Stampede Blue
Indianapolis, IN — As pandemonium ensued following the initially missed game-winning kick off the foot of kicker Spencer Shrader, Shane Steichen sighed loud enough for the nosebleeds to hear it. The third-year head coach had just led his offense down the field, trailing by two points amidst a 2-minute drill, and elected to passively chew clock behind the legs of star running back Jonathan Taylor to get into field goal range.
After getting an all-time break in the form of an untimely leveraging infraction by the Broncos’ interior defensive line on their block attempt, Spencer Shrader would remain perfect in his young career with a 45-yard game-winning kick. Just prior, Shrader had missed the would-be 60-yard attempt, but the penalty in question gave the Colts another shot from even closer — ironically enough, just inside Shrader’s career-long.
There’s a story in there about how Shane Steichen mismanaged the end of that game and got lucky; however, sometimes in the NFL, it’s best to be a little lucky. That’s not to absolve this Colts offense of their questionable final drive, but the bigger story is how pairing Daniel Jones with Steichen has quickly proved to be a worthwhile reclamation project. There’ve been some woes, but the offense has simply been too good to nitpick.
It’s been discussed ad nauseam, both the recent influx of successful reclamation projects as well as the blazing hot seats of everyone involved with this Colts regime, but after two weeks, the well-established tune is singing much more optimistically.
Sure, the long-evasive Week 1 victory was enough to single-handedly instill delirium into a checked out fanbase, and yes, the same can be said about starting the season off with a 2-0 record for the first time since Peyton Manning was in town, but this feels.. different.
General manager Chris Ballard has shown a willingness to deviate from the norm in recent years, but especially during this past offseason. The otherwise uncharacteristic big fish free-agent acquisitions in QB Daniel Jones, S Camryn Bynum, and CB Charvarius Ward were enough to prove as such, but then a wildly different defensive scheme in Lou Anarumo’s coordination was also brought in. Regardless of whether it came on the heels of a last-ditch effort or a new era of ownership opening up the checkbook due to a newfound dedication to winning, through two weeks, these additions have collectively re-wired the Colts’ psyche entirely.
The early resurgence of seventh-year quarterback Daniel Jones has been a sight to see, and it starts at the top. Chris Ballard and Shane Steichen were open and honest with Jones in the offseason, expressing their belief in him and offering him the chance to win the starting job. He took that motivation from New York, and instead of running it back to backup J.J. McCarthy at Minnesota, he decided to bet on himself in Indianapolis. Lo and behold, Indiana Jones was born.
With Jones at the helm to kick off the season vs the Miami Dolphins, Indy’s offense...
