Ten thoughts from Week Four:
1. The tribute to Edgerrin James was the best moment of the day for me. The crowd was screaming like the Colts had just won a nail-biter. They packed some amazing highlights into the short tribute video. You could tell how much it meant to #32. Manning said he was almost choked up out there.
2. Offensively the Colts were consistent. They moved the ball well all game, but seemed a bit disinterested after the lead grew to 25 points. Garcon and Collie continue to improve. Addai is getting his groove back. I still don’t like all the runs to the outside. It just isn’t working. Despite some obvious flaws, I’m giving the run game the benefit of the doubt. The Colts are finally notching rushing touchdowns and even picked up four rushing first downs.
3. Defensively, I’m impressed. The tackling has been stellar thus far. Lots of effort plays being made (Foster and Mathis come to mind). I’ll take 49 yards on 19 rushes any day. Still not in love with Tim Jennings, but the secondary will get much better with Kelvin Hayden’s imminent return.
4. Tennessee. The true dumpster fire. Allowing over 300 yards passing to Garrard? No interceptions? Guess we know the game plan for next Sunday night. (Fun fact: The Colts next two opponents are a combined 0-8).
5. Denver is 4-0, but they are really hard to watch. Their next seven games? New England, @San Diego, @Baltimore, Pittsburgh, @Washington, San Diego, NY Giants. Good luck with that.
6. The Jets can play some defense, but the team itself doesn’t scare me. Sanchez looked horrible.
7. The November 15th game against the Pats is shaping up to be a big one. That is as it should be.
8. I don’t get the retractable roof at Lucas Oil. Most estimates put its cost at over $100 million, but it gets used for just two games a year. It is nice and all, but I’d rather have that money back.
9. How good are the Colts? We are learning more each week, but it is still too early to know. I’m seeing 12 wins on the schedule at this point. I think the five remaining AFC South games will be difficult.
10. There are a lot of unknowns, but 4-0 looks really good right now.
DZ COMMENTS:
Here are 8 more. If ever there was a day to keep with the ’18’ theme, it was today.
- Dwight Freeney’s play was inspiring, but Mathis was electrifying.
- Kyle Orton’s game winning TD pass was the worst game winning pass I’ve ever seen…since his last horrible game winning pass three weeks ago.
- I know Jennings makes a lot of good plays, but only because they throw at him almost every down. Still, he is drastically better than he used to be, and does a very solid job tackling. He may be a weak link of sorts, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
- I can’t believe I’m actually worried about Charlie Johnson’s health.
- Garcon gets better every week. I can’t believe how much better these two WRs are than just two weeks ago. I didn’t think it was possible. Like I said, I wasn’t wrong to question their play through the first two weeks, but I was clearly wrong to say the O couldn’t be elite until Gonzo came back.
- This defense is crazy good. The Wildcat thing was a bit of a fluke. When Brackett, Sanders and Hayden are back…watch out. It just shows that the this D is clearly much deeper than I gave it credit for. Mathis and Freeney have become utterly unstoppable.
- It’s hard not not to believe in this team. They could win 12 games by rolling out of bed at this point. They play just 5 games against teams with winning records the rest of the year. Four of those games are at home.
And finally,
maybe it’s just self preservation, but I admit that while I thought the team could be THIS good for about a week, I got skittish during camp. I’m still not sold that the run game is quite good enough yet, but it’s clearly better than it was last year. It’s the best of all worlds right now: excellent, championship play, but room to improve and get better.
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