MarylandTerrapin

Forget the QB for a moment. What would our record be if: 1. We elect to kick the FG against the Rams to make it 23-11 instead of going for it on 4th and 7 in the 3rd Q. 2. Leading 21-17, we play it safe and run the ball three times at the end of the first half of the Browns game, forcing them to burn all 3 timeouts - OR - we punt the ball instead of attempting a 60 yard FG. The only times you should ever attempt a 60 yard FG is at the end of a half or at the end of a game.

I call nonsense on that Twitter post as the flex date is Sat the 16th, not Fri the 15th. I believe there will be 3 "TBD" games on Sat the 16th - a 1pm game. a 4:30pm game, and an 8pm game - all times eastern. I'm sure Pitt/Indy will be one of them.

Can't we all just get along? Sincerely, The Ghost of Rodney King

It's a race to 10 wins to get to the post-season. If we want to get to 10 wins, then we will need to get back to our 2021 style of play, run the ball and have some timely passing, and win the TO battle. No crime in using two back sets (JT and Moss) and even rolling G-Min out and throwing to the backs. Eat up some clock on drives to take pressure off the D. I agree that the toughest offenses we face the rest of the way are the Bucs and the Texans. I could see a realistic scenario that has us at 9-7 to face the 10-6 Texans in the finale. A Texans win could give them the South (I'm assuming a sweep over the Jags and they both finish 11-6). A Colts win gets them in at 10-7 with a sweep over Houston. They could flex it to the Saturday afternoon or SNF to highlight Stroud and maybe the Colts end up with a "feel good" storyline (rookie QB goes down, overcome Leonard's release, Minshew-Mania 2.0). All of this is moot if we don't beat the Bucs.

I suffer from constipation myself. Prune juice works wonders.

With Watson and Burrow out for the season, I'm wondering what the Cleve/Cincy records will be heading into their week 18 finale. Check out these other week 18 matchups - Texans at Colts Vikings at Lions Broncos at Raiders Bills at Dolphins Chiefs at Chargers Steelers at Ravens There will be plenty of scoreboard watching around the NFL. There will be one team from each conference that ends up sneaking in the postseason after being left for dead.

TBH, I'm not worried about being swept by the Jags as we weren't going to win the division anyway. I could see a scenario where the Colts, Jags, and Texans all have 4-2 division records with all 3 teams doing a rock/paper/scissors sweep of each other with the Titans going 0-6. We seem to play better on the road this year for some reason so that makes the home game against the Bucs an absolute must win. Week 18 of the season will be brutal, but fun as many playoff hopefuls will be playing division games against each other. I agree with other posters that our bye came at the right time - we need to get healthy for the stretch run.

When the 17 game season was announced, I always felt that you needed 10 wins (10-7) to lock in the final playoff spot. If we want to pick up 5 more wins, we need to go back to the 2021 formula of running the ball and complement it with timely passing. I would have loved to get the Rams and Browns games back and sit at 7-3, but at 5-5 we're still in the thick of the playoff race. The thing that will keep us in this is that the other AFC contenders are cannibalizing each other. Should make for some fun scoreboard watching the rest of the way.

That was the 2019 game against the Broncos when Von Miller almost sacked JB for a safety. TY made a great sideline catch and Vinnie eventually kicked a GW FG over 50 yards to cap the drive.

I see the resemblance more in the commercials. Harbaugh + glasses = Nate

And the NFL thought it would be such a great idea to go to 17 games. They should've let everything be. Four preseason games and 16 regular season games worked. The only change I would've made was to give every team 2 bye weeks during the season. It would have been a win-win - it still would have stretched the regular season to 18 weeks of coverage and given players more opportunities to heal. As it is, the league is quickly ruining the game I grew up to love.

I feel you. In fact, I authored that infamous post back in 2008 "We Are Spoiled Beyond Belief" when we had that slow start due to Manning's knee issue during the off-season. I got a lot push back for speaking the truth. My earliest Colts memory goes back to the 1976 playoffs against the hated Steelers when that * pilot crashed his plane into Memorial Stadium. If the Colts would've won that game, dozens of fans would've been killed - in a weird way, it's good the Colts got blown out as most fans had already left. I also remember the 1977 finale against the Pats that won us the division - an incredible comeback marred with controversy on the Bert Jones "non-fumble". Everything turned to crap in 1978 and beyond. I'm curious how the Pats fans are taking things.

The guy from those True Classic t-shirt commercials, Nate Twer. He is the spitting image of Harbaugh. Look him up and see for yourself.

I argue that our defensive woes can be attributed to the offense turning the ball over. The Jags scored 37 points, but had under 300 yards of total offense. The Browns scored 39 points with 316 yards of total offense. The common thread was points off of turnovers. Our D did hold both the Titans and Ravens under 20 points. Our D has forced 10 turnovers, but our O has turned it over 12 times. We need to get back on the plus side of the turnover ratio and the wins will follow.

The bolded phrase is the difference of being 3-4 instead of 5-2 as it applied to the Rams game as well.

Shane is much better than Reich - I gave him a "Good" only because I question his strategy a few times this season (see my other posts). Just take the points when they are readily available and don't be afraid to punt the ball when the situation calls for it. The good news is that Shane does have a high ceiling and he holds players, and himself, accountable.

Correct. If Shane calls the game like I mentioned above, then it's 38-23 with 5 minutes left and the refs calls don't matter anyway. Give Cleveland the garbage TD to make it 38-30 and let them try an onsides kick with 15 seconds left. There's a fine line between 5-2 and 3-4. If Shane tweaks a couple decisions (takes FG vs Rams on 4th & 7 and runs the ball vs the Browns), then we're looking at 5-2. There's absolutely nothing wrong with playing it safe when the situation calls for it - that's simply smart coaching in my book. You need to consider who you have as your personnel on the field.

Let's forget about the officiating for a moment. Shane elects to go for it on 4th down and not kick a short FG against the Titans at the end of the first half - comes up empty with no points. When Shane decides to kick a FG, he elects to kick a 60 yard FG instead of punting and potentially pinning them deep - even if it goes into the end zone, the Browns get it on their 20. Makes no sense. When you have the ball at your 11 and you're facing Garrett with under 2 minutes until halftime, you run the ball three times with Taylor/Moss and force Cleveland to burn all of their timeouts. It's not that difficult to understand as G-Min had already fumbled once earlier in the half.

4th and 5 from the opponents 46? I take the 5 yard delay of game and punt from my 49 and pin them inside the 10. If the defense declines the penalty, then I do a directional kick or try a pooch punt. At that point, anything inside the 20 is still a win. With a rookie QB, I'm kicking the FG against the Jags in the opener and against the Rams. With G-Min, I kick the FG at the end of the 1st half against Tennessee to make it 13-6. Analytics have their place in certain circumstances, but most of the time, I'm taking the points. Shane needs to know when to swallow pride and take the points when available because we don't have an offense that can score at will. Even with Peyton, Dungy admitted that it is ok to punt and let the defense play.

I remember on an occasion some years back that a coinflip was used to break a tie in drafting order. Here's an amusing scenario: Imagine that the Chiefs/Chargers week 18 game is flexed to SNF. Chiefs are 10-6 and SD is 9-7. Chargers beat the Chiefs, win the West on a tiebreaker. The point margin in the loss forces all the WC tiebreakers to take effect and it comes down to a coin toss between the Chiefs and another 10-7 team for the final WC slot. Because Taylor is still dating Travis, the coin toss is nationally televised and Arrowhead stadium is sold out just to view the toss (since KC is the defending SB champ, the toss is held at Arrowhead). Taylor Swift and Brittany Mahomes are in the luxury suite and the cameras zoom in on them. Roger Goddell flips the coin, KC loses the coin toss and are out of the postseason. The camera zooms in on Taylor & Brittany as their makeup is running down their faces due to their excessive tears. KC fans and Swifties across the country begin to protest and rioting ensues, Taylor breaks up with Travis, and proceeds to write songs for a new breakup album she calls "Coinflip". She eventually begins a new relationship with...Tom Brady.

If all 3 teams who are tied have played each other, then head to head still applies. If Houston beat Atlanta to go 3-2, then Colts, Jags, & Texans head to head would go into effect since we all played each other already and everyone was 1-1. Afterwards, it goes to the division record where the Colts would have won the tiebreaker with a 2-1 record. Let's put tiebreakers to rest by beating the Jags so we can hold 1st place alone.

Remember that 2015 was the season we went through all those QBs. Luck went down and Hasselback filled in admirably...until he went down. We had "clipboard Jesus" Whitehurst, then Josh Freeman and Ryan Lindley. We beat the Titans in the finale by rotating Freeman & Lindley - each made some good plays.

Having two solid QBs isn't a problem. Having no solid QB is a problem. With that being said, what if Shane messes with the opposition's game plan and platoons both QBs if we make the playoffs. Colts did it in the 2015 season finale when they rotated Freeman and Lindley.

I noticed it when they posted the victory speech on Monday. G-Min reminds me of a cross between Hulk Hogan and The Macho Man from back in the WWF days. I don't remember it being this lively during the Dungy era. Dungy and his Colt teams were all business. They expected to win each week so it was just another day at the office. G-Min: "...OHHH...YEEAAHHHH!!"

I think AR returns after the bye. If both the Colts and Jags are 6-4 after our bye week, then we'll actually be in decent shape for the stretch run as long as we beat the Jags this Sunday.