Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - Indianapolis Colts: Anthony Richardson Takes Viewers On Roller Coaster Ride vs. Cincinnati Bengals

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Colts got the primetime W against the Bengals, and it was our first extended look at Anthony Richardson in a game since October. 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. Thanks for tuning in and making us your first listen of the day. This is your daily podcast covering your Indianapolis Colts, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. And today's show is brought to you by GameTime.

Starting point is 00:00:39 Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNFL for $20 off of your first purchase. Terms apply. What is up, everybody? This is Jake Arthur reporting to you live from PayCores Stadium, where the Colts have defeated the Cincinnati Bengals in their preseason finale, 24-17. I think I probably have that wrong. I'm already thinking wrong here. But no, it was a big win, 27-14, I think.

Starting point is 00:01:07 Big win for the Colts, obviously. Lots to take away. Anthony Richardson is obviously the big talking point here. Had a bit of an up and down day, kind of a perfect opening drive for the Colts. 12 plays, 80 yards, took over six minutes off the clock. So just going off of that, you think it's going to be a great day, right? So the Colts go down the field, put seven points on the board, A.D. Mitchell's first touchdown of his career. So everyone's riding high, right? And then immediately on the second drive, the Colts are backed up into their own territory. And Anthony Richardson throws a pick six to a Bengals defender for a 14-yard

Starting point is 00:01:51 return there. And that's when kind of everything has to come back down to earth a little bit. So, you know, this was a game for Richardson where you could look for anything to confirm any biases you had, positive or negative. But despite there being a lot of negative and a lot of people are kind of running with that tonight, I do think we have to look at this carefully. So let's just kind of lay the groundwork here. So Anthony was 8 of 14 passing, which is 57%. He did have some big completions to alec pierce had a couple of them uh ad mitchell and then kylan granson as well uh the ones to alec pierce i thought were really nice because the first one was like an 18 yard chunk and he got a 13 yard one uh so a couple first downs to

Starting point is 00:02:38 pierce over the middle of the field uh one of them was you know a quick hot read while having someone you know blinding in on his face. So that was good for him to get rid of the ball accurately and to get a good pickup. Some of the incompletions really could have gone either way. There was kind of a 50-50 ball to Drew Ogletree on the drive where they actually still got a touchdown to A.D. Mitchell. It would have been a tough catch by Ogletree, but it did hit him in the hand. So you can go either way with that. Perhaps he could have caught that. Michael Pittman did have a bad drop on a second down over the middle of the field,

Starting point is 00:03:17 hit him right in the numbers. So that was second down. On third down, Anthony just absolutely skied it, just airmailed it to A.D. Mitchell just his feet were set and he didn't really have pressure I think on that play it just literally got away from him I don't really think there's any explanation on that but Pittman's drop led to that bad pass and then the Colts had to punt later there was another third down play where it was third and long and Anthony was looking for A.D. Mitchell over the middle of the field and on the surface on the TV angle I know it looked like a poor throw from from Richardson it was far ahead of Mitchell but looking from up here and then even

Starting point is 00:03:59 explained further from Shane Steichen afterward so Mitchell Mitchell, right after he came out of his cut, he was kind of running a shallow post, but he was expecting to see a different coverage, and he was a little surprised by what Cincinnati had there. So he had just a slight hitch when he came out of his break. So he wasn't exactly where he was supposed to be. He should have been right there where the ball was in stride, able to catch it and keep running. So that kind of led to that incompletion. So a lot of these things tonight with Richardson and the pass catchers

Starting point is 00:04:35 were miscommunications. The interception, the pick six with Kylan Granson, he thought Kylan was going to be going inside a little more. And that's, I mean, that stuff, He thought Kylan was going to be going inside a little more. And that's, I mean, that stuff, I guess you are glad to see that it's happening in the preseason. Hopefully not so much in the regular season. It's not been a great week in terms of communication between Richardson and the pass catchers. Even going back to Tuesday during the joint practice. You know, there were a couple of times where he was,

Starting point is 00:05:09 Anthony was under duress constantly during the practice, especially early in the first half. And he'd be getting rid of the ball and the ball would be right there for the receivers, but they just weren't expecting it to be there already. And they weren't able to quickly, you know, acclimate to the ball being right there and catch it so i don't know what the deal is because it's not been like that all summer but over the just like the last week the communication uh has not been great so with

Starting point is 00:05:38 that not really being a theme throughout the summer i don't quite know what to think about that maybe they're just going through a bad period right now maybe it's new stuff that has been added in recently that they're still working through and trying to kind of work out the kinks and find out everyone's trying to get used to where they're supposed to be on these certain plays that's just stuff you know we're never going to have all the answers to that because it's not stuff that you know shane steichen or anybody else is going to divulge in detail about it um if it gets to the regular season and we're seeing still seeing that stuff that'll you know that'll be bad news and something we need to see them kind of work through but in all i think it was important to look at this performance and kind of especially since

Starting point is 00:06:22 it only lasted about a quarter and a half a little over a quarter kind of break it down individually into each instance of what went wrong because on the surface if you're someone who is super skeptical about anthony or just doesn't even like him outright as a player this probably you probably had a lot of things out of this that confirmed your views uh but i'm you know i'm trying to balance everything all together i think there was some really good stuff i thought the first drive when they went up tempo was great i think that plays into his strengths i think he's really comfortable doing that the uptempo stuff uh quick you know quick reads get the ball out of his hands just nice and fast and you know he's finding his

Starting point is 00:07:05 guys in all areas of the field so i think that's really productive for them but it's also kind of finding that balance of how much you can use that because you kind of gas the defense but you're going to gas your own offensive players as well so you can only do that so much i know that was kind of a thing during the andrew luck era as well where when can only do that so much I know that was kind of a thing during the Andrew Luck era as well where when they started doing that it was super productive and they were putting points on the board but you have to find that happy medium of how much can you do that when it comes to Richardson and it's a guy who you just keep having to give him reps because he's so inexperienced I think you're just gonna kind of have to live with some of the lumps there.

Starting point is 00:07:48 The last kind of black mark on his record for today I didn't mention yet was he had the fumble where he's being chased down from behind. I'll be honest, I do worry occasionally about his. He doesn't always sense when pressure is coming from behind him. I don't know if it's just a matter of, you know, not peeking over his shoulder occasionally, but there's a lot of times he's so athletic and he knows he can get out of so many situations. But since he isn't a run first quarterback, he is always trying to wait for a passing lane to develop. And by that time, in comes, you know, the blitz or the rush coming from behind. Luckily, they took out the ball tonight and didn't go for his legs or anything like that.

Starting point is 00:08:30 So that could have been much worse than a fumble. But the Colts, fortunately enough for them, they were able to recover that. So lots of good and bad to take away from today. Kind of some extremes. You know, the first drive was like something every coach would absolutely dream of. Like that's probably exactly what Shane wanted to see coming into this. And then there were so many warts afterwards. So you kind of have to find a happy medium after that.

Starting point is 00:08:55 Coming up next, we're going to talk about some of the offensive players not named Anthony Richardson that were out there today. All right, guys, it's getting late in the summer, but it is still very much concert time. I know for me personally, there's still a few concerts left on the docket, even going into December. If you're like me, you know, you might be a devout concert goer or like in like me, who's just kind of a casual guy. Game time is your spot. Regardless, they've got a new feature called game time picks that makes getting tickets

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Starting point is 00:10:56 Last-minute tickets, lowest price, guaranteed. All right, sickos. It is 1 a.m., and you are all here watching me. So thank you very much for that. For your next listen, whether it's right now because you're an insomniac or you're going to go to bed after this and you want to listen to something else when you wake up, make that Locked On Fantasy Football. Get daily insight to the best fantasy draft strategies

Starting point is 00:11:22 so that you can win your league this season. It's part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. All right, so let's chat about some offensive highlights today. So with the first team offense, I really liked what I saw from Alec Pierce and A.D. Mitchell. They combined for four catches for 49 yards and a touchdown. Again, Pierce had two catches. The very first one of the game was 18. He had another one for 13 yards, a couple first downs.

Starting point is 00:11:51 A.D. Mitchell had, I believe both of them were for nine yards. His touchdown was for nine yards. Just a nice, shallow streak across the middle there from his slot position. And once he caught it perfectly in stride just had a nose for the end zone there and the defender tried to do every wrestling move in the book to him ripped his helmet off in the process but he held on got the touchdown and i know it's just preseason but i feel like it's really good for guys like that to get that out of the way so they're not like hunting for it and it becomes like a big deal mentally throughout the season that first touchdown for mitchell is off the board

Starting point is 00:12:29 and so now he can just kind of focus on doing his thing not that that would be plaguing him all the time but for some guys they get in their head about not scoring i mean we we see a guy like michael pitman jr incredibly productive year after year, but is just not really a touchdown guy for Mitchell. So far, so good. As far as the running game goes, the backup running back spot, not only is RB3 getting that battle getting like super, super interesting now, but the new guy on the block, Demetrik Felton, had a 40-yard touchdown run today.

Starting point is 00:13:04 That's not even a guy that we're factoring into this. And, I mean, maybe we ought to be because that is a guy who's a veteran, who's been around the league a little bit. And the Colts picked him up after Trey Sermon got hurt. But they very commonly will add a running back around the beginning of the year off of waivers during cut down times. And maybe Felton was a guy they had their eye on already that they would have gone after around that time. So as far as we know, Felton could be a guy that they want to sneak at least onto the practice squad.

Starting point is 00:13:39 Or maybe they go with four running backs and it's not Goodson andull as three and four, but Felton knocks one of them off. We just don't know. But Goodson, I think, is separating himself a little bit in this RB3 battle. He just, in terms of movement and quickness and shiftiness, he's just a little different. Hull is like a tough downhill runner. I think does really well between the tackles. I think both of them have done great and they're doing everything you're being asked. But I think, you know, when it comes

Starting point is 00:14:10 to running backs and like creating your own yards and picking up what's not there, I think Goodson is probably the guy that gives you a little bit more. So if it is truly down to one or the other, and they're not going to keep four running backs, I feel like Goodson has this thing by just a hair currently. But those two guys combined for 87 yards on 22 carries tonight. That's four yards of carry. Again, Felton had 44 yards on four carries, including the 40-yard touchdown. So pretty much all of his yardage was on that one touchdown there at the end. Jason Bean, everybody's favorite QB5. This is getting interesting, guys.

Starting point is 00:15:00 He had another good game tonight before he was, I don't want to say ruled out with a shoulder injury, but we were told in the press box that he got a shoulder injury. But he was already out for the game with Keaton Slovis in there. So I don't know if he would have been out or it's just something they identified as he left the field. But anyways, Jason being shoulder, but he had a great day again, 404 for 52 yards, 118.8 passer rating, ran the ball three times for 15 yards and another touchdown. He's a hard-nosed runner. That's a guy who doesn't have anything to lose right now and everything to gain. So, you know, for the second consecutive week, we've seen him, you know,

Starting point is 00:15:35 just kind of bear down and kind of stick his nose in to get in the end zone. He had to fight for it this time, and it went to review. But after they initially reviewed him short of the goal line, they switched it up for him and gave him the touchdown. So being passing the ball well, running the ball well, I think he's a layup for the practice squad at this point. He has done an awesome job. But I don't think he's just like that flavor of the summer kind of quarterback.

Starting point is 00:16:04 We always see the Stephen Morris, the Brad Kaya, those guys, the guy who's always quarterback three, four or five, throw Chad Kelly into the mix as well. Does really well in the preseason, but doesn't factor into the Colts plans long-term. I don't think Bean is like some guy that's going to like earn a big spot on the roster eventually or anything but i think he is an outstanding option to be like a scout team quarterback again we've discussed this recently

Starting point is 00:16:32 on here a lot zach and i but like when you're facing the ravens you're facing the bills you're preparing for a quarterback who will just take off and run anytime having a guy like jason bean back there who is hard to track down and gives defenses fits that's a good guy to have out there running the scout team so uh another good performance from being uh maybe not so much in the in training camp but he's really done something in all three preseason games. So passing marks for him. Up next, let's talk about the defensive side of the ball. There was a few guys that turned some heads there as well. You've heard us talk a lot about FanDuel on here lately.

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Starting point is 00:18:20 sports book. All right, so we discussed A.D. Mitchell getting his first touchdown. He was not the only Colts rookie to have a first today. Liatu Liatu on the very first play of the game got a sack. Dude only played a handful of plays today, but of course he got out there, got the sack, hit the left tackle with a little bit of a cross chop and uh kind of dip below him and was far out of range and the rest was history i think that's going to be i don't want to say easy work from this year but i i think he's going to be a lot more advanced for a rookie defensive end than we're used to seeing especially around here with the colts when they tend to invest in very raw guys who are big upside guys, but no production.

Starting point is 00:19:07 He's both. He's already got a pretty high floor. So I expect production from Latu pretty early on, but he's obviously going to be splitting time with Taequann Lewis, Quidipe, Dayo Adango as well. But that was great to see. Again, Mitchell get his first touchdown. Mottu get his first sack out there today. Nick Cross was out there at free safety.

Starting point is 00:19:31 Julian Blackman was at strong safety. Those roles were reversed on Tuesday during the practice. Cross was at strong safety and Blackman at free. Again, I don't really know how much it matters anymore. Zach had mentioned maybe it means that they're going to be playing more too high this year. I don't know, because when they're out there, it's not so much that they're playing too high. It's just that they're legitimately rotating those guys. I don't know if they're just still seeing what works best or if it's situational.

Starting point is 00:20:01 But at this point, Nick Cross was out there with the rest of the starters. You know, he, he played even a little longer than some of those guys. So, I mean, I think our answer tonight without the Colts officially saying it, you know,

Starting point is 00:20:15 Nick Cross is probably the other starter officially aside from Julian Blackman. I'd be very surprised if we got to week one against Houston and it wasn't Cross and Blackman out there. Again, are they going to have super defined free safety, strong safety roles? I don't know. It could depend on the opponent.

Starting point is 00:20:34 It could depend on the package and personnel that the offense is presenting. But if we're just saying who your two starting safeties at this point, I think it's Cross that joins Blackman. And I think tonight was kind of a not-so-subtle confirmation of that. Guys that did some nice things tonight, linebacker Jalen Carlisle had a couple tackles. I think two of them in a row. He seems like he's back to being in the mix there among the starting linebackers.

Starting point is 00:21:05 Again, I think it's situational, but I think you'll see Saguna Luby out there sometimes. I think you'll see Jalen Carlisle out there sometimes, aside from Franklin and EJ Speed. Again, I think it's just going to depend on the situation. But I think we're going to have a role for all four running backs that we see out there or linebackers that we see out there. Eric Johnson II, we've been kind of just begging to see something from him, really anything. He had a really high effort play today that led to a big play for the Colts. He chased down the running back far downfield

Starting point is 00:21:40 and was able to knock the ball out for a forced fumble, which Michael Tootsie picked up. So that was good for a nose tackle to go all the way from the line of scrimmage, like 20 yards downfield to hit the ball carrier so hard that it pops the ball out and then creates a turnover. That's a huge play. Tenacity is not a skill. It's kind of a mindset. And that's something that even if it doesn't pan out for him, maybe if he doesn't even make the roster, stuff like effort will always go a long way. And you'll be able to make some type of play sometime

Starting point is 00:22:16 as long as you give effort like that. That's why we see guys like Adetomi, Adeware, occasionally getting more production than what his current skill level provides. I mean, super athletic player, but he's not a complete package by any means yet in terms of putting all that athleticism together to create a clearly defined mechanical player. We saw that from Dio Adango and Quidipe earlier in their careers as well. So effort will get you pretty much anywhere you want to go. EJ Speed, I thought, did a couple really nice things. I saw him thumping some guys at the line of scrimmage, had a tackle for loss earlier. I think it was on a run play. Ronnie Harrison did the same thing, had a really nice tackle for loss as well. At this point, I mean, I don't think he's really

Starting point is 00:23:11 in the running to be the other starting safety anymore. It's been really heavily Nick Cross and Ronnie Thomas at this point. But I mean, Harrison is still out there flashing occasionally. We'll see what it comes down to with the 53-man roster, if that's enough to stick around or not. Good preseason finale tonight. It's obviously like we talked about the other day. It's always good to get a win, even if it's during the preseason. I thought we saw some good things from a lot of the starting players. The defense has been surprisingly good.

Starting point is 00:23:47 I know they were playing with the twos and threes of the Bengals out here tonight, but they looked awesome against, you know, the Joe Burrow-led first-team Bengals offense on Tuesday. So the defense really passed the test out here today, I think. So, all right, tomorrow, Zach and I are going to be back with you. I think Zach is planning even more content later in the week. Uh, but we want to start breaking down our 53 man roster predictions here pretty soon. Uh, so we'll be bringing that to you guys anytime now, uh, be on the lookout for that. We'll

Starting point is 00:24:20 definitely be with you Friday. I'd say tomorrow, but it's already 1.15. In my brain, it's mush. I don't know about you guys. But yeah, thank you guys again for making us your first listen of the day. Whether it's daytime or what, again, 1.15, that counts. So go listen to Locked On Fantasy Football next, whether that is after this

Starting point is 00:24:41 or when you wake up in the morning. Don't forget, if you guys want to become a Locked on Colts insider and chat with us directly and get the inside scoop, what's going on down here at the field, the sidelines, the postgame locker room, whatever, follow that link in our show notes, and I'll answer your questions pretty much all the time. When people get their questions in to me, I try to answer them as quick as possible, and I'll give you my honest opinion on things as well. If you don't already, follow at LockedOnColts, at JakeArthurNFL, and at ZachX2 on Twitter.

Starting point is 00:25:13 We're also on TikTok and Instagram as well. And please be sure to subscribe on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. We love your ratings and reviews as well, especially with the season here. We would love to get more eyes and ears on us. So be a friend and tell a friend about the show. And with that, you guys have a great night. I have a two hour drive ahead of me. Hopefully you guys can just roll over to bed right now,

Starting point is 00:25:37 but we will talk to you later on Friday.

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Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - Indianapolis Colts: Anthony Richardson Takes Viewers On Roller Coaster Ride vs. Cincinnati Bengals

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