Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - Indianapolis Colts: Could Anthony Richardson Be The Answer?

Episode Date: March 8, 2023

The Indianapolis Colts are quarterback shopping this offseason. Florida QB Anthony Richardson turned heads at the Combine but could he be the long term answer at quarterback? Zach and Jonathan Hagler break down the divisive quarterback's game in detail today!We are thrilled to announce the second edition of the Indy Draft Guide is available for pre-order!The 2023 Indy Draft Guide provides a one-stop shop as to how the top college prospects fit with the Indianapolis Colts. This digital download will include detailed analysis and profiles of hundreds of prospects, player comps, scheme-fit analysis, a Colts draft pick trade chart, features, and more!The most comprehensive Colts draft coverage you can find anywhere releases April 10th, 2023.Pre-order now with this special discount code! https://draftguide.gumroad.com/l/indy23/draftmasFind and follow Locked On Colts on your favorite podcast platforms:🎧 https://link.chtbl.com/LOColts?sid=YouTube📺YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLdpxJspi1hMh5HL7ExpWOQLocked On NFL League-Wide: Every Team, Fantasy, Draft & More🎧 https://linktr.ee/LockedOnNFLFollow Jake and Zach's written work on HorseshoeHuddle.com, and give them a follow on Twitter @JakeArthurNFL, @ZachHicks2, @LockedOnColts, and @ColtsOnFN!Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Place your first FIVE DOLLAR bet to get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in Free Bets – win or lose! Visit Fanduel.com/LockedOn today to get startedFANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Can the volatile Anthony Richardson be the savior of the Indianapolis Colts? We're going to talk about that all today on this episode of Locked on Colts. Let's get to it. You are Locked on Colts, your daily Indianapolis Colts podcast. Part of the Locked on Podcast 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 I just realized I said volatile yet again in the intro, guys.

So let's change that to divisive. I think divisive is a better word for Anthony. Like volatile is like a Carson Wentz or a Will Levitz maybe. Like let's change it to divisive for Anthony Richardson. If you guys notice, Jake Arthur is not here. And I just realized I got to put our names up here on on on for the Facebook stuff. There we go. Oh, I still have my Roy István stuff on there. Let me get that out of here. All right. All right, guys, if you guys are watching on YouTube, you understand a little pause there. But yeah, I'm joined by John Hagler, of course,

to talk about another quarterback in this class. If you guys are interested in some of our past conversations about quarterbacks, we talked aboutj stroud uh like a month ago i think at this point so yeah if you guys hear us talking about like head coaching stuff in there obviously the colts did not have shane steichen yet so you know it's a little dated in that regard but i think everything we said about cj stroud still kind of stands true uh with with what we think so today we're talking about anthony richardson the divisive maybe volatile quarterback we said about C.J. Stroud still kind of stands true with what we think. So today we're talking about Anthony Richardson, the divisive, maybe volatile quarterback here from Florida.

And we're going to kick this off with the positives. So, Hag, when you look at a guy like Anthony Richardson, what first pops out to you? F-O-N. He's a freak of nature. You know, I got to see him live this past season at Texas A&M. He stands out.

He stands out among some of the most athletic guys in the country. He passes the eye test. He passes the capable test. You know, a lot of times we'll see guys who are very good and you sit there and you go, well, can he make all the throws? No, no. Anthony Richards can do anything you want him to do. It's consistently. Can he consistently do it? Can he do it on a consistent basis? Those are

things that stand out right away. The upside is all the way to the bank. He's the biggest lottery ticket, I think, in this draft because his ceiling is so high. It's so much higher than the other guys and I love Bryce and I love CJ but you know what you're getting with them you know you're getting good quarter like solid quarterback play they're gonna they're gonna they're gonna do what they do Anthony Richardson he hasn't taken enough snaps to even know what he's capable of you know this is a guy who started one season and played some games behind Emory Jones at Florida so it's

his upside is scary. Yeah. I think the biggest appeal for Anthony Richardson to me is just what he can be. Like you said, I generally know what C.J. Stroud is going to be. Obviously, all these guys have bus potential, but C.J. Stroud, good anticipator. He's a point guard. He's going to distribute the ball well. He's going to be a good player, most likely.

Bryce Young, the same way. As long as the size doesn't kill him, he's going to be a good player most likely Bryce Young in the same way as long as the size doesn't kill him he's going to be a very solid passer Anthony Richardson in a league full of aliens can be an alien you know like we're talking about you know the NFL right now is dominated by these freak show alien quarterbacks we've got Pat Mahomes going to five straight AFC championship games winning two Super Super Bowls, winning two MVPs. And I'm not saying Anthony Richardson is Pat Mahomes or he's definitely going to be Pat Mahomes. But when you look at this draft class,

which guy could get to that level one day? It's the guy who is 245 pounds, runs a 4'4", can jump over 40 inches. And when you watch his, I mean, again, I'm not saying just watch his highlights. You have to watch the whole thing, but you can see the glimpses of what he can be. And it's not like, it's not even like a Josh Allen situation where we had three years of what he

was in college. You know, we saw three years of what Josh Allen was. We've seen one season of Anthony Richardson, who knows that this is just the start for him or if this is what he currently is or what he's always going to be. But this, I mean, could be i mean you look at guys like joe burrow was under 60 completion percentage his first career first year in college uh jalen hertz was way low was super low his first year like it's so unprecedented to have a guy after his first year declare like this when it wasn't like this super productive year but if you look at guys you know traditionally guys get better after their first season so look i'm not saying this is definitely a guy who's 100% going

to be a superstar but when you look at this draft class and even look at the last couple draft classes outside of trevor lawrence this is the guy who's most likely to get the superstar level oh yeah no doubt you know he's there there's some things with anthony richardson that I was more impressed with as, you know, the season went on. And then I got a chance to go down to College Station, and he does things that guys that typically bust don't do. Like Anthony Richardson, he has pocket presence. Yes. He has pocket presence.

Like that's one of the best things for me. Can you move around the pocket? And this isn't a guy who just takes off and and runs he can do it every play if he wanted to but he he sits in the pocket and he he delivers these shots the issue sometimes is a little bit of inconsistent with the accuracy and maybe footwork at times but he can do those things we've seen it and that's why i'm not that's why i'm not as afraid of anthony richard because i've seen him do things that he needs to do to succeed on the next level. Right. And the biggest thing with quarterbacks like this is the number one factor determining if these guys are going to hit in the NFL is the stuff that we really can't see.

It's the mind. It's that growth mindset. Are you going to come in and think about this whole opportunity like a Josh Allen did or like a Jalen Hurts did? Or are you going to come in, you're going to think like a Baker Mayfield did? Are you going to think like a Sam Darnold did or like a like a Jalen Hurts did or are you going to come in you're going to think like a Baker Mayfield did are you going to think like a Sam Darnold did or like these type of guys you know are you going to get rattled or blame everybody else or are you going to take every single second to learn and we can't say we have no way of telling what Anthony Richardson is so that's why it's so dangerous for people like us to be so like optimistic or so positive about this stuff but you can see that the flashes and not just the arm strength like you said the pocket presence honestly when you factor in pocket strength and

how he can take a scramble 80 yards and score i would call his pocket presence the best in this class because it's up there for sure because bryce young for instance he's elusive in the pocket he's he's a magician but if you get a hand on on him, he's going to go down a lot easier than Anthony Richardson. Richardson, you have to get multiple bodies on this guy. He's a big guy. He's a big guy amongst big guys. Yeah, he's insanely hard to tackle.

He's quick, he's nimble, he's fast. And yeah, that pocket presence shows he's not, he gets rattled because he's a kid, not because the pressure's in his face. He gets rattled because he's a kid, not because the pressure is in his face. He gets rattled because he's he just hasn't done this much. Like it's all an experience with him. And you can even see flashes here and there of look, he's moving defenders with his eyes. He's moving the safety off so he can rip it back to the right side or whatever on on single high coverage.

He's moving the hook defender out so he can hit the hook over the middle. Like you see the flashes here and there. It's he's a kid he's a kid and and i'm not saying that him being so young and being a kid is a positive but and it's not even an excuse either it's more of like it's hard to count all this against him and say this is what he's always going to be because this is just our first time seeing him you know we can say this about guys in their first year in the nfl first year in college like we just don't know and i'm not saying this is necessarily just a positive but it's like you have to be you have to like just seeing what you saw this one year it's like this kid could be it like and that's so tantalizing

there in the top 10 when you're looking for a franchise quarterback 100 100 but but one of the things that one of the defenses, like you talk about excuses, but we've seen him in chaos a little bit. We've seen him in, you know, a system or a team, rather, that didn't have it all together, right? Did he have some good players around him? Yeah, I think – my ETN is going to be a hell of a player when he comes out. His interior lineman this year is going to be our first-round pick maybe.

But can anybody aside from us football nerds name one receiver he was thrown to? I'll say this. I'll say this real quick about his offense too. Like receiver obviously is one part of it, but also an O-line coach was calling their plays last year, and it definitely shows. Their running game was fun. Their passing game was fun their passing

game was the most predictable thing you'll ever see in college it was very vanilla very vanilla no qb coach on staff either uh it was it was a coaching change so they went from you know again they needed that change down in florida but how does that help a young quarterback who's just getting into the starting role for the first time again these are not excuses this is just what happened you know like yeah they're facts like i'm not i'm not using this to say anthony richard was actually amazing last year the best quarterback in the sec no not not by any means and we're going to talk about that in our next segment here why there is reason to be concerned but when you look at everything he did in college it wasn't it wasn't amazing but you saw enough flashes in a

kid's first year as a starter to say look this could be an alien in an alien dominated league and i that's that's just where i am with him like i cannot make cj stroud have a bigger arm or be faster or stronger or more pocket maybe the pocket awareness but i can't make bryce young over 200 pounds when he actually plays. I can't make Will Levis younger and more consistent. I can take this 20-year-old kid or 21-year-old kid who just first saw the field and build off of his flashes. That's where I feel like you do a lot more coaching than me, Hag.

So as someone who just thinks in the coaching mindset or just the the defensive players mindset i can work with this you know yep and that's how like i look at it when i'm working with corners i would rather take a kid who's very raw and has all the physical tools as opposed to a kid who who's played it has a ton of experience but he has he doesn't have the athleticism, the raw capability because I feel as if I can coach that. And I've done it before.

I've seen him before. I've seen former high school quarterbacks come in and be all-conference guys at college. We look at guys like Joe Hayden who played quarterback in high school. There's a ton of them all over the place. And that's how I look at Anthony Richardson, and I've been giddy about Richardson since a buddy of mine was telling me about him his freshman year at Florida.

I have the text to this day when he was talking about, man, we've got this kid, Anthony Richardson. He's baby Cam Newton. Literally, that's the text on my phone. He's baby Cam. He was like, man, if you could see the things that he's doing at practice. And this is the year Florida was in the NCAA championship game. They had players all over the place.

He was like, it doesn't make any sense. It makes no sense of what this kid can do. He has a big arm. He's fast. He's strong. He was like, if this kid's not a top ten pick when he leaves college, something horrible went wrong. That's how the conversation went.

And, you know, I always thought about it. I've always been a fan of him. I've always paid attention to Anthony Richardson. And we saw a lot of that. Like, if you watch the Utah game you think number one overall pick I literally text my guys I text my my buddies my football soccer and I said if he goes number one I'm all for it yeah I'm all for it if the season ended after that Utah game he's absolutely the number one overall pick but obviously they played a full set of games guys and and we're

going to talk about why we should be concerned about a quarterback like Anthony Richardson you know it's not all praise here we like to be some nuance here with our discussion uh but first i want to talk to you guys about fan duel which is america's number one sportsbook the midway point of the nba season is here and now is the perfect time to download fan duel because new customers get a no sweat first bet up to one thousand dollars that's bonus bets back if your first bet doesn't win, just download the FanDuel Sportsbook app. It's safe, secure,

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so obviously i've been the big anthony richardson fan and colts twitter colts land and i think i've unwittingly kind of convinced way too many people to join me on this bandwagon and now it's kind of it's getting to the point where too many Colts fans like them to where it's like it feels like we're ignoring the flaws a little bit and again we said all in the first segment here he is a kid like in every sense of the word one season started started. He declared one season too early. He did 100% one season too early. I don't fault him for it because he was not going to develop there at Florida. We were going to get a Josh Allen situation regardless. And you know, if he's, if he stays at Florida,

he probably gets that completion percentage up to 58% next year, 57%. And we're having the exact same discussions except he's a year older you know so it's like ah shoot you know we don't even have the young kid thing going anymore but in a deeper quarterback class yeah yes yes he wasn't going to be competing for qb1 next year obviously uh so when you look at everything that is scary about anthony richardson it's because he's a kid it's every it's everything we said positive in that first one can be flipped on its head to the negative because maybe this is the best we'll ever see from him.

Yeah, you never know. The inexperience is what's terrifying. That's the obvious one. It's the amount of reps, the amount of games. That's the glaring, glaring flaw in his game. But the number one thing that stands out to me are the misses. You know, when I talk about Anthony Richardson, he has some misses on there.

And it's like a high school major league prospect who can throw 101 and has very minimal control. Because there's times he gets up there and he just air mails footballs and you're like, how? How did that happen? And that's my biggest flaw is if you can clean that up like Josh Allen did, and I don't want to compare him to Josh Allen because every big athletic kid that comes through gets compared to him.

But you have to have a good situation. You have to have an offensive-minded coach who's willing to work and build the system around you. You need weapons. You need to be able to run the ball and they have to be willing to give you a year two years to put it all together and hopefully see what you can be like i said when you're a little bit more mature when you're not a kid when you when you have some snaps when you've thrown more than 300 some passes you know that's what it's going to take but that's my biggest philosophy yeah absolutely and and there's another thing, because you guys know I'm a huge quarterback mechanics guy. I love QB mechanics. I've gotten into it a lot. And there's a there's this logical fallacy with QB mechanics that because they can be improved, doesn't mean that they will be improved.

And I fall into this a lot, too, because like I just said in the first segment, you know, I can make, in my head, I can make Anthony Richardson more consistent and mechanically sound, but I can't make Bryce Young bigger, for instance. But in some ways you can't make these guys more mechanically sound. You know, we had a guy here in Indy a couple of years ago in Carson Wentz, who never became more mechanically sound. Never, ever did. We have guys like Zach Wilson, who in their whole career have never, ever come close

to being mechanically sound. You know, some guys just don't get it. And sometimes we do buy into these logical fallacies where just because something can be done doesn't mean it will be done. And that's part of where, you know, some hesitancy comes with me with Anthony Richardson. It's like, when you look at him, sure, the upper body stuff, a lot of it's fine.

You know, yes, he needs to keep his front half closed a little bit more and stuff like that. But it's all really in the legs, you know, setting to his target, not swinging open that gate. So he's driving the ball into the ground, keeping his feet calm when when, you know, things are closing in or when he's when he sees the open guy. And that'll that'll fix a lot of his concerns. But we do live in a world where it's possible that that never happens and he's just always going to be a 55 pastor we've seen a lot of athletic quarterbacks coming to the nfl and stay as inaccurate quarterbacks in the league oh yeah no and that's one of the a guy i talked to a lot he works with a lot of quarterbacks and he talks about it all the time there's the the biggest thing with young quarterbacks, and he talks about it all the time.

The biggest thing with young quarterbacks is can you get their lower half and upper half to merge? If you can do that, you've got a great situation going on. But the biggest issue with quarterbacks, every level, is inconsistency with the lower half, whether it's feet, whether it's hips, whether it's being like, or in the upper body not working together. And then you have these quarterbacks that don't even know why they're missing at times. And that's why it's so important to have a quarterback coach because the quarterback coach can sit there and he can look at you miss and say, Hey, you're, you're, you're too open here. Or you were too toesy here, or you didn't have a base underneath you or you got too long here, whatever it may be, they can point those things out. And that's one of the things when we talk about Anthony Richardson, like you said, he didn't have a quarterback coach this past year.

Who was fixing those issues? You know what I'm saying? And they may have been. But like you said, we saw a ton of inconsistencies. We saw a ton of inaccuracies. And those are things that can be addressed, you know, on the next level. And because they have to. You take a guy in the top five, like Indy's arguably going to do,

the franchise, that coaching staff that front office they're putting their the bank you know on you and they need to address it yeah yeah and just to clarify something uh anthony richard does have a personal qb coach it's just florida didn't have a qb coach there so a little bit different you know he didn't have someone who could go through film with him individually in his own position group he did have someone working with mechanics in the offseason he did say recently in an interview that now that they're away he's away from Florida and stuff and he can only focus on mechanic stuff he does feel like he's getting cleaner with it but we did again seeing the combine throwing there were just a couple throws

here and there where he got too loose with his mechanics and he tried to just rip it and it just didn't work but yeah so there's all those concerns again because mechanics can get better doesn't mean they will get better and because this kid has limitless potential doesn't mean he's gonna hit it you know like there are a lot of concerns with that but then the other concern is again he's a kid not in terms of just feeling pressure and just being on the football field but also in reading a defense you know like don't get me wrong playing in the sec is a great experience for him like he was seeing some real nfl defenses this past year i mean he played georgia also in reading a defense you know like don't get me wrong playing in the sec is a great experience for him like he was seeing some real nfl defenses this past year i mean he played georgia twice in

his career so you're seeing an nfl defense right there a lot of nfl guys on that defense but it's so different when you get to the nfl where you're going to be making high low reads over the middle when all these guys are running for i mean linebackers to safeties are running four three you know the the ends the ends are running four three the ends are running four three nolan smith and and uh what was the name sweat or montez sweat are gonna be running four three after you and stuff like the the margin for error in the nfl is so small that you sometimes need these processors like cj cj stroud and and boud and Bryce Young because they won't miss that 0.1 seconds that they need. Where Anthony Richardson is so raw and so young that he's going to process things a little bit slower.

And it's not really at his fault right now, but it's going to be slower processing. Yes, being a mobile quarterback does kind of give you a couple more seconds back there, but not that many you know not that many so coming from an offense that he just came from where you know there were second halves of games where they were just calling four verts every single play or they were calling play action uh double hooks like that's all they were calling you know peak yeah like just a rpo peak and that was their entire offense in the second half you You know, like that.

This is a wide receiver screen 25 times a game. Like this is what they were doing there at Florida. Where is he going to be at when it comes to reading a defense? I don't doubt his capability of getting better in this regard. Yeah. But right now it's got to be low. It's got to be really low right now. Yeah. And that's just a part of it. We heard, what was it, two and a half years ago? Mahomes comes out and says, oh, yeah, no, I just learned how to, you know, truly read a defense. Yeah, I know what coverages were and things like that, but I didn't really know it.

You know, and that's Patrick Mahomes. This is a guy who had already won a Super Bowl at that point or right before he won it. Or he just won it. That year year he said he felt comfortable reading defenses it takes time everybody everybody isn't a football savant everybody isn't Bryce Young everybody isn't these guys who who have a PhD in football not my offense but in football in general they're not going to come in he's not he doesn't know to come in and he hasn't been you know formally educated to come in and have a game plan ready for the offense coordinator. That's weird. You know, that's not normal, you know? And I don't think people should expect him to. But that's where I think, you know, obviously, you know, the staff that they hired and the people that they have around them is going to be truly beneficial for him because I think

he's going to get that opportunity. And I think it's perfect for him. Yeah, and Hag's going to segue us here right into our last segment. So coming up, guys, we're going to talk about how a quarterback like Anthony Richardson can succeed not only in the NFL but with the Indianapolis Colts. All right, Hag, so we're back. Again, if you guys are on YouTube or whatever, you probably got a little bit of an ad there. But we're going to be talking about Anthony Richardson and how he could in the nfl and and before we even get into too much detail here hag when you're looking at coaches and just in just teams around the league and stuff like that

the bet one of the best overall fits for anthony richardson has to be that philadelphia offense that jalen hurts was running last year right yeah and and not just because Jalen Hurts, Jalen Hurts in a lot of ways is very similar to Anthony Richardson. If anything, he's the from a physical standpoint, a lesser version, you know, because Jalen Hurts is a very capable thrower of the football. Very athletic quarterback, very strongly built quarterback. And that's what Anthony Richardson is. Can he throw the ball? Yes. Is he physically well built? Yes. You know, then did he need a little bit of development while him when he he throw the ball? Yes. Is he physically well-built? Yes. Did he need a little bit of development when he got to the league? Did he need development in college? We saw him his first years in Alabama and they had training wheels

on him. Did he have success? Ultimately, he lost his spot because he needed that. Then he made his way to Lincoln-Riley. Things got a little bit more wide open. I think he got more comfortable being a passer, but they used his mobility well. The Eagles already have a blueprint to that eagle staff in in and now in indy but they have a blueprint on how to be successful with

a quarterback that's similar in nature to anthony richardson it's not like they're going into it like man we're just taking this raw you know piece of clay and i think we got something they know what to do with it. It's going to come down to execution. It's going to come down to do we have the right receivers. It's going to come down to are we going to give him enough time? Are you going to put the pieces around him to make him truly successful like the Eagles did? Nobody gave Jalen Hurts

credit this year. It's the offense. It's the running game. It's the O-line. Well, they made it to the Super Bowl. It don't really matter. So if that's what Indy does with Anthony Richardson over the next 10 years nobody's going to complain about it yeah I think a lot of people don't realize that yes that Philly offense was great the offensive line is great the weapons are great that offense was Jalen Hurts like that offense was designed for Jalen Hurts because here's what that offense did well they ran the ball well the quarterback is a huge part of that by the way so they ran the ball well including with

the quarterback they were quick at getting the ball out of their hands on those yak plays underneath and when they got you into that single high safety look they were killing you vertically killing you vertically and this is actually this kind of segues again just into something I want to ask you because as a defender, you clearly know. If you guys don't realize, Hag played college football, by the way. You guys can just tell looking at him here. Look at this chiseled up dude right here. But no, Hag played college football.

He was an NFL draft prospect years ago. He's obviously making it as a coach and everything now and doing some great things. But Hag back in the day was a college defender. And I'm curious, you know, when you're playing against a mobile quarterback, not only just a guy who can get out of the pocket and create, but a guy who's a threat to run the ball. Yeah.

Does that kind of dictate your coverage on defense? Like how often can you sit in that too high shell and not have that extra defender in the box against a quarterback like that? It creates doubt, you know, more than anything. It creates doubt. You know, when quarterbacks are one-dimensional, when their statutes in the pocket i can kind of let my d-lineman work let my blitz work when you face a mobile quarterback a truly mobile quarterback you whether i'm if i'm a c-gap fitter right here i'm i'm or maybe a hook hook curl dropper right

here that's got c-gap late yeah i may rush to that to that c gap a little sooner because i don't i don't want to you know let him get there and then next thing you know he pops out and he makes a throw it just creates doubt it messes with time and you add to finish it to the box and it creates instead of dropping six seven guys in coverage sometimes well now you know i have to i have to drop four now i have a lot more one-on-one matchups now i have a lot more hole shots that's what a mobile quarterback does. It creeps the defense up. It makes them doubt a little bit. It makes them a little bit more vulnerable. That's why the

league has gone athletic. It has gone mobile. There's very few statues in the league. Even the non-athletic quarterbacks are very athletic now. The older guys are the guys who don't move very well. It's not the younger guys. The younger guys coming in, you have to be mobile. The D linemen, like we saw that come on year after year they're getting too athletic the linebackers are

getting too athletic you have to be able to move around and kind of make that defense you know dictate what that defense can and can't do and that's what mobility does for you yeah and I'm glad I'm glad you ran with my leading question there because I'm going to lead this into the point I was going to make is when you look at that philadelphia eagles offense last year for instance they ran four verts i think like 56 times last year just four verts traditional four verts you know so that's what like three times a game they are running four verts and they had an explosive play rate on 20 of those calls 20 and you know why almost every single time they're running four verts the defense is in single high middle of the field close press coverage and you have to win one-on-one with aj brown devonta smith uh

quez walk-in walk-in suits a speedster as well like these are and i'm not saying the colts have these weapons but this is what shane steichen did with a mobile quarterback last year is he used the threat of jalen hurts to get defenses into his coverages that he wanted them to be in and then he just killed them vertically just killed them and you know the Colts have some jump ball monsters they have Alec Pierce who showed a lot of flashes last year they have Michael Pittman Jr. who despite not really getting many targets down the field last year we know what he can do down the field they have guys who can win that way so having a quarterback like anthony richardson where yes the accuracy is going to be concerning yes there are going to be a lot of concern from day one but he's going to be able to dictate

coverage from day one because you're guaranteeing seven eight hundred nine hundred yards rushing with this guy like if you use him like they did jalen hurts last year he's probably going to be a thousand yard rusher because of that ability to use the read option and scramble. And Jonathan Taylor. Exactly. Oh, bro. Like, I know he had a down.

Like, that should be the thought of Anthony Richardson and Jonathan Taylor in the backfield together should terrify the NFL because, like we said last year when we talked about the Colts or this offseason they're one or two pieces away on offense from being very very good and the type of receivers that they have when you look at him when you look at Pierce when you look at the big guys like like Woods like like they're big targets I can I can miss a little bit when I got six four six seven six two six three out there now they just need a little bit more speed to kind of threaten those defenses.

I think they're one... What are they picking out in the second round? 35th, if they don't trade up. If they don't trade up, and say they grab Anthony Richardson, you go get a Josh Downs or one of those type of guys that can run, who can work inside. It may not

be a perfect fit, but I love Josh Downs. I love to plug him. Like I said, they're one or two pieces away and like like you were saying though if if they can do those things they did in philly with anthony richardson okay and jonathan taylor and i know they had a staff of running backs but none of those guys jonathan taylor i know he had a down year but none of those guys are jonathan taylor at the end of the day they can do whatever they want to the defense in the nfl because they have They can do whatever they want to the defense in the NFL because they have to respect it. There's going to be people in the box. Now the receivers have to win their matchup.

Exactly. And that's my overall point. This is like, look, if the Colts draft Anthony Richardson and say they start them day one, I know a lot of you guys be freaked out by the thought of that. He might complete 51% of his passes in year one, but the Colts offense is going to be so explosive on those couple that he does hits because these receivers are going to get one-on-one press coverage middle of the field closed all day long they're going to be able to run the ball really well because you're going to have the threat of not only a quarterback that can run but a monster quarterback you know so you know this

basically drafting anthony richardson and again i know i lost some of you analytics guys because i'm talking about the run game a lot, but drafting a guy like Anthony Richardson is the reintroduction into explosive offensive football with the Indianapolis Colts. For all of you people who loved the Andrew Luck and Bruce Arians days back in 2013, 2014, whatever it was, or I think it was 2012 too, this is it. This is the close you can get to it. Yes, there are ways to make cj stroud mobile and to get more of those single high looks and attack the ball down the field but getting a

guy like anthony richardson where if you're a defense you're not scared of his throwing but you're terrified of his running you're going to give him so many favorable looks on the outside that if he even improves a little bit we're going to be talking about extremely explosive offensive football, which I know all of you guys love to hear. So, yes, Anthony Richardson is terrifying. He's a baby. He might never progress in the NFL, but what he can be is so tantalizing that I am 100% all on board

using up a top five pick on this guy because, again, like I said at the very top of the show, it's an alien league and you need aliens to compete with them anthony richardson can be an alien he's not that yet but he can be so i'm kind of all bored with him i don't what do you think hag what are your closing words on him well the thing is we haven't seen when we see freaks at the quarterback position truly freakish players at the quarterback position when we look at like i said the the josh allen's when we look at the cam new and we look at the lamar. When we look at, like I said, the Josh Allen's, when we look at the Cam Newton, when we look at the Lamar Jackson's,

those guys have success. It's hard. I'm not talking about Malik Willis, who has a rocket arm and very good athleticism. No, no, no. I'm talking terrifying athleticism. Put it like this. Anthony Richardson, we were at the game in Texas A&M, and I had some young guys with me some some high school guys with me and they saw him running down the field okay and they were oh my god he's fast like dude that dude that dude what and then the next series when they had the ball he was taking snaps at quarterback and they because they didn't know they looked at me and, and they said, that's the quarterback? I was like, yeah.

And it blew their mind because they never thought that they would see a quarterback move like that. And I was texting. I was looking on Twitter. And I wanted to see the view from the cameras because I know what I saw on the field. I just wanted to see if it looked like that on camera. These freaks have success. You know what I'm saying? It's just can you get that machine and can you drive it the right way?

And I think it's going to be hard for Anthony Wilson, I mean, Richardson not to do well because he is so damn athletic. But I'm excited about his upside. I'm terrified of the potential buzz factor. But if I'm a GM and I'm picking, it's going to be very hard for me to say, nah, I'll wait. Because you never know if you'll get a chance to get a quarterback like that again. Right, right.

I completely agree. So guys, that's all we have for today talking quarterbacks. We'll have Hacker back on next week to talk about his Bama boy, Bryce Young. So I know a lot of you guys are a little torn on. Oh, there you go. I know a lot of you guys are torn on Bryce Young in the comments section from his size to his ability. We're going to talk about that next week.

But yeah, today, Anthony Richardson was the whole conversation. Nothing about the Colts drafting him or any rumors or speculating source, just two football nerds talking some ball about this guy. Make sure you guys are following us on social media at Locked on Colts, at JakeArthurNFL, and at Zach Hicks too. And then obviously at JohnHaglerCR, one of the best in the business every single year. He's the dog.

He's the dog right there. Also subscribe to Locked on Colts podcast on YouTube, wherever you listen to your podcast. And thank you guys for making Locked on Colts your first listen every day. Now make your second listen, Locked on NFL Draft. Damian Parson and Keith Sanchez provide in-depth coverage on the biggest NFL draft prospects with deep dives into sleepers and hidden gems that can change your favorite NFL franchise.

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