Sunday Debate: Indianapolis Colts Will Miss Playoffs in 2016
Mark Morales-Smith and Brendan Pignataro hold another Sunday Debate. In this edition, they will explain why the Indianapolis Colts may or may not make the playoffs for a second straight year.
It’s once again time for our weekly debate when I make Brendan look silly and educate him about the NFL. He on the other hand will be stumbling and bumbling through a nonsensical rant I think you’ll enjoy reading if you click the link below.
Related Story: Sunday Debate: Indianapolis Colts Will Make Playoffs in 2016
This week our debate will center around the Indianapolis Colts. Brendan believes they can still win a revamped AFC South, while I believe the competition has improved enough to keep them in second or even third place.
During the Andrew Luck era and the Peyton Manning era for that matter, the Colts have thrived off beating up on a miserable division. The Texans have been decent, however, during Luck’s time in Indy, they haven’t had a viable quarterback, Arian Foster has been oft-injured and Andre Johnson saw his career wind down.
That may all be changing. All of a sudden the Texans have a young quarterback and a reliable running back. Also, DeAndre Hopkins has emerged as an elite wide receiver, who I personally rank as No. 2 in the NFL. Newly acquired quarterback Brock Osweiler is far from a lock to be a star. With that said, he has shown enough with the Denver Broncos to lead me to believe he will be better than the Brian Hoyer’s and Ryan Mallett‘s of the world. He certainly has more upside.
Foster is almost always great when fully healthy, but those days have become few and far between. Soft tissue injuries have derailed his career. He’s missed 23 games over the past three seasons and has either left injured or been eased into the lineup from injury in a ton of games. Lamar Miller is a talented young back with minimal tread on his tires. He’s averaged 4.6 yards per carry over the course of his career and has seen his contributions in the passing game increase each season. He caught 47 passes in 2015.
Hopkins was a breakout star last season catching 111 passes for 1,521 yards and 11 touchdowns. He has proven to be completely quarterback proof no matter who’s throwing him the ball, he is a superstar wideout. Combine this improved offense with an already tough defense and the Colts will no longer be able to walk over the Texans.
That brings us to the Jacksonville Jaguars. A team that has won a total of 14 games during Luck’s four year career. They have been the league’s doormat during this span. That is no longer the case. They were visibly improved last year with an explosive pass offense and they were the winners of both free agency and the draft. Blake Bortles exploded for 4,428 yards and 35 touchdowns while both Allen Robinson and Allen Hurns have emerged as star receivers. The team added offensive line help and Chris Ivory to beef up the rushing attack to complement their aerial assault.
The defense is where they vastly improved their talent. They drafted perhaps the two best defensive players in the entire draft in Jalen Ramsey and Myles Jack. Ramsey did suffer a slight tear in his meniscus this week, but he is expected back. Even so, they also added both Tashaun Gipson and Prince Amukamara to their secondary. Both are underrated and more than viable starters.
They already had Davon House and Jonathan Cyprien in their secondary. Defensive lineman Malik Jackson from the Super Bowl-winning Denver Broncos was another big splash in free agency. They’ll also be getting last year’s third-overall pick Dante Fowler back after he missed all of last season after tearing his ACL Day 1 of practice. Both will surely help their defensive front. Clearly this team is improved top to bottom.
I’m not going to try to sell you on the Titans. They are still a bottom of the barrel team. It’s possible they could be improved, but they won’t be striking fear into anyone’s heart.
During the course of his career, Luck has dominated the AFC South, going 17-2 within the division. Without being able to stomp over these teams, they are doomed to not only lose the division, but miss the playoffs as well. Against the rest of the league Luck has gone 18-18 and has struggled against playoff teams not named the Broncos and Texans.
The Colts once again haven’t done much to improve this offseason. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love what they did in the draft. It’s by far the smartest draft of often bewildering general manager Ryan Grigson’s career. They loaded up on much needed offensive line help and added a high-upside defensive tackle in Hassan Ridgeway.
Still, if you’re relying offensive lineman to fully fix a broken team that has been poorly constructed over half a decade, you may be a tad disappointed. This draft was a great step for the long-term future of the team. Nevertheless, the O-line will be only so improved immediately and they still can’t stop the run at all. The pass defense isn’t exactly strong either.
Free agency wasn’t very kind to the Colts. They overpaid for Dwayne Allen who is good, but is injured more often than he’s healthy. They also lost their best linebacker Jerrell Freeman and did little to replace him. The division is passing them by and they will just have to sit and watch this season while they do so.
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Their only hope is that Andrew Luck makes a Cam Newton like jump into elite MVP-caliber status. He’ll have to become more efficient, cut down on turnovers and build chemistry with his young receivers. It’s not impossible, however, it’s going to be very tough.