My Take

[ChaosTheory]

I'm typically one of the few optimists in a sea of doomsday. But just like I try to offer some perspective and try to talk people off the ledge after losses, I'll do the same in regards to drinking the Kool-Aid and saying stuff like "we definitely lose this game if Reich is the coach."

I'll rewatch the game, but ultimately, I didn't notice a huge difference in the team. Obviously the Ehlinger experiment proved Ryan is way better (what a weird situation). But compared to the previous Ryan-led Colts, I think we saw a lot of similar stuff.

Look at it like this... Michael Pittman fumbled the fucking ball on the final drive at the LV 26 with about 5:50 to go. If he doesn't somehow, miraculously come in late and recover his own fumble... how are we looking at this game?

Even with that lucky recovery... If Stephon Gilmore doesn't make another outstanding individual play, this time All-Pro vs. All-Pro... how are we looking at this game?

We had already fumbled at the LV 22. According to Ballard, coming into the game, we'd had 11 turnovers inside the opponent's 50 and 9 of those were inside the opponent's 38 (scoring position). Today we added a 10th and came VERY close to adding an 11th. Those are massive in that they take points straight off the board and give the other team a big momentum boost.

We avoided one and came away with a win against a bad Raiders team. If we avoided both, we probably get a comfortable two-touchdown win. And that same logic applies to previous games against better teams where we had multiple turnovers. We played well enough to win in several losses but the turnovers are king.

Chrome pointed out in the gameday thread that he heard Bill Polian talking about the team and basically mentioned how thin the line is between having a good season and "burn it all down." That's completely true.