Stampede Blue
8-4 after an ugly loss, where the defense seemed to be the only ones that wanted the Colts to win, including the refs. Opposing teams seemed to have figured out the Colts’ offense, rendering it useless in three of the past four games, and the playoffs seem to be slipping once again from the grasps of this franchise that just cannot seem to close out winning seasons.
Even despite losing his No. 1 cornerback on the first drive of the game, and still not having the most important player on this defense in DeForest Buckner, Anarumo once again called a masterful game and more than did his job yesterday. What I love the most about Anarumo is that he gets the job done with the players he has, and he has adjusted the game to the strengths of his players. The defensive line is doing some excellent work despite basically having only one player that can consistently win one-on-one matchups, and he is doing an excellent job of hiding Franklin’s and Pratt’s deficiencies in pass-coverage.
We have several culprits for the loss yesterday. First and foremost I would like to highlight Steichen, that seems to have completely lost touch on how to run this offense. I understand that the Texans have a really good defense, but the lack of execution and creativity for a unit that once was among the best in the league is baffling. Even looking at the drives where the Colts scored you have a beautiful deep ball by Jones to Pierce who made an amazing catch, and then a DPI call, and a miracle catch by Downs to keep the chains moving. The offense never managed to find any sort of rythm, which seems to be the case the past four weeks. What sucks even more is that the defense did more than enough for the team to win in each of the three losses.
Now the refs deserve a paragraph of their own. Led by Clay Martin, it was perhaps the most blatant call I have seen go against the Colts, and I believe this deserves an investigation because one cannot be so bad at their job. I understand the missed facemask call late in the game, and even the missed extra-point seemed a bit about perspective, but the missed delay of game call followed by the non-existent DPI on Kenny Moore on third down in the redzone was a terrible call at the most important moment of the game. That was a 4-point swing that ended up being the difference in the game, a game that had major playoff implications. Hopefully this Martin guy is out of the NFL and does not ruin any more games because of his blatant incompetence.
As for the Colts’ specialists, Badgley once again missed an extra-point, and it was a...
