Jump to content
Indianapolis Colts
Indianapolis Colts Fan Forum

Why I'm not mad.....


SoCalColts

Recommended Posts

Obviously. That's why we lost.

 

My point was just that I don't think this was a terrible loss, aside from the way we shot ourselves in the foot. Not taking a moral victory or anything, but we're talking about a handful of plays, and most of the issues were self-inflicted. 

 

Agreed.  But what many here won't admit, is the discrepancy between top team and bottom teams (except the most rancid. LOL) isn't as much as many make it out to be.  Many game are lost because a team make two, three, or four bad mistakes a game, otherwise have a solid outing. We're falling back into that making too many mistakes to be a good team slope.  Some teams have extras in the tank to overcome them, others do not.  Our gas tank here seems to be getting lower as well.  I don;t see all that much confidence recently, and no swag.  Plus, we had to dig way to often and too deep in 'trick plays' bag. Spend some of that fake punt time learning how not to block in the back or make it look like you tackling a D-lineman when your trying to Protect 12... or gap discipline, or...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 87
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Top Posters In This Topic

I saw a lot of positives as well.  Loved the Newsome sack.  

 

I think this was supposed to be easier for NE but Indy didn't lay down and die like they've done in the last few outings.

 

Luck is still healing and looked pretty good for his first game back.  The O-line and the run game were ok.  As you stated, Pass coverage needs improvement.  

 

Brady was averaging 346 yards/game. He was going to throw the ball effectively. We actually held him to his lowest adjusted yards/attempt of the season, and that's with a couple big blunders (the Martin catch and the Gronk catch and run). The plays Brady made for TDs to Edelman and Blount were just really good plays that caused our zones to be stretched further than they should have been.

 

I hate when people talk about the blueprint to beat a good team, but this is pretty much it. You flood them with coverage, and you have to get Brady off his spot and force him to make contested throws, and you have to tackle. You're not going to overwhelm them with immediate pass rush, and you're not going to keep him from completing passes.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

 

 

 

7. I see so much hate for Pagano about he's a bad coach, but when are people going to talk about Grigson and players he drafts. We have so many needs on defense and offensive line yet we draft for offense. I mean people complain Pagano is suppose to be a defensive guru, but its hard to make a good defense with C+ players.

 

 

 

You really lost me here.  Grigson has done a good job building the DL this year and his veteran Safety additions have been home runs.  He was right about the OL, in that the current combination has played quite well without any huge additions.  The OL has been the worst coached unit of the team over the last 3 years, but it has talent and is rounding into form.  You can label them C+ players, but I didn't notice any quality difference between the Colts' and Patriot defenders, and yet many are calling the Pats' D one of the league's best.  But I don't mind people underestimating the Colts' D...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think they had a good game plan.  I also like the fact that they threw the kitchen sink at them.  Had we recovered that onside kick (bad call IMO on the ref) or really did draw a penalty with that punt, we'd be hailing Pags as a genius.  But it is what it is.  I think there was a lot of positives and yes, I'll take moral victories any where I can find them.  There was a lot here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Three big mistakes, IMO. The obvious punt trick, the blown coverage on Gronk, and the gashed run defense on Blount's TD. Other than that, the Colts played well enough. 

 

A bigger issue was abandoning the run in the 4th quarter, which is inexcusable and was totally unnecessary. It happens way too often, and someone needs to scream in Pep's ear or Luck's ear or whoever is ultimately making the call to keep feeding Gore. 

 

But especially on defense, the game plan was more than good enough. Just had some sloppy play against a really good team at the wrong times. And one gigantic brain fart.

 

Add the 11 penalties.  I think our defensive game plan was very sound like you said -- and our defense didn't really have the 'bad' penalties - the only ones I thought were blatantly bad were Cole's offsides (one of which got declined anyway -- but for a guy that is in his 30's and a veteran like him, you can't be giving the other team, especially Brady, free plays) -- Toler's Pass INT was questionable, IMO, but still not terrible.  Adams' facemask, we obviously could have done without, but to his credit their RB got so low so late in that play, I didn't think there was much else he could have done to still have made the tackle there.  The offensive holdings and false starts are what was killing me.  It may very well be our OL needs yet another facelift -- not for nothing, but C. Jones and Ninkovitch are both very good (pro bowl quality) players -- I was a bit disappointed in Costanzo for a couple of his holds (one I thought was questionable), but Reitz is made to be a back up in this league -- line him up one on one enough times vs. a pro bowl quality player and he is bound to get dinged with some holding calls.  A few of them later in the game helped kill us, iMO.

 

You're right.....the problem wasn't the game plan, the problem was that we abandoned it for no reason and that stupid, *ic, foolish, brainless, fake punt sealed the deal.  I don't care who's fault it was or what it was designed to do.  You don't do crap like that.  As soon as they lined up, I was screaming at the TV, before they snapped it, any * would have seen that wasn't gonna work.

 

I'd like to know why we abandoned the short game and the running game in the 2nd half, before we got down by 2 scores?  

 

Like I said, if I'm Irsay, the coaches are gone....Now.  I'd have guards in front of the doors with boxes of their crap and find someone else.

 

I'm still not ready to give up on the coaches -- and don't think it'd be wise to do so in mid-season of Luck's contract year.  We are still in control of our division and if we can get the minor mistakes fixed there is a chance we're looking at a 5 or 6 win team right now.  As I said above, I think some of the mistakes we're making are due to lack of quality players than anything else -- see our OL's holding problems for example -- the coaches don't really have any better talent on this team at that position now -- when we've got back-up quality players expected to guard pro-bowl quality players, all the coaching in the world isn't going to end at least some of the penalties.

 

My main concern was that they kept the game close and showed signs of growth. The Pats respected our run defense, but then exposed the whole in our middle of the field defense.

The Colts still aren't an elite team yet. But it maybe more of a personnel issue than a coaching issue. In this game the lack of playmaking LBs and pass rush killed us.

 

Yes -- Rodney Harrison said it very well at half-time, IMO, when he mentioned that if a pass-rusher on either team could step up and beat one-on-one blocking to hit the other QB, it would be a difference maker.  To beat Brady you have to be able to hit him without a whole lot of blitzing or he will eat you up with his dink-and-dunk game.  Mathis looks to be improving but still a step slow, Cole has not impressed me at all, and Newsome has yet to develop into the player I think he can be.  We will need this group to step up if we want to have a shot against teams like NE come playoff time. 

 

All coaching. Coughlin fines his guys 500 dollars for not being 5 minutes early to meetings. This group went from least penalized to most in a few years. No discipline. They should have fines, they should be doing pushups or running hills like back in high school.

 

Like I said earlier -- maybe fine Costanzo or make him do push-ups because he is a very good player with no excuse to be penalized.  Fine Cole for jumping offside twice because no 30+ year old that's been in the league as long as he has should be doing that.  Fine Andre Johnson for a false-start because a future HOFer with as much experience as him shouldn't be doing that.  Not to defend Reitz, but what do you expect when you have him going up vs. players as skilled as the Pats' line/LB all day -- he's outmatched and without serious help he is going to get a few holding calls on him -- that to me is on the FO, not the coaches or the players.

 

Obviously. That's why we lost.

 

My point was just that I don't think this was a terrible loss, aside from the way we shot ourselves in the foot. Not taking a moral victory or anything, but we're talking about a handful of plays, and most of the issues were self-inflicted. 

 

Agreed -- all 3 of our losses this year have been mostly caused by self-inflicted wounds.  If we can get rid of them, we can and should be able to play with any team.  Of course, I think we need some improved play from our LBs and our OL (specificallly the right side of the OL), but no team is so solid across the board that there aren't some mismatches when playing other playoff caliber teams.  The bigger thing, IMO, is to just remain healthy and stop beating ourselves.  I'm not ready to panic yet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Agreed -- all 3 of our losses this year have been mostly caused by self-inflicted wounds.  If we can get rid of them, we can and should be able to play with any team.  Of course, I think we need some improved play from our LBs and our OL (specificallly the right side of the OL), but no team is so solid across the board that there aren't some mismatches when playing other playoff caliber teams.  The bigger thing, IMO, is to just remain healthy and stop beating ourselves.  I'm not ready to panic yet.

 

I'm not panicking about anything; wouldn't do any good. I like talking about my team and football in general, but I really don't understand all this over-reactionary stuff that happens around here.

 

Setting that aside, the truth is that we're not playing as well as we need to be. Too many mistakes, some of our best players have played poorly and/or made huge mistakes, etc. And some of the coaching has been dreadful, to be honest. We're 3-3 instead of 6-0 or 5-1 because we haven't been as sharp as we need to be to really contend for a SB. And if that keeps up all season, our inevitable playoff appearance will be short-lived, and there will be significant personnel changes in the offseason. Until then, I'm looking for our guys to coach and play better, not for them to be fired or undermined by their superiors.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

×
×
  • Create New...