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Old 10-05-2018, 08:25 AM
GoBigBlue88 GoBigBlue88 is offline
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Just some non-obvious thoughts. I was wiped last night.


1. I'm not sure if Reich or the booth should have challenged the Pascal INT (I'm not calling it a Luck INT), but that should have been reviewed, right? Couldn't you argue possession with knee down? If it's Reich, then you also factor in Agholor being out of bounds, and he really needs to learn to throw a flag.

2. The WR roster beyond Hilton is embarrassing. How bad is Reece Fountain if he couldn't beat out this group? Ballard screwed up here this offseason. This wasn't a "fix everything" offseason, but you can't have basically street WRs who are THIS bad and be sitting on as much cap room as the Colts are.

3. Erik Swoope is a good receiver. It was dumb that he was off the squad in favor of Mo Alie-Cox last week.

4. One of Quenton Nelson or Ryan Kelly was to blame for the first Luck INT, which came because a free runner found himself in Luck's face. I've watched the play over and over again and can't determine if Nelson stayed passing his block to Clark to long, or if Kelly was supposed to slant left and pick up the delayed blitz. Either way, miscommunication between those two, which is disappointing to see because that's supposedly the strength of the OL, right?

5. But on the good OL news front: I thought Braden Smith played very well. He went against the weaker Pats DE at all times, so it's weighted somewhat, but he played well enough to where I'm not sure you just slide Good back in the starting RT spot. Interesting decision to be made there.

6. Final OL point: I genuinely can't figure out why the Colts can't even pretend to have a run game. A lot of teams are still playing Colts in nickel. I do think the Colts waste too many run downs with delayed handoffs or dives into a loaded front, but I also see plenty of downs where the Colts are simply running into a four-man front and all the blocks just stick on the first level while some LB comes through and completely cleans house at the LOS.

7. I think you saw why this team needs Marlon Mack (or a back like Mack) last night. Hines is a terrific weapon in the passing game, but too small to run between the tackles. Wilkins is tough enough to run between the tackles, but not much of a factor in the passing game. This team missed Mack last night.

8. I'm a bit torn on Eberflus' designs last night -- they were ultra conservative -- but I keep landing on how handicapped Eberflus was throughout. We knew from last year that Chris Milton should never see the light of day as an actual cornerback, so that was always going to be ugly. But then there was some random guy named Arthur playing corner too. And down their top two linebackers, incidentally their most athletic linebackers. I'm not sure what I could have come up with with the benefit of second-guessing that would have been any better than what Eberflus offered, to be honest.

9. But Reich and Eberflus need to come down on that dumb shit like celebrating a gift turnover when you haven't done shit all day. Frankly embarrassing to see bad corners who would never see the light of day were it not for a fluke INT celebrating like they've done something.

10. Matthias Farley was AWFUL last night. In general, the Colts safeties have underwhelmed this year, probably because they're systemically never within 10 yards of the ball. But I don't know what Farley was doing out there last night. He took a gift INT, but he also gave up a ridiculous TD that should have been an easy INT, got stiff armed to oblivion, and let a hobbled Gronk run free all night. All while joining the aforementioned group celebration. That was embarrassing.

11. I think it's hilarious that Lenzy Pipkins is always trying to fight someone though. Mostly because it's fun to make jokes about that name.

12. Two more hamstring injuries last night. TY Hilton maybe out several weeks with his. There needs to be a serious inquiry made as to what the hell is going on with the Colts' medical and training programs. Something is wrong. It's not just bad luck when it's this many years in a row. I don't have an answer, but the questions must be asked. If I were to guess, I would say the Colts are doing something wrong on the preventative end that's making players more susceptible to hamstring injuries. Part of their strength & conditioning program. Occam's Razor there, and I could be wrong, but generally when a team has a rash of the exact same injury, it's because they all do something to make themselves vulnerable to that injury.
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