Stampede Blue
The Indianapolis Colts are on the road to take on the Los Angeles Rams in week 4 of the 2025 season, kickoff is at 4:05 p.m. EST.
At this point Colts fans have read some version of “for the first time since” hundreds if not thousands of times and I’m going to add another: For the first time since I’ve been writing for Stampede Blue, the team is 3-0 and the offense looks dominant. Daniel Jones is playing well and the offensive roster assembled by Chris Ballard and his staff is making the quarterback’s job as easy as any starting quarterback in the NFL through three weeks. Defensively it’s more difficult to judge but this week T. Troy Russell told us the numbers say they’re right around (maybe a touch below) average through three games.
And that feels right. The Colts were able to sack Cam Ward four times a week ago but the Edge rushers weren’t the ones making any sort of a real impact. If this Indy defense is going to be better than maybe a touch below average Laiatu Latu needs to find his grove as the “best ****** rusher in the draft” sooner than later. This week the Colts will get back Charvarius “Mooney” Ward but they will be without Kenny Moore who is recovering from an Achilles injury that is not season ending. In my opinion Moore should be placed on IR and allowed to recover well beyond the point he’s cleared by the medical staff. At his age an Achilles injury could effectively end his career and the team has elevated long time Lou Anarumo, nickelback Mike Hilton for today’s game. If you’re keeping track at home the Colts are starting Mooney Ward, Xaiven Howard and Mike Hilton at corner. Which is an ELITE CB room… in 2022. Ward is still playing well and the team hopes Howard continues to shake off rust after sitting out all of 2024. Hilton was on the market and was likely waiting for the right opportunity to play this season and a 3-0 team running a system that he has excelled in with a DC that used him so well during the peak of his career seems like a good opportunity to me. So we’ll see.
The Rams will be the Colts’ biggest test so far. Matt Stafford isn’t Tua, Nix or Ward. Stafford is a 17 year, Super Bowl winning veteran. Uncle Lou is going to have to reach pretty far into his bag of tricks to confuse someone like Stafford and frankly, I’m not sure he can. And even if he does, the pass rush has to get home, the backers have to cover and the DB’s have to all execute and they all have to do it on every play, all day or Stafford will make them pay. Can they do it? Of course, they’re professional football players. They have the ability. Will they do it? Outside of a week one dismantling of a bad...
