Gather round children, let me tell you a story. Once upon a time, the Colts were good at football.
That wasn’t evident last night, as they were on the receiving end of history and a 34-7 beating from the Saints, a low point that makes it easy to forget they started the season 5-2.
“Tonight, we just got it handed to us,” Colts coach Frank Reich said, via Zak Keefer of TheAthletic.com.
Left tackle Anthony Castonzo said the result “feels like a wake-up call,” which is appropriate since they’ve been sleepwalking the last two months. They’ve now lost four straight and six of the last seven, and what looked like a promising season that included wins over the Chiefs and Texans dissolved in front of them.
While football people hate using it as an excuse, injuries are at the core of what’s gone wrong with the Colts, with most of their offensive skill players missing time, many of them out for the season. Wide receiver T.Y. Hilton‘s limiping to the finish line on a bad calf, having missed seven games. The Colts only won one of them. But along with kicker Adam Vinatieri showing his age and Jacoby Brissett being unable to drag the carcass of the offense around, there are plenty of reasons.
Enough to justify a big backslide from last year’s unlikely playoff run.
“This sucks. I want this taste out of my mouth. I don’t want this feeling ever again,” linebacker Darius Leonard said. “It’s gonna make the offseason all that easier. You’re losing . . . that’s an extra edge. Who loves to lose? Nobody. It’s not gonna be hard in the offseason to say, ‘OK, what do I gotta do to get better at?’ Because you’re losing ballgames. Last year, we’re coming off a hot streak and lost in the second round. And now, we’re not gonna be in the playoffs, and it sucks.
“We play this game to win championships, and now to not even compete for a championship, that sucks, and that’s gonna hopefully make everyone on this team a whole lot better, to get this nasty taste out of their mouth, because losing is not something I like to do.”
If that’s motivation, the Colts have plenty built up.
https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMiSWh0dHBzOi8vc3BvcnRzLnlhaG9vLmNvbS9jb2x0cy1hY2tub3dsZWRnZS1qdXN0LWdvdC1oYW5kZWQtMTEwMDU1MjY3Lmh0bWzSAVFodHRwczovL3Nwb3J0cy55YWhvby5jb20vYW1waHRtbC9jb2x0cy1hY2tub3dsZWRnZS1qdXN0LWdvdC1oYW5kZWQtMTEwMDU1MjY3Lmh0bWw?oc=5
2019-12-17 11:00:00Z
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