The Colts are basically Cleveland in talent level-with Luck

[threeflight]

When you really look at the Colts roster, you start to see a trend throughout most of it.  The pure lack of talent on all sides of the ball.

 

Go back to the Glory years during the Manning era.  You had Manning, Wayne, Harrison, Stokely, Collie, Clark, James, Addai, Pollard, Saturday, Glenn on the offensive side, and people like Freeney, Sanders, Mathis, Bethea, and a slew of good linebackers.

 

Now?  Compare those players to Luck, Hilton, I guess Moncrief and Kelly on the O, and who on the D?  Davis?  And that is just the starters.  While the Colts have never been a particularly deep team, even our depth now is pretty non existent.  There is just no talent here.  Add in the VERY average coaching at best and it really goes to show you that without Luck, we are the Browns.

 

Thing is, Irsay is in a tough spot. He wants to make a change to a big name coach and GM.  And he should. But his main choices like Harbaugh, Gruden, and Manning, are just not available YET.  So what does he do?  Sit and wait and then fire P and G when someone becomes available?  Or fire them now, hire a no name, and then have one of his top choices become available next year.  Then what...fire the coach he just hired?

What he should have done, and this would have been ballsy, was to go after Harbaugh the moment be became available.  I realize that would mean firing Pagano after 3 good seasons, but if you want Super Bowls with Luck, it would have had to have been done.

 

Now he has to wait....

[backshoulderfade]

I think we can pick up a blue chip talent, along with several complementary players in this offseason. Would go a long way to making us competetive.

[Andrew Luck fan club]

Yes the defense is literally void of talent.. that's why we need a nice FA and draft. And hope Henry Anderson can get back to his old self. He was a great player his rookie year. 

[Valpo2004]

No way we are as devoid as Cleveland.

 

Last year we where competative in many games and won several with Hasselbeck under center.

 

This year with Tolzien under center we where competitive with the Steelers.  It didn't come across on the scoreboard but that's because we constantly blew it at the goal line.  

 

Browns are just straight up not competitive in most games.  

 

We arn't talent rich, without Luck.  But we are not as devoid as the Browns either. 

[jvan1973]

23 minutes ago, threeflight said:

When you really look at the Colts roster, you start to see a trend throughout most of it.  The pure lack of talent on all sides of the ball.

 

Go back to the Glory years during the Manning era.  You had Manning, Wayne, Harrison, Stokely, Collie, Clark, James, Addai, Pollard, Saturday, Glenn on the offensive side, and people like Freeney, Sanders, Mathis, Bethea, and a slew of good linebackers.

 

Now?  Compare those players to Luck, Hilton, I guess Moncrief and Kelly on the O, and who on the D?  Davis?  And that is just the starters.  While the Colts have never been a particularly deep team, even our depth now is pretty non existent.  There is just no talent here.  Add in the VERY average coaching at best and it really goes to show you that without Luck, we are the Browns.

 

Thing is, Irsay is in a tough spot. He wants to make a change to a big name coach and GM.  And he should. But his main choices like Harbaugh, Gruden, and Manning, are just not available YET.  So what does he do?  Sit and wait and then fire P and G when someone becomes available?  Or fire them now, hire a no name, and then have one of his top choices become available next year.  Then what...fire the coach he just hired?

What he should have done, and this would have been ballsy, was to go after Harbaugh the moment be became available.  I realize that would mean firing Pagano after 3 good seasons, but if you want Super Bowls with Luck, it would have had to have been done.

 

Now he has to wait....

Addai, collie,  pollard??

[WarGhost21]

I wouldn't sink us to Cleveland's level, because we do have some offense outside of Luck. But yes, without Luck we would be right above Cleveland and SF IMO

[Steamboat_Shaun]

Browns go into this offseason with over $100mil in salary cap space, the first overall pick as well as the 12th overall, with 13 total draft picks. That's basically twice what the Colts have available to them this offseason, and having Hue Jackson over Chuck Pagano offsets the Luck advantage IMO.

 

Long story short, I don't think our roster is going to be as talented as theirs for much longer.

[Superman]

You're romanticizing the past. For instance, Marcus Pollard wasn't better than Dwayne Allen, especially not at this point in his career. Collie and Harrison never played with each other, neither did Addai and James, neither did Pollard and Addai, etc., so lumping all those players together is painting a very inaccurate picture. Over the course of 14 years, yes, the Colts had a lot talent, and this iteration of the Colts can't touch it. Yet.

 

That doesn't mean this version of the Colts is anything reminiscent of the Browns. And I'd like to point out that the problem with the Browns isn't that they're bad now, it's that they've been bad since they came back into existence. They are perennial cellar dwellers, unlike the Colts, who are used to being in the playoffs every year (and whose fan base has a collective meltdown when they don't make it, or even when they lose a playoff game; people wanted Jim Caldwell fired after his first season). 

 

Yes, the roster needs talent, desperately. It's not nearly as bad as you're trying to make it seem. 

[Superman]

2 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

having Hue Jackson over Chuck Pagano offsets the Luck advantage IMO.

 

Are we going to let Hue Jackson earn his reputation as a good head coach, or are we just going to give it to him?

[RockThatBlue]

The roster obviously has holes, but we are definitely not Cleveland level. 

[SaturdayAllDay]

6 minutes ago, Superman said:

You're romanticizing the past. For instance, Marcus Pollard wasn't better than Dwayne Allen, especially not at this point in his career. Collie and Harrison never played with each other, neither did Addai and James, neither did Pollard and Addai, etc., so lumping all those players together is painting a very inaccurate picture. Over the course of 14 years, yes, the Colts had a lot talent, and this iteration of the Colts can't touch it. Yet.

 

That doesn't mean this version of the Colts is anything reminiscent of the Browns. And I'd like to point out that the problem with the Browns isn't that they're bad now, it's that they've been bad since they came back into existence. They are perennial cellar dwellers, unlike the Colts, who are used to being in the playoffs every year (and whose fan base has a collective meltdown when they don't make it, or even when they lose a playoff game; people wanted Jim Caldwell fired after his first season). 

 

Yes, the roster needs talent, desperately. It's not nearly as bad as you're trying to make it seem. 

I was typing almost this exact thing out and you beat me to it. 

 

Great post!!

[jvan1973]

12 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

Browns go into this offseason with over $100mil in salary cap space, the first overall pick as well as the 12th overall, with 13 total draft picks. That's basically twice what the Colts have available to them this offseason, and having Hue Jackson over Chuck Pagano offsets the Luck advantage IMO.

 

Long story short, I don't think our roster is going to be as talented as theirs for much longer.

Because Hue did such a great job this year??

[PeterBowman]

the original post is Cleveland Browns level.

 

The Colts are bad, they're mediocre. They're not devoid of talent, they're devoid of playmakers on D, except the linebackers, that's pretty devoid and needs a HUUUGE upgrade.

[Steamboat_Shaun]

Just now, Superman said:

 

Are we going to let Hue Jackson earn his reputation as a good head coach, or are we just going to give it to him?

 

He got a very raw deal in his first year by having to play with so many different backup QBs, the Josh Gordon debacle, basically losing ALL of his quality offensive linemen, etc. Their putrid record is a huge indication of that.

But look at how well the Terrelle Pryor at WR experiment worked. He went from fringe roster guy to the Browns leading WR, and tallied over 1,000 yards. I'm not saying Jackson's primed to be Belichick 2.0, but that type of outside-the-box thinking, coupled with the fact that he is an innovative offensive mind, is why I think he'll be a good HC.

[throwing BBZ]

41 minutes ago, threeflight said:

When you really look at the Colts roster, you start to see a trend throughout most of it.  The pure lack of talent on all sides of the ball.

 

Go back to the Glory years during the Manning era.  You had Manning, Wayne, Harrison, Stokely, Collie, Clark, James, Addai, Pollard, Saturday, Glenn on the offensive side, and people like Freeney, Sanders, Mathis, Bethea, and a slew of good linebackers.

 

Now?  Compare those players to Luck, Hilton, I guess Moncrief and Kelly on the O, and who on the D?  Davis?  And that is just the starters.  While the Colts have never been a particularly deep team, even our depth now is pretty non existent.  There is just no talent here.  Add in the VERY average coaching at best and it really goes to show you that without Luck, we are the Browns.

 

Thing is, Irsay is in a tough spot. He wants to make a change to a big name coach and GM.  And he should. But his main choices like Harbaugh, Gruden, and Manning, are just not available YET.  So what does he do?  Sit and wait and then fire P and G when someone becomes available?  Or fire them now, hire a no name, and then have one of his top choices become available next year.  Then what...fire the coach he just hired?

What he should have done, and this would have been ballsy, was to go after Harbaugh the moment be became available.  I realize that would mean firing Pagano after 3 good seasons, but if you want Super Bowls with Luck, it would have had to have been done.

 

Now he has to wait....

 

 Take away Lucky, give us the QB`s they used last season and we might have won 2-3.
 So yes we are very close in talent level.  JMO of course.

[Superman]

1 minute ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

 

He got a very raw deal in his first year by having to play with so many different backup QBs, the Josh Gordon debacle, basically losing ALL of his quality offensive linemen, etc. Their putrid record is a huge indication of that.

But look at how well the Terrelle Pryor at WR experiment worked. He went from fringe roster guy to the Browns leading WR, and tallied over 1,000 yards. I'm not saying Jackson's primed to be Belichick 2.0, but that type of outside-the-box thinking, coupled with the fact that he is an innovative offensive mind, is why I think he'll be a good HC.

 

I disagree for the most part, but that's fine. What I have a problem with is you're suggesting that he's not only better than Pagano, but so much better that it cancels out the Luck advantage. 

[SaturdayAllDay]

4 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

 

He got a very raw deal in his first year by having to play with so many different backup QBs, the Josh Gordon debacle, basically losing ALL of his quality offensive linemen, etc. Their putrid record is a huge indication of that.

But look at how well the Terrelle Pryor at WR experiment worked. He went from fringe roster guy to the Browns leading WR, and tallied over 1,000 yards. I'm not saying Jackson's primed to be Belichick 2.0, but that type of outside-the-box thinking, coupled with the fact that he is an innovative offensive mind, is why I think he'll be a good HC.

you could say the same of us tho. We lost our whole secondary to start the season, lost almost our entire starting offensive line throughout the season, and Luck played with an injured throwing shoulder all year. 

 

We still went 8-8. If you are going to throw one coach under the bus because of injuries and a bad roster you can't use them as excuses for another coach. 

[Smonroe]

5 minutes ago, SaturdayAllDay said:

you could say the same of us tho. We lost our whole secondary to start the season, lost almost our entire starting offensive line throughout the season, and Luck played with an injured throwing shoulder all year. 

 

We still went 8-8. If you are going to throw one coach under the bus because of injuries and a bad roster you can't use them as excuses for another coach. 

 

Right.  We have less talent than most teams, yet we were 8-8 and in a number of games until the end.

 

Sure, Luck is a huge factor, but you have to give some credit to the coaches. 

[tfunky14]

Not exactly.

[Steamboat_Shaun]

2 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

I disagree for the most part, but that's fine. What I have a problem with is you're suggesting that he's not only better than Pagano, but so much better that it cancels out the Luck advantage. 

 

Fair. Maybe he doesn't cancel out the Luck advantage, but considering how close we came to getting swept by the Jags last year, I really don't think I'm all that far off base.

 

Regarding Jackson, even with the carousel of QBs they were forced to use, Cleveland still managed to have the best rushing offense in the league for the first 5 or so weeks of the season last year, then all of there linemen got injured, and everything went downhill for them.

 

If Pagano would've been let go after last year, Jackson would've likely been one of the top candidates for the job, and yes, I think it would've been an upgrade. Look at Andy Dalton's numbers last year vs the year before when Jackson was the OC in Cincy. It's like night and day. If he's able to get that kind of production out of Dalton, sky would be the limit with Luck.

[BProland85]

Irsay HAS to get council from the right football minds as to who to go after in free agency and the draft. He HAS to make this team an attractive sell to Peyton and a quality HC candidate again. Right now it isn't. 

[CR91]

You can't be serious

[jameszeigler834]

1 hour ago, threeflight said:

When you really look at the Colts roster, you start to see a trend throughout most of it.  The pure lack of talent on all sides of the ball.

 

Go back to the Glory years during the Manning era.  You had Manning, Wayne, Harrison, Stokely, Collie, Clark, James, Addai, Pollard, Saturday, Glenn on the offensive side, and people like Freeney, Sanders, Mathis, Bethea, and a slew of good linebackers.

 

Now?  Compare those players to Luck, Hilton, I guess Moncrief and Kelly on the O, and who on the D?  Davis?  And that is just the starters.  While the Colts have never been a particularly deep team, even our depth now is pretty non existent.  There is just no talent here.  Add in the VERY average coaching at best and it really goes to show you that without Luck, we are the Browns.

 

Thing is, Irsay is in a tough spot. He wants to make a change to a big name coach and GM.  And he should. But his main choices like Harbaugh, Gruden, and Manning, are just not available YET.  So what does he do?  Sit and wait and then fire P and G when someone becomes available?  Or fire them now, hire a no name, and then have one of his top choices become available next year.  Then what...fire the coach he just hired?

What he should have done, and this would have been ballsy, was to go after Harbaugh the moment be became available.  I realize that would mean firing Pagano after 3 good seasons, but if you want Super Bowls with Luck, it would have had to have been done.

 

Now he has to wait....

The roster is terrible but not quite Cleveland terrible.

[Buck Showalter]

meh... not a fan of the comparison...

If one has to make some analogy, i'd say the Colts are closer to the '13-'15 Falcons... Just need to get the defense to help keep things competitive...

[SaturdayAllDay]

3 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

 

Fair. Maybe he doesn't cancel out the Luck advantage, but considering how close we came to getting swept by the Jags last year, I really don't think I'm all that far off base.

 

Regarding Jackson, even with the carousel of QBs they were forced to use, Cleveland still managed to have the best rushing offense in the league for the first 5 or so weeks of the season last year, then all of there linemen got injured, and everything went downhill for them.

 

If Pagano would've been let go after last year, Jackson would've likely been one of the top candidates for the job, and yes, I think it would've been an upgrade. Look at Andy Dalton's numbers last year vs the year before when Jackson was the OC in Cincy. It's like night and day. If he's able to get that kind of production out of Dalton, sky would be the limit with Luck.

The thing is, Irsay allegedly DID try and make a change last offseason when he looked into getting Sean Payton. If this is true, then obviously Jackson wasn't one of the top candidates for the job. With all the rumors swirling over last offseason and again this year it seems like Irsay is only going after an established coach, not a promoted Coordinator. 

 

Also as far as we know the only reason the Browns offense slowed down was because it was a new system with a new offense and the other teams didnt know what to expect from them. As soon as they had a few weeks of tape other teams had something to plan against and they started losing their edge. Honestly its probably a little from column A, a little from Column B. 

 

Definitely not enough evidence to prove hes going to be a successful HC. If he comes out swinging next year and they improve, then hes on his way. 

[Andrew Luck fan club]

Random but I still don't know why Cleveland let Mack leave.. amazing player and he's really helped ATL.

[2006Coltsbestever]

No

[SaturdayAllDay]

2 minutes ago, Majin Vegeta said:

Random but I still don't know why Cleveland let Mack leave.. amazing player and he's really helped ATL.

They didnt have much of a choice. He had a player option to void his contract. I might be remembering wrong but I seem to remember that the contract he signed said they couldnt tag him if he exercised that option. 

[Dudley Smith]

40 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

 

He got a very raw deal in his first year by having to play with so many different backup QBs, the Josh Gordon debacle, basically losing ALL of his quality offensive linemen, etc. Their putrid record is a huge indication of that.

But look at how well the Terrelle Pryor at WR experiment worked. He went from fringe roster guy to the Browns leading WR, and tallied over 1,000 yards. I'm not saying Jackson's primed to be Belichick 2.0, but that type of outside-the-box thinking, coupled with the fact that he is an innovative offensive mind, is why I think he'll be a good HC.

 

Pryor was actually recruited by a number of teams as a WR out of high school (including Notre Dame I believe). He went to Ohio State because Jim Tressel allowed him to play QB. His true talent has always been as a receiver, so I am not sure it is really all that far-fetched what Jackson did. I guess I will give a little credit since no one thought to try it before now with him.

[John Waylon]

Oh... Oh my...

[Dudley Smith]

20 minutes ago, BProland85 said:

Irsay HAS to get council from the right football minds as to who to go after in free agency and the draft. He HAS to make this team an attractive sell to Peyton and a quality HC candidate again. Right now it isn't. 

 

I'd like to believe that but what is more likely is that the people he has talked to simply aren't interested period (Peyton, Gruden, etc.). It has nothing to do with the state of the roster, which could probably be drastically improved in just a couple of seasons with the right FA signings and draft choices.

[OffensivelyPC]

What is this trollish nonsense?  

[Superman]

46 minutes ago, Steamboat_Shaun said:

 

Fair. Maybe he doesn't cancel out the Luck advantage, but considering how close we came to getting swept by the Jags last year, I really don't think I'm all that far off base.

 

Regarding Jackson, even with the carousel of QBs they were forced to use, Cleveland still managed to have the best rushing offense in the league for the first 5 or so weeks of the season last year, then all of there linemen got injured, and everything went downhill for them.

 

If Pagano would've been let go after last year, Jackson would've likely been one of the top candidates for the job, and yes, I think it would've been an upgrade. Look at Andy Dalton's numbers last year vs the year before when Jackson was the OC in Cincy. It's like night and day. If he's able to get that kind of production out of Dalton, sky would be the limit with Luck.

 

The Browns actually moved Pryor to WR before Hue Jackson got there. Not taking away all credit for it, because Jackson says he was trying to get Pryor to consider the change back when he was with the Bengals. Still, it wasn't just a stroke of genius on Jackson's part, Pryor has been considered a potential WR prospect for several years now. Credit the Browns for getting it right at this point.

 

If it were me, Jackson would have been on the short list of candidates last year. But if you believe the reports that he considered trading for Payton last year, and that he tried to hire Gruden this year, then it's not likely that Jackson would have been on Irsay's list. Seems like Irsay doesn't want to replace Pagano for another first timer, he wants an established guy if he's going to make a change.

 

And yes, I like Jackson. Just think we're being premature at this point. I know the Browns don't have a good roster, but they only won 1 game. Jackson's best season saw his team finish with the same 8-8 record that Colts fans are up in arms about, which is Pagano's worst. Jackson is better than Pagano, specifically on offense, and I believe that if Jackson was coaching the Colts, they would have won 10+ games this year. I just think we're crowning him a little prematurely. 

[SilentHill]

I don't think we are at the Browns level just yet.... trending in that direction? Sure no one can argue that, but we're not there yet.

[jshipp23]

2 hours ago, threeflight said:

When you really look at the Colts roster, you start to see a trend throughout most of it.  The pure lack of talent on all sides of the ball.

 

Go back to the Glory years during the Manning era.  You had Manning, Wayne, Harrison, Stokely, Collie, Clark, James, Addai, Pollard, Saturday, Glenn on the offensive side, and people like Freeney, Sanders, Mathis, Bethea, and a slew of good linebackers.

 

Now?  Compare those players to Luck, Hilton, I guess Moncrief and Kelly on the O, and who on the D?  Davis?  And that is just the starters.  While the Colts have never been a particularly deep team, even our depth now is pretty non existent.  There is just no talent here.  Add in the VERY average coaching at best and it really goes to show you that without Luck, we are the Browns.

 

Thing is, Irsay is in a tough spot. He wants to make a change to a big name coach and GM.  And he should. But his main choices like Harbaugh, Gruden, and Manning, are just not available YET.  So what does he do?  Sit and wait and then fire P and G when someone becomes available?  Or fire them now, hire a no name, and then have one of his top choices become available next year.  Then what...fire the coach he just hired?

What he should have done, and this would have been ballsy, was to go after Harbaugh the moment be became available.  I realize that would mean firing Pagano after 3 good seasons, but if you want Super Bowls with Luck, it would have had to have been done.

 

Now he has to wait....

We went 6-3 without him last year with a medicre at best coach...That tells me that the talent level isn't bad..I'm not making excuses, but we were decimated at almost EVERY position with injuries this year..It is not the NORM to have the injuries we had this year at all...Next year if we just have an average year injury wise and the guys we have heal up and develop we should be much better even if we do nothing to add talent...We will of course add talent through the draft and free agency so we have the possibility of making a major jump much like the Falcons did this year even with this staff...

[presto123]

 The guys on NFL Live just said today that other than Luck, the Colts have the worst talent in the AFC South. They basically wasted the years where Luck was making very little money and here we are 5 or so years later sitting with the worst talent in a bad division.(maybe we have more talent than Cleveland, but we are still one of the worst in this regard)   Then we have an owner who still doesn't believe this is a fireable offense. Irsay has let personal friendships cloud his judgement. I have no doubt about that now.

[threeflight]

Well again, I think if you go down the list of guys that the Colts have that are truly considered above average (excluding kickers), the list is very very small.

 

Luck

Hilton

Kelly

Maybe Davis though he was down this year

Anyone else?

 

I mean, that is pretty freaking pathetic.  It has to be at the very bottom of the league as far as players that other teams would love to have.

[presto123]

1 minute ago, threeflight said:

Well again, I think if you go down the list of guys that the Colts have that are truly considered above average (excluding kickers), the list is very very small.

 

Luck

Hilton

Kelly

Maybe Davis though he was down this year

Anyone else?

 

I mean, that is pretty freaking pathetic.  It has to be at the very bottom of the league as far as players that other teams would love to have.

 

 Probably Walden as well.

[buccolts]

Interestingly enough, the JMV show brought up this very topic about an hour ago.

They simply posed it as a question, mainly to each other, though I had to stop listening shortly after.

Stupid job.

[jvan1973]

56 minutes ago, threeflight said:

Well again, I think if you go down the list of guys that the Colts have that are truly considered above average (excluding kickers), the list is very very small.

 

Luck

Hilton

Kelly

Maybe Davis though he was down this year

Anyone else?

 

I mean, that is pretty freaking pathetic.  It has to be at the very bottom of the league as far as players that other teams would love to have.

How many players on the Patriots would you say are considered "above average"