Colts Recap: Week 15

[Andy]

**Completely forgot to post this** Sorry

 

Houston Texans 29 vs Indianapolis Colts 17

 

 

Scoring Summary

1st Quarter

FG S.Graham 29 yd. Field Goal (6-69, 3:13)

TD A.Johnson 3 yd. pass from M.Schaub (S.Graham kick) (13-57, 5:44)

2nd Quarter

FG A.Vinatieri 26 yd. Field Goal (7-26, 2:10)

FG S.Graham 35 yd. Field Goal (7-63, 2:22)

TD B.Braman 8 yd. return of blocked punt (S.Graham kick)

TD T.Hilton 61 yd. pass from A.Luck (A.Vinatieri kick) (2-74, 0:39)

3rd Quarter

FG S.Graham 27 yd. Field Goal (11-78, 6:20)

TD D.Allen 8 yd. pass from A.Luck (A.Vinatieri kick) (8-80, 5:01)

4th Quarter

FG S.Graham 46 yd. Field Goal (7-11, 3:24)

FG S.Graham 33 yd. Field Goal (9-78, 3:40)

 

 

What the Colts did Right

For starters, Andrew Luck played a mistake free game. He didn't throw any interceptions, and didn't force too many throws. The Colts did not lose this game because of Luck.

 

Vick Ballard had the best game of his career. Not only did he post the best stat line of his career, but he did it against one of the best run defenses in the NFL. His great patience was the reason he was able to find holes and burst through them. He's an explosive guy, and the thing I love about him, is that he always falls forward. He did a great job of doing all of that against a stout run D.

TY Hilton had the only good performance from the receivers, but if it weren't for the very nice 61 yard touchdown, we wouldn't be talking about him. Although, he did run some nice routes on the day. Dwayne Allen and Coby Fleener both had fantastic days blocking. Yes, Coby Fleener had a fantastic day blocking. That's two weeks in a row. For Allen, that's 14 games in a row. He's been a beast all year, and I'd put him up there with Heath Miller, and Anthony Fasano. Allen also did a fine job catching the ball, even getting a touchdown.

 

The run blocking was pretty good. Ballard was able to have a big day because of it. Anthony Castonzo had a great game pass blocking and run blocking. Run blocking, he was awesome, doing a great job against Barwin and pulling out and taking out some guys down the field. Pass blocking wise, he had some off plays, but all in all, he pretty much stopped a good playeri in Connor Barwin. AQ Shipley wasn't bad, as he probably had the 2nd best game out of the lineman. It was a shame to see him injured at the end.

 

Defensively, they were pretty good. They only allowed 22 points to a top 8 offense, which, with Andrew Luck and this offense, could win you a lot of games. The part that impressed me is that they held the Texans to 5 field goals. The run defense in the 1st half was very good. Foster didn't have any big runs for more than 10 yards, and was contained. That's how you stop him.

 

Mathis and Freeney had relatively good games. Dwight Freeney was able to have a positive game against one of the best left tackle in the game. Mathis was able to get a lot of pressure on Schaub, and even got a sack on him too.

 

In the secondary, Antoine Bethea had one of his best games of the year. He was sneaky when it came to blitzes, and even got a sack. In the secondary, he covered very well, and for the most part, his tackling was fine.

 

 

What the Colts did Wrong

A few costly mistakes cost the Colts the game. Those big mistakes were the blocked punt, the fumble inside the Texans' 3 yard line and the holding penalty on the Reggie Wayne touchdown.

Andrew Luck wasn't very accurate. He didn't make mistakes, but he didn't do much else. He didn't have many big plays, and it seemed like the Houston secondary had the best of him. However, as stated before, the Colts didn't lose this game because of him.

 

Reggie Wayne makes his first appearance on the "Colts did Wrong" part this year. He had very little impact in the passing game and was just shut down. Donnie Avery had a few drops too, and that was disapointing. He was a bit inconsistent, and that's 2 bad weeks in a row now. Let's hope that doesn't turn into a trend.

 

Now, the O-line... Holy crap. Was that the worst performance by any team this year, in regards to pass blocking. The Cards O-line vs the Rams is probably still the worst performance, but this one is up there. Mike McGlynn himself allowed 9 pressures, 3 sacks and a cheap shot on Luck at the end of the first half. That's just McGlynn. Joe Reitz was also badly beat by the Antonio Smith, as Reitz allowed a sack to Watt. Linkenbach was not horrible, but when he went up against Watt, he was man handled.

 

The run defense in the second half was abysmal, especially in the 4th quarter. Jerrell Freeman and Pat Angerer, who both didn't have great games, were pushed around by the Texans' O-lineman, and there was no penetration from the D-line. The run defense in the first half and the 2nd half were two completely different stories. Foster was able to find the holes, burst through them and get 20+ yards each time on the last 2 drives. Terrible.

 

I did say Bethea had a great game, but his tackling in the 2nd half was off. He missed a couple of tackles on Foster, and that's not good, considering he's one of the best tackling safeties in the NFL. Davis was picked on a lot, and was just constantly beat by Andre Johnson. He gave up 119 yards on 8 receptions (10 targets going his way) He's been having a bit of trouble against the top receivers in the NFL. The secondary was really picked apart by Schaub, who had a 109.7 passer rating. That's the 8th quarterback this year to have a passer rating of 96 or better against this secondary.

 

Special teams... I rarely talk about special teams, because usually it doesn't have a big impact, but today, it was a reason the Colts lost. The blocked punt really hurt the Colts, and had that blocked punt not happen, they would have only been done by 5 points.

 

 

Game Ball

This week's game ball goes to Vick Ballard, and there's no question about it. He put up 105 yards against one of the best run defenses in the NFL, and had multiple big runs in the 2nd half. He ran with patience and power, a deadly combination in this league.

[dram]

great job again, Andy, thankyou for your analisis

[thunderkyss]

Pretty good analysis. But, let me ask you a question.

 

Prior to the game, did anyone think, "We'll win this game if Vick Ballard & T.Y. Hilton goes off?"

 

Andrew Luck played a mistake free game? That's probably the only part of your game plan that came to fruition.

 

So how well did you really do?

 

You were not even close to executing your game plan. Andre Luck completed 50% of his passes, a shocking 6.9 yards per attempt. He was sacked 5 times for 38 yards. You had 4 recievers catch 3 passes, that's a good thing, But Regie Wayne only had 14 yards as opposed to Hilton's 78 yards. Vick Ballard ate a lot of yards, couldn't cross the goal line.

 

While Houston's Matt Schaub completed 74% of his passes for 8.4 ypa. He was sacked 3 times for 22 yards. 3 receivers with 3 or more catches, Andre Johnson had 11 catches for 151 yards. Arian Foster carried the ball 27 times for 165 yards. Houston only scored 1 offensive TD & I'm sure their game plan was not to make 6 field goal attempts, so they weren't perfect on the night either.

 

However, which team do you think was closer to accomplishing their game plan?

 

This game was not as close as the score would make you think.