Sox 2010, which went as follows ......


"The Orioles currently have a record of 4-18, which is the worst in all of baseball. They have not had a winning season in more than a decade. The Red Sox are one of the best teams in all of baseball, and they have not had a losing season in more than a decade. The Red Sox have better starting pitching than the Orioles, better relief pitching than the Orioles, and a better offense than the Orioles. In addition to all of that, Oriole Park has become known as "Fenway South" because almost half of the fans in the stadium root for the Red Sox when they play the Orioles there, even though the stadium is in Baltimore ...... so based of all of that, I think that the Orioles will sweep all 3 games from the Red Sox."


Sure enough, the Orioles swept all 3 games from the Red Sox.


https://www.baseball-reference.com/t...e-scores.shtml

o

That's right. I mentioned him once, quickly got shot down, and we moved on. Nobody was making a case for him here.