Ballard 2024 end of year presser
 

Watching it now. He is owning his mistakes from the past. and it looks like he wants to make some serious changes to his style.

On Anthony Richardson: "We knew when we took him it was going to be a roller coaster... The number 1 thing we have to figure out and have to work through is he's got to stay healthy. That, to me, is the biggest question."

"We have to have competition at the position ... because competition makes you better and because he's not proven he can stay healthy for 17 games."

On his team-building: "Right now, we're not close. I want to make that clear. Being close is losing on the last play of the of the Super Bowl. Going 8-9 is not close."

Re-signing and rewarding so. many of his own last offseason created a complacency and that was a major problem. Must be an edge in the locker room.

Apparently had a convo Zaire Franklin & I don't think it was comfortable for Franklin.

He did say things I wanted to hear now lets see if there is action behind those words.

They also let DBs coach Ron Milus and LBs coach Richard Smith go

It’s better to hear him acknowledge mistakes than to double down on them, but I won’t believe it until we see it. He’s been the same guy from the beginning and the issues have been obvious from the beginning to anyone not drinking the Kool Aid. The only thing that’s changed is that he’s running out of excuses. I’m afraid he’s just a con man placating the masses still convinced he’s right. Unfortunately all we can do is watch and see.

He has to reflect, and it seems he did. It seems to me that he identified his shortcomings correctly. What he does with that information is what matters.

When he addressed free agency, it seemed to me that his pause was there because he did not want to let it out what he has planned, but I think we see him more active in the trade market than before, and tries to do the trades like for Buckner, which was a definite home run.

That isn't too surprising.

Both of those guys have pretty much followed Gus Bradley around for much of the last decade.

o


Whenever I read something along these lines, I always think of Jim Caldwell's time-out call with 29 seconds left to play in the 4th quarter of the 2010 Wildcard playoff game against the Jets ...... and his subsequent post-game press conference in which he insisted that he would do it all over again if he had the chance.



Look at the expression on Peyton Manning's face, followed by his helpless hand-gesture immediately after the timeout was called between the 1:55:12 and the 1:55-25 mark of this video.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0y48nV0UR1E

o

While the criticism of Richardson is valid I see Ballard's comments as deflection from an egregious failure that rests squarely on his shoulders, that is, his misguided approach to the secondary last year. The back four was an absolute disgrace last year. Ballard steadfastly refused to utilize free agency, trades, or draft capital to improve the secondary both in starting talent and depth, instead proudly insisting that the growth of the players would be sufficient.

How did 2024 stack up against 2023 in some valuable metrics? Yards per attempt: 2023/7.32 2024/7.60 Completion percentage: 2023/65.1. 2024/69.4 Touchdowns: 2023/21 2024/27 Interceptions: 2023/15 2024/16 (woo-hoo)
Passer rating: 2023/88.2 2024/95.8

While one must take into account the job the front 7 are doing these figures are a damning indictment of Ballard's failure as a GM. It was, without question, one of the biggest topics of conversation last offseason. Not just on this forum but in the media as well. This was the hill Ballard chose to die on. And die he did. So much of what comes out of his mouth is nothing more than subterfuge to secure yet another inexplicable year of employment at perhaps the most impactful job in the NFL. I'll bet the sheer number of people that Ballard has been willing to throw under the bus requires them to run on a schedule around Lucas Oil Stadium.

Exactly. With the exception of in '22 where he blamed the OL going to shit on the media giving him crap about the WR room, he basically says the same thing every year: the buck stops w/ me, I need to get better, etc. I'll believe all of that when I see it.

I like how he called out the “unnamed player “ giving quotes to the media a chicken shit

Almost certainly happened exactly two days after the season ended, when Franklin made that public apology.

Okay, we all remember '22 with not a lot of fondness, I know. But, before that season, Irsay gave the edict to put all your chips on the table. Which of course we know that Ballard didn't do, giving the Colts Matt Pryor and Danny Pinter to work with as O-Line replacements for Castonzo and Glowinski.

If he didn't get fired for that alone, then he is teflon.

Yada yada yada. It’s all meaningless.

A tiger doesn’t change his stripes and Ballard won’t change his. When the rubber hits the road, he will revert to the same old formula.

Of course AR needs REAL competition but Ballard won’t be willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. And then he’ll say well it just wasn’t feasible.

Of course, we need help in free agency at multiple positions but Ballard won’t be willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. And then he’ll say well, we just don’t have the cap space.

This isn’t going to work. The Colts need a hard reset. If Chris Ballard had what it takes to build a winning team, he would have done it by now.

Bookmark this post if you want but i guarantee you Jim Irsay will be forced to blow the WHOLE thing up at this time next year.

All Jim has done now is delayed ripping off the bandaid.

I was thinking the exact same thing about a tiger doesn't change its stripes. Ballard will do what he does and it will be the same old shit. I've been out on Ballard for a while and when I saw Colts fans on the internet (not here) posting he would be shit canned I just laughed.

Irsay has backed Ballard to the point where I feel like he has a permanent residency here. Sometimes I think Jim overcompensates with the "stability" because his dad was such a loose cannon. Regardless of that, Ballard was going to get time to develop Richardson and we are going into year 3, so we will see.

I don't have much hope for Richardson tbh. I've watched a lot a football over the years and I feel like I've never seen a QB as erratic as him pan out. Yes, he is young and raw, but I don't see it. I keep seeing comparisons to Josh Allen's development but I don't think the talent is there.

I don't post too much and I don't like to post negative shit, but I just needed to vent.

No doubt his comments over the past half decade or so have been meaningless. Hopefully this year it's different, but I'm not going to hold my breath.

I got around to watching it last night. It was fine. He answered tough questions and appeared more humble than usual. I hope there is positive change, but I'm in the "show me" camp until I see it on the field.

o


276 posts in 8 years ???

Would you please shut the fuck up, you windbag ???

o

Our only hope is that he does change because Jim is on his way out and no way the daughters fire Ballard as their first official act in power! We are stuck with Chris Ballard for the next 5 years!:eek:

I don't care if your name is Cletus... This won't fly.

I fucking despise this mealy mouthed do nothing fuck more than I ever have before after this shit. Spew all that bullshit, buck stops with me, not close, gotta be different.

Then as others have pointed out essentially just bus rolls over a bunch of others to deflect the shit from him.

Dude is pure con, pure trash, pure scum!

FUCK YOU CHRIS BALLARD--- FUCK YOU!

Be interesting to see who the “competition “ is at QB

Do they put some real heat on his ass and sign Fields or do they just light a small flame signing someone like Desmond Ridder.

Who they sign will tell me if they truly believe in AR or not

o


Anything, everything, and everybody ...... from the time that you wake up to the time that you go to sleep you hate, despise, and curse anything and anybody that comes across your path.

o

I would look at Daniel Jones.

It's a homophone....(no homo)!:D

Or Sam Darnold if Minnesota is dumb enough to let him go.

They won't do that. They will franchise Darnold and keep McCarthy.

Hard pass there. We'd be better off w/ sticking with Ehlinger as the "competition".

Then no competition?

I'm not saying that. I'm just saying we'd be better off w/ Ehlinger than Daniel Jones.

Not really the case surprisingly; my personality is pretty chill and sort of agreeable in general. I do however have a very very very low tolerance for stupid bullshit and this dude is kinda near the top of the stupid bullshit pyramid. He is one of biggest buck passing deflecto ass bags I've ever seen and it is so shitty to see him be rewarded for that.

To say that Ehlinger is on the same level as Jones is ludicrous. I'm not wedded to Jones, but I do want an experienced, athletic, younger QB (mid to late 20s). How many of those can you name?

Or draft a guy like Jackson Dart or the kid from Indiana !!

Not really considering how terrible Daniel Jones is. Bringing him in would be like bringing Wentz back. Only Wentz is more talented and was at least good at one point in time in his career.

To clarify - I'm not saying Ehlinger is any good. I'm saying that Daniel Jones is that bad.

Daniel Jones is as much better than Sam Ehlinger as Lamar Jackson is better than AR.

I don’t want to sign Jones, but he’s objectively a HELL of a lot better than Sam Freaking Ehlinger.

Talentwise yes, but performance wise he's not. Jones had 1 maybe close to average season in a contract year, but otherwise he's been a shit show. He's so bad that NYG ran him out of town and took at ~$20M cap hit to do so w/ absolutely nothing in return. Like I said earlier, bringing in Jones would be like bringing in a worse version of Wentz.

And yes I fully realize that we need someone better than Ehlinger backing up/competing w/ AR. Like most of us on here I actually think Bean is much better than Ehlinger and said numerous times that Bean should have been on the roster rather than Ehlinger.

Just for fun I prorated Ehlinger's and Jones' career stats to a 17 game season and here's what you get (rounded to the nearest whole number):

Jones: Passing - 64% completion %, 3,593 yards, 17/12 TD/Int ratio. Rushing - 537 yds, and 4 TDs. Also, 12 fumbles/yr

Ehlinger: Passing - 63% completion %, 3,247 yards, 17/17 TD/Int ratio. Rushing - 493 yrd, 0 TDs. 11 fumbles/yr



So objectively speaking Jones is slightly better than Ehlinger. Not leaps and bounds like some of you think he is. And again I'm not trying to prove how "good" Ehlinger is b/c he clearly isn't. I'm justing showing you bad Daniel Jones actually is.

Here are your under 30 alternatives...should they be available. Darnold (doubtful), Wilson, Lance, Rush, Fields, Mac Jones, Daniel Jones.

Given the situation, without thinking/researching much... Isn't Fields the most intriguing?

He's the closest 1:1 with AR. He can obviously do the run game stuff, and his completion percentage is beyond what AR has displayed yet.

If we're talking about motivation... A 26-year-old, similar style athlete/player who just had a pretty decent showing with a more competent roster filling in for Wilson.

Slim pickings for sure. Of the players you listed and assuming Darnold is unavailable I would go w/ Fields or Rush. The rest are pure garbage. If I have to pick one of those 4 I would say Mac Jones, but that's only b/c we could give Dam shit about it when he comes into the game and sucks.

Of the UFA QBs I would pick Mariota. He's not under 30, but at 31 isn't ancient. And he played really well this year when he had to step in for Daniels.

Has a more decorated college resume and played in one of the worst weather stadium/divisions in the NFL