Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - Indianapolis Colts: Shorthanded Defense Needs to Give Anthony Richardson Help vs. Green Bay Packers

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Colts matchup this weekend went from one that they were originally picked to lose to now being a game that they've probably got to try and win. Let's get to it. You are locked on Colts, your daily Indianapolis Colts podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. All right. Thanks for tuning in and making us your first listen 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.

Starting point is 00:00:32 Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. And today's show is brought to you by FanDuel. Now through September 22nd, all FanDuel customers can bet $5 and get a three-week free trial of NFL Sunday Ticket from YouTube and YouTube TV. Visit Fandle.com to get started. What is up, friends? This is Jake Arthur and Zach Hicks of HorseshoeHuddle.com. I am your resident media member for the Colts, and Zach is your resident film nerd over at Horseshoe Huddle. And today, like every Friday, we are here to bring you our

Starting point is 00:01:06 official preview of Colts and Packers. And I got to be honest, Zach, I hate that segment one has to be how it is, but we got to talk about injuries right off the bat. I think that's what really shapes this whole matchup on both sides, Packers and Colts. So you look at the Colts, the official injury report just came out a little bit ago. Julian Blackman has been ruled out already. You know, one of your probably three most important defensive players. And then DeForest Buckner, Quidipe, and Josh Downs are all questionable. Matt Gay is back for what it's worth.

Starting point is 00:01:40 He missed last week's game. And then for Green Bay, they've got a few guys questionable. Jordan Love, Marshawn Lloyd, and Jaden Reed, I think. Love, it feels like a little gamesmanship from Green Bay here. He suffered the MCL sprain last week, and immediately everyone was like, eh, probably not IR, but he's still going to miss a little bit of time. He hasn't practiced this week, but he's still listed as questionable, probably just to try and keep the Colts guessing, even though they have been preparing for Malik Willis the entire week.

Starting point is 00:02:14 But, yeah, for the Colts, this defense, it was a group that already gave up over 200 yards rushing last week, did not have a great day, and now some of their best players have a big fat question mark on them yeah yeah you know we we were saying all off season jake that the worst case scenario for the colts this year would be any kind of injury to juju brents or julian blackman like even one even one one of those guys missing some time with injury would be bad news for this colts team with how weak their secondary is and And now we're at week two and we have no more Juju Brents for majority, if not all of the season. And Julian Blackman is

Starting point is 00:02:51 out with the same injury that he had late last season. So having that flare up again, I know the Colts said they don't think it's a long-term injury, but like, I don't know why we would not be concerned about that. I mean, he, he went from playing last week to not even touching the practice field this week whatsoever and being ruled out with an injury that he suffered last year. That's concerning to me. So, look, again, we've had this conversation all offseason, and we were very big on this show of saying go out and get LeJarrius Sneed, go out and get Justin Simmons.

Starting point is 00:03:23 But we were also pretty big at, like, look, you don't have to make those moves, but you have to bring in some playable players behind these guys. And I hope Dallas Flowers has the game of his life on Sunday. I hope Ronnie Harrison, who was a free agent in the first week of the regular season this year, who's back on the practice squad now and very likely to be called up and start on Sunday. I hope that those two guys have the game of their life. But why are we in this situation again? The same situation we were in last year, going into week 18, a playoff game last year,

Starting point is 00:03:54 where we were starting, you know, Daryl Baker Jr. was playing a bunch of snaps out there at corner. And we were starting Ronnie Harrison at safety in that game. It's like, how do you see what happened last year with corner and with safety? And just bring back the same depth this year. Like, i don't even care about bringing back the young starters like i'm fine with you betting on juju brent staying healthy even though it's a bad bet because he hasn't been healthy since high school i understand betting on it because you invested a high pick on him i understand investing in nick cross you spent a top 100 pick on him and julian blackman a player that you like. But why is there nothing behind them?

Starting point is 00:04:28 Rodney Thomas is on this roster. You're bringing up a veteran safety that you turned to linebacker middle of last season. You're bringing him back to start over Rodney Thomas. What's the point in having Rodney Thomas on this team then? What's going on here? You can say you like the cornerback room all you like. You kept four of the guys that you originally had in camp at corner you know because they they waved daryl baker jr and all the rookies they drafted and grabbed womack from from the 49ers

Starting point is 00:04:53 so like the depth just simply was not good like again i understand starting the kids at that corner and safety totally get it what are you doing with depth here like these are half these guys like are not rosterable players like i would have reset the safety room this offseason at least the backups or whatever the corners you could have brought in some veteran just to be a safety net for when juju brentz goes down with an injury but now we're stuck with womack versus dallas flowers or maybe david long is coming like i don't know if he's going to get the call up an outside corner Chris Lamont's maybe starts on the outside like I don't I don't know what the plan is there and then it's safety again you're bringing in Ronnie Harrison who wasn't on a team last week to be your starting safety this week like they're lucky they might

Starting point is 00:05:40 be going against Malik Willis because it could work out in their favor quite a bit but man it's frustrating something that was so foreseeable all offseason as it's going to be something that bites you in the butt in the in the regular season already happening in week two like this was so avoidable like you don't even have to go out and get a Justin Simmons for the very meager contract that he signed like an extremely meager contract that was very affordable. You didn't even have to do that though. Like what was it? The safety from the Jeremy Chin signed for like two and a half million or 3 million with the, with the commanders.

Starting point is 00:06:13 Like you could have just done something like that, like a $2 million deal to someone to bring them in here to, to back up or be a rotational player. But now we're stuck with a linebacker playing safety or Rodney Thomas, who they clearly have no interest in playing on defense anymore so I mean it's frustrating I don't know how we're back in this situation it's such as it was such a foreseeable thing and we can't get the same excuse of like oh you can't predict injuries you could kind of predict a guy like Julian Blackman

Starting point is 00:06:42 who's missed 26 percent of the games in his career missing some time you could kind of predict a guy like Julian Blackman who's missed 26% of the games in his career missing some time you could predict Juju Brents who's missed like 80% of his career games you know missing some time so very avoidable issue that's already rearing its ugly head here in week two of the 2024 season and we'll have to see man like I know we had talked about these other injuries but like already Julian Blackman and Juju Brents, like, come on, man. Come on. Yeah. I'm with you. I am okay with them saying we like who we have, but that doesn't mean you don't add insurance behind him. You put a ton of eggs in the basket of Juju Brents, who has not at any point been 100% since you drafted him. He has always had something to deal with.

Starting point is 00:07:25 And Julian Blackman has never played a full season. You put so much eggs in the basket of those guys. And now, I mean, Blackman, let's just say, he's not going to be out for very long. But Brents is. You were really reliant on those guys' health who have never been healthy. And now, look.

Starting point is 00:07:40 So, yeah, I digress. We'll go on to other injuries. But, yeah, DeF deforest buckner that's kind of another one you know like let's say he plays when he plays through injuries he's often on a snap count so let's say he starts but is only going to play like a quarter of the time you know 25 is it taven brian is it rayquan davis is it Tommy? Like, who is it? I mean, Raekwon Davis, you would hope would probably get an increased role and hopefully he looks better because that's one of the only two free agents you sign. But Taven Bryan feels a lot like this. That's like

Starting point is 00:08:21 playing Daryl Baker Jr. If you still had him. You know, like, what are you doing? So that one's going to be frustrating if Buckner's out. Again, even if he's in, he's probably not going to play his full workload. Quitty was at least back on the practice field Friday. So hopefully he starts and plays a normal workload. I don't think we're as worried about edge. You got Latu, you got Taequann Lewis, you got Dio and then Josh Downs. I'm not incredibly optimistic. It feels like he's probably still a week away. Cause I mean, he's only practiced one week and he did

Starting point is 00:08:55 miss like five weeks up to this. So if he plays, it's kind of like Buckner to me. I don't know if he'll have a full workload, but but I mean maybe he still gets out there I mean some Josh Downs is better than none yeah and I don't think it's as pressing for Josh Downs to get out there just because you know you have A.D. Mitchell who looked good last week you have Ashton Doolin who looked really good last week you have Anthony Gould who's done some good things so I don't think they're gonna push it too much like I think it's questionable but probably more so doubtful unless Downs like looks really gooday like pre-game doing everything he needs to do okay cool get him out there uh but it is promising that pay seems to be trending in the right direction

Starting point is 00:09:33 hopefully he can get out there buckner like you said maybe you don't go do a whole full game load on him because look the packers are going to run it down the colts throat in this game like it's going to be a run heavy game plan, regardless of Jordan love plays or not, because you're not going to have your sprained knee quarterback. Even if he's out there, throw the ball 60 times, you know, you're going to run the ball a lot.

Starting point is 00:09:52 And a Buckner misses time. Like again, the tape and Brian, hopefully Raekwon Davis is up to speed. It could look a lot like last week and we don't want it to look like that again. So we'll see, man.

Starting point is 00:10:04 This defense is already like ailing it's already look feels like it's flailing a little bit and uh it's only week two so we'll see i guess i guess it can only get better after this week hopefully yeah we're all looking for the guy who did this basically all right coming up next we're going to talk about the offense because you know vibes are better. I like talking about the offense a little more. When you're hiring for your small business, you want to find quality professionals who are right for the role. That's why you got to check out LinkedIn Jobs, which has the tools to help find the right professionals for your team faster and for free. LinkedIn isn't just a job board either.

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Starting point is 00:11:57 Plus, if that's not enough, be sure to check out FanDuel's Profit Boost in the app and use it for FanDuel's double- your winnings for all of Sunday, September 15th pregame money line bets. Profit boost will be live starting last night on Thursday. So view your account page now to learn more about your boost for this weekend. Right now on FanDuel, the Colts are currently three point favorites in this one. And the total point over under is just at 40 and a half, which I, I feel like that's pretty low. I mean, if anything, I feel like this is a defensive or a game where the defense is just going to not have the time of its life.

Starting point is 00:12:34 I think this just has Colts Browns 2023 written all over it to me. Maybe I'm being optimistic, but I think both teams are just going to be able to score a little bit whenever they want. So visit fan roll.com to download America's number one sports. And guys, the new locked on NFL is here. Locked on NFL is now two shows every day. First,

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Starting point is 00:13:20 All right, guys, we're talking Colts offense because Jake and I actually want to have some fun on this episode. So previewing this Colts offense going into this Packers game I think there's a lot of good things to build on in that first game that we saw against Houston Texans the Colts were one of the few teams in the NFL able to hit the deep ball I know a lot of the conversation topics around national media when it comes to the NFL this past week was the lack of targets past 10 to 20 yards of depth of target. The Colts did not have that problem whatsoever. Anthony Richardson was ripping the ball down the field, had multiple passes that targeted receivers 50 plus yards down the field. So the Colts were really good at the home run ball. They were also solid in the intermediate

Starting point is 00:14:03 game. I think, you know, the Texans were able to take away a little bit of the intermediate game because their middle linebacker Aziz Alshier was on one that entire game he was absolutely fantastic in that showing and I don't think the Colts are going to have the same issues in this one with Quay Walker not I don't think Quay Walker is the same caliber of linebacker as as Alshier but also a little bit up this week too he's been on the injury report yeah soshier, but also a little banged up this week too. He's been on the injury report. Yeah. So again, I think it's a little bit better for the Colts there with intermediate game, but the real thing that the Colts need to establish, and I'll let you build on this a little bit too, Jake, obviously the ground game, establishing the dominance in that

Starting point is 00:14:38 ground game, get Jonathan Taylor going a little bit. Like it doesn't need to be vintage Jonathan Taylor game where it's like 150 yard rushing game or anything but just get him a lot more productive and efficient on the ground game and then just building some kind of layups into your offense or some sort of quick hitters and easy answers for your offense from what I understand with this Packers defense they don't blitz a ton but when they do blitz it's a lot of nickel pressures a lot of you know bringing like corners and faster players so the Colts got to have their outlets. I want to see Shane Stike and give more answers to his young quarterback in those situations this week. I know last week some of it was Richardson just keeping his eyes down the field too much, but a lot of it was also just relying too much on stagnation in the short game. And I'd rather have some moving parts, you know, again,

Starting point is 00:15:27 more wide receiver screens, more RPOs, more RPRs to get the pocket moving a little bit. The play action game was great. The deep passing game was great. Intermediate was pretty good. Those are great. Let's build on that, but let's get the ball moving a little bit. Let's get some drives that are eight, nine, 10 play touchdown drives and not, I mean, look,

Starting point is 00:15:42 the two play touchdown drives are awesome too, but like sometimes you need to establish your will a little bit and, and just drain a defense like the Texans were doing to the Colts last week. So I just want to see some, some shoring up right there with the Colts offense. The start was good last week. Let's just make it a little bit cleaner this week, a little bit more consistent. And I think this Colts offense can score on just about any team, especially the Green Bay Packers this weekend this weekend yeah we know the Colts will be able to be kind of that lightning in a bottle type offense where you need the big play it can come but it's you got to get establish a little bit of a rhythm of course I think the most obvious course of action there

Starting point is 00:16:19 is to try and get Jonathan Taylor established obviously but I also noticed there there wasn't really much in the passing game for the running backs either. If you're dialing up shorter stuff just to get, again, establish a rhythm, get sticks moving a little bit, you could do that with Taylor or Tyler Goodson. You have options there. Honestly, that's stuff Anthony needs to kind of work on anyways is the consistency of his short

Starting point is 00:16:46 passes and the accuracy and the touch there so that's a couple things I think they could do but one thing I think is is very good is so last week there there was really no run game outside of Anthony it was all big play based but I think that certainly helps you establish that run game in this one because the defense is going to have to be scared of Anthony going over the top of them. They're not going to really be able to load up that box as much as they want to and try and stop Anthony and Jonathan running the ball. So Jeff Halfley's defense, you know, one week in the NFL. So it's like, what's he going to, you don't really know his

Starting point is 00:17:25 trends totally yet. Cause you got college players from Boston college, but you know, now you have NFL players. So the Colts, I don't know, they're going to probably try and just establish what they want to do rather than take advantage of what they think green Bay's defense can do. Um, but yeah, yeah, I would start with the run game and I would work in more running backs into the short passing game. Yeah, and one thing I do want to shout out is our friend of the show, Colts Film Room,

Starting point is 00:17:53 who's going to be on all of our Monday shows going forward. So big shout out to Colts Film Room. Ben Boris over there does a great job. But he did find on his film review of the Packers last week that when the Philadelphia Eagles used motion last week, the nickel corner did not move with the motion wide receiver. He stayed on that play side. And if you wanted to get, say, A.D. Mitchell's in the slot to the play side or to the strength of the offense, you could motion him to the backside and that nickel won't travel with him.

Starting point is 00:18:24 They'll drop a safety down or pull a linebacker out to be on your AD Mitchell. Now, if Josh Downs does play, that's easy money for Josh Downs. Josh Downs was thriving on matchups like that last year. But even if it's AD Mitchell or Anthony Gould or Ashton Doolin, those are prime matchups for the Colts to take advantage of. So that's another way that you can kind of get the quick hitters going in your offense. You know, have quick slants off that option routes, quick outs, whatever you need to do to take advantage of those safety and linebacker matchups you'll get in the passing game. But for the run game, I think a real big thing just for the run game and overall just the consistency of the offense is getting into more of those third and short type of situations. Now, we saw the third and 15 in the fourth quarter last week where Anthony Richardson threw it up to Alec Pierce for a big time gain. It was awesome. But outside of that, every time the Colts were outside of like third and five,

Starting point is 00:19:13 third and six, they're often struggled to get those first downs. And it was, and it's just, again, we don't have, when you have a quarterback who's not super efficient yet as a passer, he's going to struggle with the pure drop back pass game and obvious passing situations. So the key for the Colts to just maintain offensive possessions is get into third and manageable, third and four, third and three. It's insanely hard to stop this offense in those spots because you have a quarterback who can run like a fullback,

Starting point is 00:19:40 like Mike Allstott, basically, if he ever wants to. And then you have Jonathan Taylor. You have the RPR game and the RPO game. If you can get into those manageable parts of the field, those third and threes, third and fours, when Steigen can rip out, again, those RPOs and RPRs, it's going to be hard for any kind of defense to stop that. So if the Colts want to maintain possession of the football this week,

Starting point is 00:20:00 win first and second down, get into third and three, third and two, improve the overall success rate of the offense and they'll be able to really control the game and score some points so I'm optimistic again I don't need Richardson to be a 70% passer by any means mix in some home runs with a couple of of bunted singles and we're good you know like let's just get on base a little bit and then you can mix in some of those home runs and have some fun too but yeah I think this will be a good a good week for the offense, not because Green Bay's defense is a pushover or anything. I think they have a really solid defense and I like what Halfley's doing. But I do think, you know, they're going to learn from this first week and they're going to be able to run the ball a little

Starting point is 00:20:36 bit better against the Green Bay Packers. Yeah, I definitely like some of the things Philadelphia was able to put on film for the Colts to maybe kind of take advantage of as well. So pretty bullish on the offense this week. Let's go ahead and talk about the defense facing Malik Willis next. And now a word from our pals over at PrizePix. Just one Caleb Williams passing yard gets you a win on PrizePix every week in September. That's right. Only one yard gets you an automatic win every football weekend in September. That's four weeks of free Ws, maybe. It didn't look promising at times for that one passing yard last week, but I digress. Don't miss this deal on price picks, because it's gone when September ends.

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Starting point is 00:21:58 Tell me what you think about these ones, Zach. So Anthony Richardson, his more or less on rushing yards is 39.5. I'm curious on that one. I don't know. But Jonathan Taylor's is one I'm going to probably drill the more than on, 79.5 rushing yards. I think he gets his first big one this week. Yeah, I could see Taylor going for a big one. I really like that Richardson number because, I mean,

Starting point is 00:22:20 when I was watching the last bit of that Eagles and Packers game last week, Hertz was killing them in the scramble game. And I think if the Packers are going to roll out a lot of man coverage, the second Richardson gets out of the pocket, he's going to have a lot of room to scramble. He might hit those 39 yards on one scramble. So I really do like that scramble number for Anthony Richardson. Honestly, yeah, he did great last week. He had that one long one early on.

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Starting point is 00:23:27 Like there are numerous examples of it happening. And I think there's a recipe for Willis to do well. I was listening to the move, the six podcast this week. And Daniel Jeremiah was like, you know, you're not asking Malik Willis to look over this thing long term and protect it like you go ahead and pound him in the run game like use him up as much as you can while you have him in place of Jordan Love and go to his strengths like I don't know that I love the Colts defense number one having defend to defend Josh Jacobs with the teeth but then the quarterback they're playing as well is another one who's going to be able to run around and you just gave up over 200 yards rushing. I'm not going to say Malik Willis is going to be a great passer in this one by any means, but will he be able to make enough plays to make this game dangerous for the Colts?

Starting point is 00:24:19 Yeah, and we got to remember the Colts last year were 9-18 on the doorstep of making the playoffs and they had multiple games against backups last year and below average quarterbacks. Now, they won a couple of those games. They beat the New England Patriots. They beat the Carolina Panthers, two quarterbacks that just are simply below average at this point in their NFL careers. But also, they lost to a lot of backups. Jake Browning came in and was near perfect against the Colts. Taylor Heineke had a fantastic game against the Colts.

Starting point is 00:24:46 PJ Walker filled in for most of that Browns game. And I will say he didn't have that great a game, but he had a great final drive against the Colts in that one. I mean, you could go to more of an average star. Derek Carr tore them apart as well. Like, you know, it's not like the Colts only get destroyed by good quarterbacks under Gus Bradley and what Chris Bowdbacks under Gus Bradley and Chris

Starting point is 00:25:05 what Chris Bowd has given Gus Bradley these last couple years so yeah I'm with you like I don't think just because Malik Willis is starting we should infer that oh the Colts defense is going to be the you know the number one defense in football this week or anything like that it still poses a threat I like the idea of what you just said with Daniel Jeremiah where it's like you run him I don't think Malik Willis is like a pure running quarterback, if that makes sense. Like I know he's athletic enough to be it. I don't think he's like an Anthony Richardson,

Starting point is 00:25:32 like it's running is in his genes basically, like we see with Anthony Richardson or like with Lamar Jackson, but he can certainly do it. Great athlete, a quarterback, big arm, not super accurate. I think what this really comes down to is when we saw the jake brownings and the taylor heineke's last year just absolutely destroy the colts what did those two quarterbacks have in common in in those games a good run game bijan robinson killed the colts in that game last year along with tyler tyler tyler algier i think it's how he says name tyler algier had a great game you look at Chase Brown for the Bengals killed the Colts in that game the screen

Starting point is 00:26:09 game was really working for those those teams and then they took advantage of the one to two coverage bus down the field they were able to hit their targets down the field the long one to to T Higgins I believe in the Bengals game long one to Drake London and I think Kyle Pitts had a touchdown against the Colts so that's really what is, is can Malik Willis hit the screen game? Can the Packers hit the run game very well? And can he hit on those one to two deep shots that are going to be there for the Packers? If they can do that, this Colts defense can give up 30 points to a backup quarterback. We saw it all last season. Now, you know, spinning it more so to a Colts defense perspective this is a

Starting point is 00:26:46 much easier matchup than what they had last week regardless if Jordan Love plays or not because even if Jordan Love plays it's going to look like the two sprained ankles Carson Wentz I think to a degree where it's like he's going to struggle to move in the pocket he's going to be struggling to get off his spot now it could lead to the Packers throwing more screens, which we know is a disaster for this defense, so we'll see with that. But it really comes down to getting Malik Willis or Jordan Love, whoever it's going to be, behind the sticks, third and seven plus, third and six plus. If you can really bottle up that run game and force them into very obvious throwing situations where they can't mix in a screen or a shot play on third and one or something like that and just really take advantage of you, then you can win this matchup. throwing situations where they can't, you know, mix in a screen or a shot play on third and one

Starting point is 00:27:25 or something like that, and just really take advantage of you, then you can win this matchup. But again, we've seen enough with this, this tenure at defensive coordinator and the players they have on defense where, yeah, you can't really just say this is a layup type game for this defense. It needs to be a get right game for this defense, but will it be, I don't think it's, is as set in stone. They're missing two, three starters, maybe four starters. Buckner doesn't play. It'll be three if Paye doesn't play.

Starting point is 00:27:53 So not super healthy on defense right now, coming off a really bad week for their defense. So we'll see. Again, if they can get them into third and seventh plus and let this pass rush go to work, I think it'll be a good game for the Coltsts but that's a lot of ifs right there because i don't know how much we trust secondary with dallas flowers and with ronnie harrison starting and potentially no buckner up the middle and no quitty pay as their best run defending edge like you got to stop josh jacobs

Starting point is 00:28:19 first and get him into those third and sevens, which might be a challenge for this defense. Yeah, I think the pass rush really needs to be key. They've got to make sure they force Willis into some mistakes. It just can't be efficient passing. Again, you saw with Browning and Heineke. When he's passing, you need to get to him. Because another thing with Browning, I can't recall with Heineke, but I don't think they even hit Browning once. No, no no so the

Starting point is 00:28:45 pass rush was non-existent so we know as of last week it looked pretty good you're able to rattle a guy like CJ Stroud a little bit don't disappear now like this is a game you cannot disappear because what else is there to be confident in the defense other than the pass rush right now yeah and and the big thing I think with Malik Willis compared to a CJ Stroud like Stroud is such a good quarterback to where if you get him behind the sticks, if you get him into a third and long, if you, if there, if there's drive is stuttering because of false starts or holdings, he's good enough to get his team out of that. Malik Willis, or even a very injured Jordan Love, which again, whichever one starts, I don't know if that player is good enough to get the Packers

Starting point is 00:29:23 out of bad situations. So be disciplined. Don't get pass interference on third and longs or pass interference to give them free downs. Don't go off sides and give them shorter distances and make them make the mistakes. Because when you have a quarterback like Malik Willis back there, if they get a holding on first down, that might be the end of the drive right there. It's not CJ Stroud where Stroud's going to get them that first down within two plays. It's a very different type of thing. So yeah, take advantage of the negative plays that you force.

Starting point is 00:29:49 If you get a tackle for a loss or whatever, like that should drive them enough back to probably end the possession right there. So it really comes down to, again, just getting off to the passer, forcing negative plays, getting ahead on the run game. And again, we'll see. We'll see what happens with this team. I'm not super confident in the secondary, but I'm not super confident in Malik Willis either.

Starting point is 00:30:10 So like it could be a 30 point explosion for the Packers or it could be a 10 point game for the Packers offense. I have no clue how to take it. That's kind of my overall view on it right there. Well, then I'm going to put you on the spot real quick before we get off here. What's your score prediction? My score prediction all week has been 23-13 Colts. Maybe I'm just, again, trending too optimistic because it's early in the season. I will say though, like this game is not

Starting point is 00:30:34 a must win by any metric. It's an NFC opponent early in the season. But if you have an opportunity to go against Malik Willis early in the season. And especially when you look at the stats, like only one team that starts 0-2 every year on average makes the playoffs. It's like an 11% rate of a team makes the playoffs if they start 0-2. It kind of makes this game close to a must win for the Colts. So they got to be on their A game. I know they're banged up, but the Packers are pretty banged up too, especially at quarterback. You got to take advantage and you got to finish this one off

Starting point is 00:31:04 if you're really serious about pushing for the playoffs this year. Yeah, I've got 30, 24 Colts in this one. The things I'm concerned about are not as big of a deal as I think the Colts advantages are. They have the quarterback advantage in this one, even if Jordan Love is out there because Love's banged up. So normally the better quarterback is going to win. I think they'll be able to reestablish Jonathan Taylor. And even if their run game is just killing the Colts again,

Starting point is 00:31:31 if you can, if you can sack Willis and force a fumble, if you can make him throw a dumb throw and it gets picked or like, there's going to be a mistake made by Willis that makes a difference. So I do think Green Bay will be able to score a little bit of points. That's why I give them 24. But I think the Colts will be able to do more than enough offensively and again, win 30 to 24. Yep. Let's go guys. Let's make this a very optimistic week for the Colts. Let's get back to one on one and one and build some optimism for this team after a week one game where it wasn't too bad but like now it's real time you got to win this one you got there's no moral victories in this game

Starting point is 00:32:09 like it's a win or loss basically when it comes to this one before we get out of here though I do want to remind you guys that our friends over at locked on NFL are now two shows every single day featuring Tyler Rowland in the morning and then Tony Wiggins for some real NFL talk afterwards make the madman Tyler Rowland and the Barber Tony Wiggins your second listen over at Locked on NFL on YouTube, where we list your podcasts. And if you guys don't already, make sure you're following at Locked on Colts,

Starting point is 00:32:31 at JakeArthurNFL, and at Zach Hicks2 all on Twitter. Also subscribe to us on YouTube, where we list your podcasts. We love your guys' ratings and views, and we'll catch you guys back here after the game on Sunday.

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