Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - COPYCAT: What Indianapolis Colts Can Learn from Super Bowl LX

Starting point is 00:00:00 Super Bowl 60 is a wrap, but neither of the teams competing even made the playoffs last year. And that means your Indianapolis Colts can learn some lessons from the Seahawks and Patriots. Let's get to it. You are Locked on Colts, your daily Indianapolis Colts podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. All right. Welcome to Locked on Colts, part of the Locked On Podcast Network. now the number one sports podcast network out there.

Starting point is 00:00:37 And today's show is brought to you by Fandul. The winter games are on, and there's no better way to follow them than with a bet on Fandul. Fandul play your game. What is up, everybody? I am Jake Arthur, the Indianapolis Colts beat writer for Roundtable Sports.

Starting point is 00:00:52 And we are talking about the Super Bowl today. Obviously, that's what the whole NFL world is talking about. Now, as an Indianapolis Cold Space show, we have no business talking playoff. let alone the Super Bowl. But as always, we're going to try and find a way to tie this back to us because who's better than number one, right? But no. So the Seahawks beat down the hated Patriots.

Starting point is 00:01:14 I don't know how you guys still feel about the Patriots. Tom Brady and pretty much everybody involved is gone. But if the Patriots are in the Super Bowl, you don't want to see them win. And now as a result, they have the most Super Bowl losses in NFL history. So that's always good. But the Seahawks beat them down 29 to 13. and it really wasn't even that close. A couple kind of garbage time scores by the Patriots

Starting point is 00:01:37 after it felt like the game was already pretty well decided. But we look at both of these teams, and from the preseason, no one would have really thought that the Seahawks or Patriots, either team really, was going to be able to make a prime run to the Super Bowl. Now, the Seahawks were 10 and 7 the year before in the first year under Mike McDonald's.

Starting point is 00:02:00 They were a decent team, but they missed the playoffs. But, you know, they go out with Gino Smith. They bring in Sam Darnold, and suddenly they go from 10 and 7 to 14.3. The Patriots were the real story, though. They had drafted Drake May the year before, I believe with the third overall pick. They were a lowly team, 4 and 13. They got all the way to 14 and 3.

Starting point is 00:02:23 So they're one of the bigger ways we can learn some lessons here from this Colts team. That, of course, 8 and 9, they missed the playoffs, 5, straight years. They have the epic collapse down the stretch, going from eight and two to losing seven in a row and missing the playoffs, of course, again. So we're going to look at what these teams have done in common to really get them into the Super Bowl and get them on top of the NFL landscape. It's for the most part things they have in common that they both have done that it's really not out of the question for the Colts to be able to do. So, When you look at offense, a lot of homegrown talent on both sides of the ball offensively,

Starting point is 00:03:07 especially with Seattle. So you look at Kenneth Walker, who had about 100 yards in the first half last night, was your Super Bowl MVP, Jackson Smith and Jigba, who was the offensive player of the year, and just about their entire offensive line, essentially, is homegrown. They drafted everybody as well. You just draft offensively, let those guys work. Now, for the Colts, they've already done that. They've kind of checked that big box so far,

Starting point is 00:03:34 and they mirror the Seahawks in a lot of ways there. You know, the offensive line, they've drafted and developed John and the Taylor, Michael Pittman Jr., Alec Pierce, Josh Downs, Tyler Warren. The whole group is essentially drafted by the Colts except for the quarterback. So the Colts have already done really well there. When you look at the Patriots, they drafted Drake May, Ramandre Stevenson, Trayvion Henderson, Kayshawne Beauty, Jared Campbell, the left tackle, Jared Wilson, the left guard.

Starting point is 00:04:08 Not a great night for either of those players, but they were solid players leading up through the season. They just kind of ran into, you know, they were very much overmatched last night. But Will Campbell and Jared Wilson, not bad draft picks regardless there. It's two teams that have their quarterback, despite having. good defenses. This was not a Trent Dillfer or Brad Johnson situation. You look at Seattle, they went out and they got Sam Darnold, who followed up last year's breakout campaign with yet another one. So we now think Sam Darnold is probably pretty legit. Two really solid years in

Starting point is 00:04:46 a row, just got his office coordinator head coaching job with the Las Vegas Raiders, Clint Kubiak. And then Drake May was a point away from a share of the MVP award. So Drake May, a fantastic second year in the NFL. So no question about quarterback here with either team. Offensively, again, both teams were top 10 in yards, points, passing, and rushing. So the Colts, for most of the year, they had that argument as well. They were on a historic pace for scoring. Their points per drive was like number one and one of only a few teams of this millennium,

Starting point is 00:05:26 essentially that had marks as high as they did. They had the top offense. They were running the hell out of the ball with Jonathan Taylor. He was an MVP candidate. The quarterback Daniel Jones was top five in passing yards pretty much all year. So the Colts checked a lot of these boxes early on before the collapse. Now, what I did find interesting with both of these offenses, though, they were not in the top 10 in rushing yards per carry or in.

Starting point is 00:05:56 red zone scoring. So that told me kind of a couple things there. They also weren't elite on third down and they were on the lower end of fourth down attempts as well. So all those things together, it kind of told me that while they're top 10 in rushing the ball, but not top 10 in yards per carry, it meant that they ran the ball when they wanted to. You know what I mean? It's not like they had some big potent rushing attack like the Ravens or anything. were like the Colts earlier in the year, but they ran the ball when they needed to, you know, crucial downs, short yardage, nursing a lead, things like that. And Shane Steichen and Chris Ballard have both said they really would like to be able to

Starting point is 00:06:40 establish the run and run the ball when they need to run it, not just throughout the game, blah, blah, blah, but the Colts did do a great job of that in the second halves of games in the first half of the season. You know, they threw a lot in the first half, but then they battered, defenses with John and the Taylor in the second half. So that is something, at least we've seen the Colts do that. And then when you bring in not elite success in the red zone for these teams, again, not elite on third down either.

Starting point is 00:07:09 And they didn't go for a ton on fourth down. Actually, Seattle was dead last in fourth down attempts. To me, it means they take the points. And basically, you know, when you get down high red zone, you know, decently into into opponent's territory, you're going to go for field goals and you're going to take those three points rather than chancing it with fourth down attempts. I'm a little mixed on this one because I do like how aggressive Shane Steichen is on fourth down.

Starting point is 00:07:40 I don't think he makes a ton of awful decisions on fourth downs. But there are times where we look at it and are like, yeah, Shane, man, you probably could have taken the field goal, take the points there. And it looks like these teams generally played at safe. Mike McDonald with the Seahawks and, of course, can't think of his, Mike Brable with the Patriots. Those are coaches who are maybe a little more conservative who are going to take the points. Now, I don't want Shane Steichen to lose his edge and lose his aggressiveness, but, you know, maybe here and there take the points instead of going for the jugular.

Starting point is 00:08:15 You know, if it's fourth and four or something, you know what I mean? Maybe then kick the field goal. But yeah, yeah, that's something the Colts are going to have to do. some self-evaluation over the off-season, and perhaps that's one thing that they turn up. But that is it for the offense and some of the kind of commonalities between New England and Seattle that the Colts can learn from. Again, the good news is the Colts already did a lot of those things early in the season, and I think that's pretty encouraging.

Starting point is 00:08:43 You know, injuries are going to be one thing that kind of derail the whole train car, but it is what it is. I think it's good that the DNA is there for. for the Colts. They know how to do it if they can just stay healthy and kind of stay out of their own way. But coming up next, we're going to look at the defensive side of the ball, and especially one defense in Seattle. That is one of the better defenses that we've seen in quite some time. The winter games are officially here, and if you're anything like us, you're locking in for the events that you only get to see on the biggest stage every four years. And that's why following the

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Starting point is 00:09:53 Bandw, play your game. All right, welcome back, everybody, and thank you again for making Lockdown Colts, your first listen of the day, and thank you for making Locked on the number one sports podcast network. If you haven't already, go check out our new Everydayer Clubs. You can check out our audio ad-free and get an invite to the members-only locked-on every day or club Discord server, which includes a group chat just for listeners of our shows.

Starting point is 00:10:21 Go to Lockdowncultz.com or I'm sorry, Lockdowncultz. supercast.com to join or even get a subscription today. All right. So let's talk about defense now. So on the offensive side of the ball, we pointed out that both teams had a decent amount of homegrown talent through the draft there. But on defense, that's still the case there. But you can really notice that these teams have bought some instant impact,

Starting point is 00:10:48 high impact defensive playmakers here. So New England went out and got. Last year's Super Bowl star from the Eagles, Milton Williams, defensive tackle. They got Williams, Carlton Davis, Harold Landry, Robert Spillane, Caleb on Chase on. You look at each of those guys and you're like, yeah, I could see how they had a hand. And the Patriots getting through the season and getting to the Super Bowl. Now, of course, Landry, unfortunately, had a late injury that kind of threw things off for him. But New England had a boatload of money last year.

Starting point is 00:11:19 And they went out and they spent it. And they spent it well. and they got high impact players that really hit. I don't look at what they did and see a whole lot of misses here. They got heavy contribution across the board. Seattle didn't do a ton with buying necessarily, at least not this year, but you look like that Marcus Lawrence was a big one. Sam Darnold, obviously, that was expensive,

Starting point is 00:11:45 but that was on the offensive side of the ball. But yeah, I look at this and I'm like, you can buy a defense. fence quickly. With the Colts obviously need to do, I think on everybody's wish list this year, even though they have not a ton of cap space right now to work with, like, depending on where you look, it's around $35 million. But we've talked ad nauseum about contracts they need to kind of revisit to create more space, whether that's Pittman, extending Quentin Nelson, doing something with the

Starting point is 00:12:21 Forest Buckner, Kenny Moore, Giver. Stewart, like they've got contracts out there to look at and kind of create more space from. So it's easier said than done to just say spend a ton of money and get that, especially when you have Daniel Jones and Alec Pierce on the offensive side of the ball that's going to eat up a ton of that money. The Colts need to create more cap space so that they can go out and spend handsome money on defensive playmakers. They did a great job of that last year, Charberius Ward and Cambinum.

Starting point is 00:12:52 were big impact players, but Ward obviously had his issues staying healthy. Cam Biden responded with having kind of a career year. You know, career high four interceptions, did a lot of really good things. That one was definitely money well spent. But you look at the defensive line, edge, interior, whatever you want to do, spend a bunch. Linebacker, I would maybe lean more towards drafting, but if you wanted to spend money on one linebacker, maybe not two, but one, go ahead and do it. need impact players.

Starting point is 00:13:24 So you look at the defensive side of the ball for both of these teams. Just like with the offense, they were top 10 in yards, points, passing, and rushing. Seattle was also sixth in takeaways, and seventh in sacks. Obviously, you look at last night with that pass rush, they were really, really good. And then they were first against the run in yards per carry. So I look at these things and I say D-line, D-line, D-line. You can tie all of those factors straight to the defensive line. Obviously, sacks, yes, yards per carry, yes.

Starting point is 00:14:00 But when you've invested so much draft capital and in like the trade market and free agency on the defensive line, it's all going to come together to complement each other well against the run and against the pass. And then rushing quarterbacks leads to errant throws. And then you get takeaways. Look at what happened with Drake May last night. made some mistakes when he was under duress. So for the Colts, again, like I said, interior, edge, linebacker, secondary, all over the place. There's not a spot on the defense that would be wasted money, I wouldn't think.

Starting point is 00:14:43 So let's look at the edge room right now. You have Liatu Latu and JT. Tuam Low are really the only. noteworthy edge defenders you have under contract for next year. Samson Ebbecom is a free agent and you should probably go ahead and let him walk. Tyquoam Lewis, same thing. Even if you bring him back, he can't be like your third rusher. He's just, he's not that explosive anymore. He's a little older.

Starting point is 00:15:10 You just like Chris Pallard said, you have to get younger. You have to get faster. You have to get more explosive. And resigning 30 plus year old guys with entry histories is just not the way to do it. So you have to do that with Laotu Latu and Tuamala being your only guys. And then we've talked about DeForest Buckner and Grover Stewart, both being 32 years old to start this year. DeForest Buckner, we've heard he wants to play, but it's coming off of a neck injury that landed him on IR twice last year. So even if you think those guys are going to be healthy and awesome next year, it would be very, very wise to have the foresight

Starting point is 00:15:50 to invest early in defensive tackle depth in the draft. I would have been fine with them doing it early last year, to be completely honest with you, if like Walter Nolan would have fallen in their lap, Kenneth Grant, you'll get the year before with like the kid from Texas that went to Seattle, Byron Young, maybe, no, but you guys are talking about. But yeah, just invest, especially in the interior,

Starting point is 00:16:19 because it takes a year or so for those guys to get good, and especially edge rushers. I mean, they say it takes two or three years for those guys to get really, really good. Well, the Colts miss on a lot of edge rushers. So, number one, you have to spend money there because you need to go get guys you know where at least decent. I think in free agency this year, this is a good group of edge rushers that still have

Starting point is 00:16:43 some upside. You've seen a lot of guys who have had to be in rotations with other veterans. and they just haven't got a ton of playing time, but like in a vacuum and their smaller sample size of playing time, they've done really well. And it looks like they're ascending players. I feel like Chris Ballard usually does decent with those type of players. So good year for that.

Starting point is 00:17:07 But yeah, that's the draft we're talking about. But you still have to go by players that you feel really good about. Number one, the tape they've already put out there. the NFL, but then still becoming ascending players. Milton Williams is a great example of that from the Patriots was a star in the Super Bowl for the Eagles last year and then went and then was a stud on Sunday against the Seahawks as well. So so far lessons we've learned, obviously you have to have a quarterback, but make sure you draft well on offense and then you spend your money big time on defense because I feel like defense is like the earlier instance.

Starting point is 00:17:49 impact players. Call me crazy. Maybe it's splitting hairs and there's really no difference there. But I feel like you can buy a defense a lot more successfully than you can buy an offense. So coming up, we're going to look at kind of like some wild cards, some X factors. Maybe things you can't even predict, but, you know, if the Colts can pull these things off, they might be at a pretty good spot. If you've ever hired someone who looked good on paper but maybe wasn't the right fit,

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Starting point is 00:19:15 that it deserves at Indeed.com slash locked on. NFL. Just go to Indeed.com slash locked on NFL right now and support the show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Hiring, do it the right way with Indeed. All right. Welcome back. Every dayers, we are reflecting on the Super Bowl and being jealous about what we just saw the Seahawks put out there. Because I'm not going to lie, with how the Colts looked early in the season, this looked like a good year for them to not only make the playoffs, but make some noise in the playoffs and potentially reach the Super Bowl. This just was obviously a down year for the AFC.

Starting point is 00:19:58 The Patriots who went from essentially flipped their record from the year before, their win-loss record, quickly vaulted to the top seed. You know, you didn't have the Ravens, you didn't have the Bengals, you didn't have the chiefs. The bills weren't all that elite this year. So this, unfortunately, is a very disappointing year for the Colts to have missed the playoffs. And so we're kind of looking at Seattle and New England and looking at some commonalities. Like, what did these teams really succeed at the Colts might be able to adopt?

Starting point is 00:20:32 So this next one here, we've talked about the draft on offense. We've talked about spinning definitely on defense. But I just look at these and I look at some of the most important players on both teams. And I say, you've got to go aggressively pursue X factors. go look for guys you think are difference makers. And I mean, don't let there be a price tag on it. Go get them. You know, whether it's free agency, the money you're going to spend,

Starting point is 00:21:00 whether you're going to trade for guys, like, just go do it. Like, this game had its handprints all over it from guys who were just aggressively pursued by both sides. So Sam Darnold, obviously, Stefan Diggs, Garrett Bradbury, Milton Williams, who I've mentioned a million times already, Carlton Davis, Cooper Cup, Rashid Shahid, who I've been crazy about on this playoff stretch, really the second half the year since Seattle traded for him, DeMarcus Lawrence, Leonard Williams, a couple years ago with Seattle.

Starting point is 00:21:31 Ernest Jones has been on like 19 different transactions over the last few years that settled back in Seattle and has been a stud for them. So aggressively pursue players you think are going to be difference makers. And I do feel a little encouraged about that when it comes to the Colts. because it definitely felt like they were intentional about that last offseason. They identified Mooney Ward and Cam Bynum as difference makers. They had belief in Daniel Jones and they made it happen. So they actually had conviction about some of these guys and they did make it happen.

Starting point is 00:22:08 In the past, they, I mean, they've been criticized for not going aggressively after high-priced players, which they've entered the chat with some of those guys, but they haven't been able to close deals because they were just essentially pinching pennies and protecting dollars and not putting enough liquid money up front, essentially, which always kind of put them behind in the bidding war. But, you know, they put up guaranteed money, and it made a difference last year.

Starting point is 00:22:42 So I'm a little more confident that they will do that. they don't have a ton of money right now. Again, we've mentioned probably in the ballpark of about $35 million in cap space. Now, the cap is going to go up anywhere from like $22 to $26 million. So that's definitely a big factor for the Colts as well. But then I think it still would be wise to go create additional cap space by revisiting some of the contracts that are maybe a little outdated at this point. So we know at Edge.

Starting point is 00:23:14 interior defense linebacker you can have impact players at linebacker if you just make it happen they don't have to be afterthoughts like they can be difference makers i think the colts just need to realize that and i think they kind of got a little bit of a sour pill of that last year by realizing that maybe they don't need elite linebackers but having bad linebackers will get you beat because that is exactly what happened last year um but now on the offensive line i think I think they're fine, especially you look at like Borton Gonzalez, another year developing for those guys. Right tackle is a little tricky.

Starting point is 00:23:53 Do you bring back Braden Smith? If not, how much competition do you bring in for Jalen Travis? That one will be interesting. At receiver. Michael Pittman, Jr., if you trade him or release him, which I don't think they would release him, but if you trade him, that assumes that you're going to have the money. then to bring back Alec Pierce.

Starting point is 00:24:16 So that still means you have Alec Pierce, but no Michael Pittman, Jr. Pitman's not bad. He just, you don't want to pay him $29 million. So now you have to find a way to replace Michael Pittman Jr. So that one might be best to go through the draft to do it, maybe even early. Because if you're going to a free agency for receivers, as we'll see with Alec Pierce, that's a very, very expensive enterprise. So maybe Corner is another one. one if you don't want to count on Charbrose Ward and Justin Wally, both hitting it out of the park

Starting point is 00:24:51 in this year. So, yeah, aggressively pursue guys that you have conviction about. Because I do feel like when Chris Ballard and the Colts have conviction about certain players and they do swing big, a lot of times it works. Like, look at Soss Gardner so far. When he's been on the field, it's been fine. I think he's rebound a little bit from his Jets days. he has been hurt, which we're going to get to in a minute.

Starting point is 00:25:17 But, like, that's a player who has a high cachet around the league is, like, an elite cornerback. When they take a big swing, it's usually for a significant player. So I would like to think they're going to do that at least once this year, not just from a player internally, get someone from the outside who's going to make a big difference. And then the other thing that we can't predict, other than if you want to predict that it doesn't happen for the Colts, is, just having really good luck with your health, which both the Seahawks and Patriots were able to do.

Starting point is 00:25:51 Not the case for the Colts last year at all. Here's a list of players who missed a notable amount of time, I would say. Daniel Jones, obviously, Anthony Richardson, you can make an argument that maybe the Colts win a game, an extra game. If Anthony Richardson is out there to be able to relieve Daniel Jones after he gets hurt, you can make an argument. for that. Braden Smith obviously missed the final month of the season. DeForest Buckner on IR with

Starting point is 00:26:21 the neck injury twice. Jalen Carlis really was never right at any point in the year. It was hampered for several months by the ankle injury that he had. Sauce Gardner, a calf injury, derailed most of his time with the Colts. Mooney Ward three concussions

Starting point is 00:26:37 this year got on IR twice. Kenny Moore missed a few games with that Achilles injury. Justin Wally tore his ACL over the summer. Hunter Waller suffered a Liz Frank injury and his foot over the summer. Jalen Jones spent a ton of time off the field with hamstring injuries. And then kicker Spencer Schrader, the week after winning aFC offensive player or aFC special teams player of the month for the first month of year gets his knee blown out by getting hit on a field goal block attempt. So the Colts had awful, awful luck with injuries.

Starting point is 00:27:16 If the tides just turned for them a little bit, though, maybe not to fully reflect what Seattle and New England had going on, but just not the disaster that was last year, then I think things can break their way a little bit. So hopefully you came away a little encouraged that things could go well for the Colts because a lot of these things that we've seen New England and Seattle succeed at this year, we saw the Colts have extended success with it in the first half of the season to the point

Starting point is 00:27:45 where it didn't just look like a mirage. And, you know, they hit a tougher part of their schedule and they dealt with some injuries that I think kind of took the win out of their sales a bit. But I'm overall, I feel decent about what the Colts could look like next year if they just make some of the appropriate moves in the offseason. So hopefully you guys too, do too, but drop a comment in here. Just let me know what you think. Do you have hope for this next season or not?

Starting point is 00:28:12 I know a lot of people are obviously in the dumps about Chris Bowdo and Shane Stuyken being back. But overall, give us a vibe check there in the comments. And again, thank you guys for tuning in today to Locked on Colts. We'll be back tomorrow for both the Daily Show again and the Locked on Colts Squad show, bringing in Derek Shultz now and thank you. it along with Zach Hicks and myself. Make sure you guys subscribe to our show so you get all of the latest episodes. If you don't already, follow at Lockdown Colts at Jake Arthur NFL and at Zach Hicks

Starting point is 00:28:43 too on social media. If you never miss an episode, then remember the everydayer club is built just for you. Get Locked on Colts audio ad free plus members only Discord access and more. Just go head over to Lockdowncultz.com to join the club or follow the link in our show notes. it now as we are closing this thing out and with that you guys have a great great night

Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - COPYCAT: What Indianapolis Colts Can Learn from Super Bowl LX

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