Positives & Negatives of game 1

[achcolts]

Positives

Langford is the best fa pickuppickup

Vontae Davis.

Our rookie DL are looking great, McCoy had a worse game than his stats show

Gore still got it

Varga is gonna be great if they use him more

Ol could have been better but I expected a big challenge from bills front7 I think its better than last year

Negative

We will keep getting out coached and expect luck and co to pull 4th quarter heroics to make up for the first 3 quarters theres now an established problem with coaching

Coaching staff shows failure to learn and adjus

I'm worried about Andre

This might be the worst season colts will have mainly becausenof distractions and lack of focus

[aReggie7]

Positives:

- Frank Gore

- Defensive line played much better than I expected. They were not the reason the Colts lost this game

 

Negatives:

- Linebacker play

- Coaching

- Bad Plays (penalties, turnovers, Moncrief's kick return)

 

I don't want to be overly critical of the offensive line. Luck and the receivers had their chances to make plays against one of the best pass rushing lines in the league. Yes they got pressure but the Colts left some plays on the field and I don't think Pep had his best day of play calling.

 

The end result of this game isn't nearly as disappointing as seeing the Colts show nothing to warrant the talk that they are Superbowl contenders. They really are lucky the AFC South isn't very good.

[ThaCaliColt]

Yeah if they manage to play that way every game, ouch! That D is really something special, it must be nice.

Hey, as long as they play that way just 2x more against New England I'm all good. 

[chrisfarley]

Positives:

 

The Defensive Line: Anderson had 8 Tackles, and 1 Assist, even saw him run down Taylor 20 yards down the field.

McCoy was held to 42 yards on 17 carries, of which 1 was 16 yards way after the game was over.

 

Clayton Geathers: Awesome stop on that 4th quarter drive, batting that ball up in the air.

 

Luck: It seemed like there were only about 3 guys on Offense that cared today, Luck's heart is never in question. Though he did try to do a bit too much. 

 

Varga: Solid rushing for a UDFA, and he even had a couple really good Kick Returns too.

 

The Bad:

The Offensive line: We've known this for.... four years, heck, we've gotta reach waaaay back to the Manning Years to find a solid O-Line for the Colts.

 

Trent Cole: 12 guys had more tackles than Cole. 12. Really, all the linebackers belong here. Out of position a lot, lazy in coverage, undisciplined in containment. We are a 3-4, so there's no reason that a Lineman should be outplaying the ILBs.

 

Dorsett: Granted we don't typically expect too much from a rookie, especially on game 1, but the lights weren't out in the stadium until he muffed his second punt of the day. I'm starting to move to Team Whalen on punt returns.

1st round draft picks usually have more of an impact to start the season ...than Dorsett (I said usually)...... but he was a low 1st round pick so there's that.

[throwing BBZ]

Positives:

- Frank Gore

- Defensive line played much better than I expected. They were not the reason the Colts lost this game

 

Negatives:

- Linebacker play

- Coaching

- Bad Plays (penalties, turnovers, Moncrief's kick return)

 

I don't want to be overly critical of the offensive line. Luck and the receivers had their chances to make plays against one of the best pass rushing lines in the league. Yes they got pressure but the Colts left some plays on the field and I don't think Pep had his best day of play calling.

 

The end result of this game isn't nearly as disappointing as seeing the Colts show nothing to warrant the talk that they are Superbowl contenders. They really are lucky the AFC South isn't very good.

 

 I think Luck uses his "amazing mind" to call lots of the plays at the line. And there is this thing called checkdowns too!

[funktacious2]

These are technically called excuses, buuuut:

1) It's a season opening away game

2) Bills have a great D

3) The weather was rough

4) Penalties killed us

5) We're at home next week.

Seriously though, those penalties... the first drive looked incredible as we were moving the ball at will. Then we get a holding penalty, then a false start and all of a sudden it falls apart. The Defense goes out and make a stop, then the offense squandered it again. Then we collapsed in the second quarter and continued to make some costly mistakes late (Dorsett's punt fumbles, tipped interception). The Bills played a very well rounded game, but I think without these costly mistakes the game could have been much closer if not a win. What costly mistakes did the Bills make this game? Nearly everything went their way and they'll win plenty of games that way.

[John Waylon]

Positive:

 

Very little Werner. 

[Smurphy1]

And the problem with that is, once other teams get tape on how to tame our offense.....more times then not, its successfully duplicated. For such a "explosive" offense, they get shut down quite easily.

 

We'll see how many other teams have the enough defensive talent to duplicate it. That bills D is good.

[John Waylon]

4) Penalties killed us

 

 

Yeah. Of all the things that frustrated me yesterday this was at the top of the list. We're always good about not committing penalties but yesterday was just awful. 

 

Dorsett had me rolling my eyes yesterday, but the one play that really raised my ire was his fair catch inside the 10. That's gotta be coaching. That is simple, simple stuff. You set your feet on the 10, and you don't move backwards. There's no need to even try to fair catch it. It doesn't matter if we fair catch it, or they end up with it, we still start at the same spot. 

 

That is all coaching and preparation. I put that squarely on McMahon. Sure, Dorsett could have just gone rogue and acted on his own, but if they had been covering these situations in the two months before yesterday I'm more inclined to believe that he would not have called for a fait catch inside the 10.

[Coffeedrinker]

Positives:

 

• Gore looked good
• TY looked good
• Oline looked good overall in both pass blocking and run blocking (when the 5 olineman can't block 7 defenders that is not on the lineman that is on the scheme and game plan)
• Lance Louis struggled early but settled down.  Mewhort looked good all game.
• Anderson and Langford played well the entire game.
• Vontae Davis played well
• Mike Adams played well.
• Varga should be the #2 RB

Negatives:

• Andrew Luck played poorly
• Coby Fleener played poorly
• Doyle was not very effective blocking.
• Freeman was really bad.
• Lowery was really bad
• Cole was really bad
• Walden played hard but you could see he was the focus of the Bills line and they negated him and no one else stepped up.
• Butler should not play on the outside under any circumstances.
• Pep continues to show he should not coach in the NFL.
• Manusky is very predictable on his D calls, that is why with every team he's been with his defenses get progressively worse every year.
• Both offense and defense seem to be reactionary, they don't seem to try to dictate things, they just try to counter what the other team is doing.
•  

[BullsColtsFan1]

 

Positives:

 

• Gore looked good
• TY looked good
• Oline looked good overall in both pass blocking and run blocking (when the 5 olineman can't block 7 defenders that is not on the lineman that is on the scheme and game plan)
• Lance Louis struggled early but settled down.  Mewhort looked good all game.
• Anderson and Langford played well the entire game.
• Vontae Davis played well
• Mike Adams played well.
• Varga should be the #2 RB

Negatives:

• Andrew Luck played poorly
• Coby Fleener played poorly
• Doyle was not very effective blocking.
• Freeman was really bad.
• Lowery was really bad
• Cole was really bad
• Walden played hard but you could see he was the focus of the Bills line and they negated him and no one else stepped up.
• Butler should not play on the outside under any circumstances.
• Pep continues to show he should not coach in the NFL.
• Manusky is very predictable on his D calls, that is why with every team he's been with his defenses get progressively worse every year.
• Both offense and defense seem to be reactionary, they don't seem to try to dictate things, they just try to counter what the other team is doing.
•  

 

Geathers should start in front of Lowry.  Geathers is an animal.  He's already blocked more passes in one game then Landry did in 2 years lol.  I think he should be our starting safety.

[BullsColtsFan1]

Postitives imo- Vontae(of course), Langford, our run D on McCoy(Not so good on the other two), Geathers

 

Negatives-Everything else on offense and defense.

 

Nothing to panick about yet.  Take care of New York on Monday and get rolling! 

[Surge89]

 

Positives:

 

• Gore looked good
• TY looked good
• Oline looked good overall in both pass blocking and run blocking (when the 5 olineman can't block 7 defenders that is not on the lineman that is on the scheme and game plan)
• Lance Louis struggled early but settled down.  Mewhort looked good all game.
• Anderson and Langford played well the entire game.
• Vontae Davis played well
• Mike Adams played well.
• Varga should be the #2 RB

Negatives:

• Andrew Luck played poorly
• Coby Fleener played poorly
• Doyle was not very effective blocking.
• Freeman was really bad.
• Lowery was really bad
• Cole was really bad
• Walden played hard but you could see he was the focus of the Bills line and they negated him and no one else stepped up.
• Butler should not play on the outside under any circumstances.
• Pep continues to show he should not coach in the NFL.
• Manusky is very predictable on his D calls, that is why with every team he's been with his defenses get progressively worse every year.
• Both offense and defense seem to be reactionary, they don't seem to try to dictate things, they just try to counter what the other team is doing.
•  

 

 

I agree with everything you said except the bolded Pep part.  Pep's first season we played a run heavy traditional style of offense like the one at Stanford.  Everyone complained and cried about it.  Now that he has Luck flinging the ball 50 times a game like Arians used to everyone is complaining.   I feel like everyone needs to step back and let Pep run the offense he used to run at Stanford again..  Yes its boring (running the ball) and yes it isnt going to be record breaking, but it wins games and protects Andrew.  Imo we are back to the Manning days with a lesser QB and that is a recipe for disaster, because only Manning could carry like that.  No other QB in the history of the game could pull off some of the things he did while here in Indy.

 

The other 2 lines I just have to make a point.  I've complained about coaching since the minute Arians was hired.  Arians is a bad play caller, Pagano was not a proven commodity, Manusky is the same old same old.  This team has been severely held back by coaching and decision making for 4 years now.  When you can say that a part of the squad is reactionary or they come out flat and its a repeated thing then you know there is a coaching problem.  Grigson has brought talent and while I don't agree with every decision I do think he is more than viable. Many people complain about the Line(both) talent but this Line talent is actually quite high and much better than what Manning had in his last 5 or 6 years in Indy. The issue was pairing Luck with a rookie HC, OC and a stale DC .  Then the minute the Rookie OC's method doesn't work you make him abandon it and go back to the Manning days. The Oline calls are still questionable at least 40% of the time (like the refusal to go into max protect for some stupid reason), the Linebackers are still fundamentally awful, both sides of the ball always seem unprepared and have to make in game adjustments, which half work and the other half don't.

 

This team has benefited from playing in the worst division in football and that is why things don't change. They see the post season reach as an adequate measurement of progress when the actual achievement is no where near the value of ANY other team in the NFL making the postseason.  

 

rant off...

[Hoosiernsavga]

The positive is its just the first regular season game. The negative is this Colts team is not very good. We will improve with experience or worsen when we play a good offensive team or have any season ending injuries especially on the offensive line. I thought the team was built to play faster and they look slow and lost on both sides of the ball. I know on paper we have more talent but we were much better last year.

[Hoosiernsavga]

I agree with everything you said except the bolded Pep part.  Pep's first season we played a run heavy traditional style of offense like the one at Stanford.  Everyone complained and cried about it.  Now that he has Luck flinging the ball 50 times a game like Arians used to everyone is complaining.   I feel like everyone needs to step back and let Pep run the offense he used to run at Stanford again..  Yes its boring (running the ball) and yes it isnt going to be record breaking, but it wins games and protects Andrew.  Imo we are back to the Manning days with a lesser QB and that is a recipe for disaster, because only Manning could carry like that.  No other QB in the history of the game could pull off some of the things he did while here in Indy.

 

The other 2 lines I just have to make a point.  I've complained about coaching since the minute Arians was hired.  Arians is a bad play caller, Pagano was not a proven commodity, Manusky is the same old same old.  This team has been severely held back by coaching and decision making for 4 years now.  When you can say that a part of the squad is reactionary or they come out flat and its a repeated thing then you know there is a coaching problem.  Grigson has brought talent and while I don't agree with every decision I do think he is more than viable. Many people complain about the Line(both) talent but this Line talent is actually quite high and much better than what Manning had in his last 5 or 6 years in Indy. The issue was pairing Luck with a rookie HC, OC and a stale DC .  Then the minute the Rookie OC's method doesn't work you make him abandon it and go back to the Manning days. The Oline calls are still questionable at least 40% of the time (like the refusal to go into max protect for some stupid reason), the Linebackers are still fundamentally awful, both sides of the ball always seem unprepared and have to make in game adjustments, which half work and the other half don't.

 

This team has benefited from playing in the worst division in football and that is why things don't change. They see the post season reach as an adequate measurement of progress when the actual achievement is no where near the value of ANY other team in the NFL making the postseason.  

 

rant off...

Arians is one of the best play callers in the league IMO!

[JRnINDY]

The positive is its just the first regular season game. The negative is this Colts team is not very good. We will improve with experience or worsen when we play a good offensive team or have any season ending injuries especially on the offensive line. I thought the team was built to play faster and they look slow and lost on both sides of the ball. I know on paper we have more talent but we were much better last year.

After watching several games yesterday I also felt that several Colts looked slow and robotic as in thinking to much or just doing their job. We have speed and natural athleticism all around but only a few played that way.

[aaron11]

Luck always gets a pass for some reason

he was both good and bad at times yesterday.  no one was getting open deep, yet pep kept calling plays down the field!  AJ looked bad out there and may not be an nfl starter anymore.  

 

neither interception can be blamed solely on the qb, especially not the second.  luck had us back in the game until dorsetts fumble

[Surge89]

Arians is one of the best play callers in the league IMO!

 

You haven't seen many games under him then.  In Pitt and in Indy he got his QB's killed and was either boom or bust.  So either he scored 30+ or he scored less than 10 and backup QB is playing because of injury.

[UKColt13]

Positives:

Dline balled out all night. Made shady look very average. Got a lot of penetration all game too.

Vontae. Watkins didn't even register on the box score last night. Dude came to play

Oline. Allowed only 2 sacks and 4/5/6 pressures against (Dareus or no Dareus) one of the best front 7s in football. Also, we successfully ran the ball against the Buffalo D. That's big. Gore looked good doing it too.

Negs:

0 sacks for the D. We got it half right, we stopped the run well but didn't get consistent pressure.

Still not great against the blitz

Still having problems containing mobile QBs.

Promising looking 1st drive killed by 2 Oline penalties.

We abandoned the run game too early. I don't know if that had something to do with Gore picking up a knock though.

Luck looked panicked too much especially against the blitz.

WRs struggled for separation, although I can give some props to the Buffalo secondary, they played a good game.

Very rough night for all of the LBs and Darius Butler looked extremely uncomfortable on the outside.

[UKColt13]

Geathers should start in front of Lowry.  Geathers is an animal.  He's already blocked more passes in one game then Landry did in 2 years lol.  I think he should be our starting safety.

I think he will be by mid season. That and Varga taking over a #2 in the backfield.

[Coffeedrinker]

I agree with everything you said except the bolded Pep part.  Pep's first season we played a run heavy traditional style of offense like the one at Stanford.  Everyone complained and cried about it.  Now that he has Luck flinging the ball 50 times a game like Arians used to everyone is complaining.   I feel like everyone needs to step back and let Pep run the offense he used to run at Stanford again..  Yes its boring (running the ball) and yes it isnt going to be record breaking, but it wins games and protects Andrew.  Imo we are back to the Manning days with a lesser QB and that is a recipe for disaster, because only Manning could carry like that.  No other QB in the history of the game could pull off some of the things he did while here in Indy.

 

The other 2 lines I just have to make a point.  I've complained about coaching since the minute Arians was hired.  Arians is a bad play caller, Pagano was not a proven commodity, Manusky is the same old same old.  This team has been severely held back by coaching and decision making for 4 years now.  When you can say that a part of the squad is reactionary or they come out flat and its a repeated thing then you know there is a coaching problem.  Grigson has brought talent and while I don't agree with every decision I do think he is more than viable. Many people complain about the Line(both) talent but this Line talent is actually quite high and much better than what Manning had in his last 5 or 6 years in Indy. The issue was pairing Luck with a rookie HC, OC and a stale DC .  Then the minute the Rookie OC's method doesn't work you make him abandon it and go back to the Manning days. The Oline calls are still questionable at least 40% of the time (like the refusal to go into max protect for some stupid reason), the Linebackers are still fundamentally awful, both sides of the ball always seem unprepared and have to make in game adjustments, which half work and the other half don't.

 

This team has benefited from playing in the worst division in football and that is why things don't change. They see the post season reach as an adequate measurement of progress when the actual achievement is no where near the value of ANY other team in the NFL making the postseason.  

 

rant off...

I didn't complain about it.  And all of last year I talked about how Pep doesn't establish the running game.  I talked about how no RB is going to be successful when he only gets the ball 3 or 4 times a half.

 

As to your rant, yes the reactionary part is directly related to the coaching.

[ColtsFanMikeC]

Positives:

 

1) Vontae was a stud.  They only attempted 1 pass to Watkins I believe and Vontae broke it up.  I am very glad to see him shadowing the other team's best WR instead of just playing on one side.

2) The DL.  They were penetrating and doing a lot to stop the run.  The only time runs broke out was when a LB didn't close a gap (see the K. Williams run) or when the QB scrambled on a broken play (fortunately, we don't have to face many mobile QB's this season, but it is hard to say who is responsible for those runs -- coaches maybe? LBs and safeties maybe? I don't think that falls on the DL though).

3) Varga as a KR.  I am glad we took Moncrief out after he forced us to start a drive on our own 3.  A couple Varga took out of the endzone I was skeptical about, but he bounced off some people and was bringing the ball past the 20.

4) Dorsett as a WR -- I thought he looked good in the limited time he got filling in for TY.  I thought TY looked pretty good before he went out, too.

5) I think this team has heart -- they played very bad, but some how when I was watching I was still hopeful they would pull it off until Dorsett's fumble.

6) Geathers -- I was trying to watch him every time he was on the field.  He made a couple very nice plays and it was rare to see him out of position. 

 

Neutral:

1) Pat McAffee -- he looked good on kickoffs and was OK punting. 

2) Offensive line -- the holding penalty on Holmes was very costly, Louis looked a little shaky but seemed to settle down, I didn't really notice much from Mewhort, Herremans or Castonzo (except a penalty on AC) which I'm fine with (nothing spectacular, but in my opinion, you are doing your job as an OL if you're not getting noticed).  The Bills d-line is the best we will play all year (I think one of the 2 best DLs in football), so we should only improve as the OL unit has time to gel and the opposing DL quality drops off.  They were definitely allowing some pressure, but we were also in obvious pass formations most of the game and that is a very good D, so that is to be expected, IMO.

3) Luck -- he was getting pressured, especially early, which didn't help him.  The first INT I thought was totally on Luck with an under throw.  The second INT was a little high, though it took a very good play from both Bills' defenders involved (the one punching it from AJ and the one in position the make the play).  Overall, I thought Luck was a little high with his throws today and a little late on some, but don't think this loss was his fault by any means.  I'm not worried about Andrew.

4) Safety play -- I thought Adams was pretty good and Lowery was OK.  I think some of their flaws were highlighted due to poor ILB play.

5) Dwayne Allen -- he wasn't great, and his stat line would have been better had Holmes not negated his 30 yard reception with a penalty.  He will be in the end zone many more times this season, I believe.

6) Moncrief as a WR -- his hands seemed pretty good, but he didn't really seem to be creating separation on his own.

 

Negative:

1) Butler -- he got toasted a few times on the outside.  That said, I don't know that we have a CB on this roster with Toler and Smith out (besides Vontae who was blanketing Watkins) that wouldn't have gotten burned by Harvin.

2) LB play -- D'Qwell I thought was much better than Freeman.  That Williams TD run was all Freeman, IMO.  Pretty much all the big runs from the RBs were because they got into lanes that should have been filled by our LBs.  Cole didn't impress me much with his pass rush.  Walden was OK, but not great.

3) Play calling -- we were very predictable on both O and D.  I was really hoping to see us mix up our offensive sets but we were in 3 WR, 1 TE, 1 RB sets the majority of the time.  The way Buffalo was sending the blitz, I thought we should have switched into some 2 or 3 TE sets to counter with run plays or short drop offs to our TEs.  I was also hoping to see more 4 WR sets to see how teams would deal with TY, Dorsett and Moncrief and their collective speed.  Finally, I am not impressed with our WR screen plays -- I watched the Broncos' game later in the afternoon and they were very impressive in setting up their WR screens and moving the chains.  We certainly have the WR talent to be effective, but the way the plays are designed or executed wasn't getting it done.  Also, on our TD drive in the 3rd quarter -- to me, that is a perfect type of drive to start a game or to finish a game when we have the lead, but we ran almost 10 minutes off the clock when we were down 3 scores in the second half.

4) Andre Johnson -- I thought he was struggling to get separation and there were a few balls thrown his was that I think he should have caught.

5) Dorsett as a PR -- I think he'll improve and hope we give him another chance, but I had all the hope in the world we would come back in that game until he dropped that punt.

6) Adam Vinatieri -- he wasn't even close on that 52 yarder.  I'll give him benefit of the doubt because he has been Mr. Clutch for so long, but I really hope that isn't a sign of Father Time catching up to him.

7) Moncrief as a KR -- I was very angry when he took that ball out of the end zone and even more angry when he slipped inside of our own 5.  Sometimes, when it comes to luck, you have to make your own and it sure doesn't make life easier for our offense to have them start in field position like that.

8) Overall field position battle -- this is where we were best in the league last year -- yesterday, we were constantly starting in worse field position than Buffalo.  Some of this was due to untimely penalties, turnovers, bad choice making by our returners, etc... but we need to change this ASAP.  It is very hard to win in the NFL when you can't win the field position battles.

[FloridaColtsFan]

Positives? Vontae, langford, front 3 in the dline.

Negatives? Everything else

 

Let's not forget Tyler Varga !!

[austriancolt]

Colts are facing the same old problems! Relying on their Quarterback to win games like in the Manning era. A ÖL that is terrible for years now and a general manager that still thinks some back ups or late rounders solve the problem. A Defense that has one impact player in vontae davis and again a GM that ignores to load it with talent for the fourth straight year. A team that again and again looks unprepared going into a game for the third straight year which is on the coaches.

[BullsColtsFan1]

I think he will be by mid season. That and Varga taking over a #2 in the backfield.

Man I said the same thing about Varga.  I figured he'd get more carries at some point in time.  He's good, that spin move/juke he had was nice.  His story is amazing too.  Getting hurt in high school and being told he'd never play again.  Apparantely he had a nasty knee/leg injury and almost had to have it amputated.  I am rooting for him.

[Steamboat_Shaun]

Dating back to Week 14 of last season, the Bills' D has faced Peyton, Rodgers & Luck. Combined stats: 601 yards, 2 TD, 6 INT.

— Field Yates (@FieldYates)

September 13, 2015

 

Out of those 3 guys, Luck had the most success. Interesting.

[jeremy2020]

Davis was amazing. He's one of the best corners in football without a doubt. 

[Freenyfan102]

Negative crappagano is still the coach

[akcolt]

And the problem with that is, once other teams get tape on how to tame our offense.....more times then not, its successfully duplicated. For such a "explosive" offense, they get shut down quite easily.

They played a pretty big roll in shutting themselves down. You can't make the mistakes we made and expect to win the game. Our ST's were quite effective at pinning us deep. Turnovers and penalties. It was bad football

The positive is it's all things that can be cleaned up. It was one game.