Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -10/11- Colts Updated PFF Grades; Injury Updates & Colts Defense Must Be Better

Episode Date: October 11, 2016

A handful of injuries are threatening some recently healthy player's Week 6 availability, analyzing the updated #PFF grades and there are two strengths on the #Colts defense, but the rest needs to step up immediately. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked On Colts, your daily podcast on the Indianapolis Colts, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back to Locked On Colts, ladies and gentlemen. I am your host, Matt Dainley, and this is Locked on Colts for October 11th, Tuesday. And I hope that you guys have had a chance to check out the Locked on Colts special that I put up yesterday with the interview with Gary Myers, who is the author of Brady vs. Manning. And I hope that you guys have gotten a chance to check that out. That's actually really good. I'm not just saying that either. I mean, the guy's got a ton of experience

and has really got some really crazy access with Brady especially, but both Brady and Manning, and a lot of people that were really close to him. So it's very interesting. So if you guys get a chance to check that out, please do. It's going to be well worth your time. I think it's right at about 50 minutes or so, but it is most definitely worth your time. So it'll be the last episode before this one.

So get a chance to check that out. Please do that. But today's Locked On Colts is brought to you by Mike Earnest at Century 21 and Sheets. Colts fans, are you thinking about buying a new home in the greater Indianapolis area? If you are, give Mike Earnest a call at 317-285-9691. Mike and his Century 21 Sheets team works with homebuyers throughout the greater Indianapolis area, especially first-time homebuyers. Whether you are a first-time homebuyer or an experienced homebuyer, Mike and his team will help you achieve your real estate goals.

Give Mike Ernest a call at 317-285-9691. Today we're going to go through the updated Pro Football Focus grades, kind of run you guys. I touched on a couple things the other night about Andrew Luck, but I wanted to kind of really put it in perspective for you guys today. And I think I'm going to touch on that right after we check in with some of the injury issues with the Colts at the moment. Moncrief, apparently, at least Per Pagano, is trending in the right direction. Jonathan Harrison hasn't really changed a whole lot.

He said he's doing a little bit better, but his status is obviously still up in the air for this week. Josh McNary apparently got a stinger in the game, and I don't know if – I mean, I think they think he's going to be all right. I don't think there's any real issues with him being able to play this week. Patrick Robinson was in and out. I mean, he has been – man, this guy's getting nicked up bad. It seems like anytime we get another corner in there opposite Vontae Davis, they seem to be really injury prone or something. Maybe it's just

bad luck. I don't know. But he's got an issue with his knee and his groin. And again, those are two nagging issues. we saw him limp off the field you know seem uh seemingly untouched and and didn't really put any real weight or anything on that knee sometimes all you gotta do is just tweak it in the right direction and uh especially on a surface like that where it's not quite as soft as natural grass you know you're gonna have probably guys with a little more lower body issues and stuff like that, knees and hips. But Darius Butler apparently fractured his finger late in the game, and he's going to have surgery.

Apparently they're going to have to put a plate in his hand or in his finger or something. So they said his availability for this weekend is in jeopardy. I'm going to go ahead and take a stab that he is not going to play. Obviously, I think that just about everything we touched on on yesterday's episode about the goods and the bads, what was positive and worth talking about, Pagano talked about. He also talked about some of the negatives.

One of the things that he didn't really kind of dance around, I wouldn't say danced around it. I think he just got to the point. The Bears in the second half were like 0 for 4, 0 for 5 on third down. But we talked about this. It wasn't the third down. I mean, that's great that they got off on four or five third down opportunities. But the issue was, is that the Bears were so successful on first and second down. I mean, they're just chewing up yardage, first down after first down after first down. That's not good. And and at that point if it gets like that third down is really just a useless stat at that point you know when you're giving up first and second downs uh 10 and 12 and

14 yards uh third down opportunities really are you know for the most part i mean a couple insignificant situations obviously are important however uh, they lose their thunder a little bit for the whole grouping when you're allowing first and second downs to go for so many yards. He obviously talked about Pat McAfee and Adam Vinatieri having good games, which they did. T.Y. obviously had a fantastic game. Quan Bray, really good on special teams as well. He also mentioned penalties, and penalties were definitely an issue.

The Colts have got to clean this up. It's so petty. I mean, it just seems like they're just lost out there at times for a couple possessions at a time. I don't think in the, I mean, in the end, it's not really going to kill us. You know, the one thing, and I, and I almost hate to say this because I feel like it's, I'm just going to get bit by it in the next couple of weeks, but the Colts haven't that I've noticed anyways haven't had a ton of holding penalties in on big play opportunities when they go deep and or a first down typically you know at least lately maybe I've probably forgotten a little bit about the first couple games but it seems like they're not holding but I guess that

could also be construed as they're not blocking very well either. So it just kind of depends on how you want to look at it. He also touched, he was also asked about how 20 sacks through five games, how he's been feeling about that. And obviously, you know, a very typical answer from Chuck, we've got to get better. Those guys are working extremely hard. You can just point to those things and you never want to give up sacks, obviously, this and that. Not really an answer, just kind of a, you know,

we got to get better at it and so on and so forth. And I'll take that from him after a win, although it's empty, and we all know that it's empty. But the point is that, you know, we often look from the outside looking in, and we don't really see – because they couldn't care less how they played if they win the game. They really couldn't. But we will analyze it and justly because that's, A, well, that's my job,

but that's you as a fan's job as well to hold your team accountable. And that's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with critiquing your team. It doesn't mean you're not a fan. Doesn't, you know, just be realistic about it and hope that other fans are realistic about it as well. He was also asked about Robert Mathis. Mathis has been Casper, you know, the friendly ghost. Nobody knows where he's been, but he's not showing up on the stat sheet very much at all. But overall, when we look at it, just a quick reminder about the game. They did very good in the hurry up.

They were effective. Andrew made some fantastic plays, like I mentioned to you, on the touchdown pass to T.Y. He pulled Dorsett back down towards the line of scrimmage so that he could chip block Willie Young, and that was essential to the touchdown pass. I mean, Luck only had about two and a half seconds of the ball in his hands before he let it go, which is ideal, but it's still, you never know. Willie was closing hard, and Dorsett's just little chip

block took him off his feet and took him off balance. So you never really know what could have happened. But in the end, Colts got a win. And that's all that honestly, that's all that matters in the end. But we still are pretty boring if we don't critique or point out the good or point out the bad about what our team has done in the past games. Now I want to get into this thing about Luck. And like I said, I talked to you guys about his second half stats and how kind of amazing they were yesterday.

But I want to go a little bit deeper and kind of shine it on the fourth quarter. And we'll go, I'm going to tell you about the offense. I'm going to tell you about Andrew Luck himself. And then I'm going to show you how amazing it is that Andrew Luck's having these kind of fourth quarters with the rest of the team surrounding him, isn't really pulling their weight. In comparison to the rest of the league, the Colts' offense is putting up 6.79 yards per play. That's ninth in the league. They have a 1.2% turnover rate.

That's eighth in the league. They have seven touchdowns. That's first in the league. They have seven touchdowns. That's first in the league. 25 first downs. That's second. But this is all being done while their offensive line ultimately and their offense is 26th in the league, and they've allowed six fourth quarter sacks thus far. So that's pretty bad. A lot of luck's numbers. Obviously, the touchdowns are going to be the same. That's first, individual stats, but individually in fourth quarters, he's tops among the rest of the NFL and passing yards with 586 sixth in completion percentage at 67.1 among quarterbacks with 45

or more fourth quarter pass attempts. Now there's some of those guys that have only had like 20 attempts in there. They've got a 70 and 80% completion rate, but that's, you know, I didn't think that was realistic to compare him to somebody who's thrown 15 balls in the fourth quarter over five games. So he's first in touchdowns, like I said, at seven. He's tied with 15 other quarterbacks with one fourth quarter interception, and he's tops in first downs to 25. That's the same as the offense, obviously.

He has the best QB rating amongst quarterbacks with 30 or more fourth quarter attempts. And also, like I said, he's been sacked six times in the fourth quarter, and only Ryan Tannehill, Matthew Stafford, and Cam Newton have been sacked more in the fourth quarter. Now, why is this so fantastic? Well, let me tell you, aside from the six sacks that the offensive line's getting up, his defense is allowing 9.67 yards per play. That's dead last in the league. So every yard, what's Luck getting here? Luck's at 6.79, and his defense has given up almost three full yards more per play than he's racking up, and he's first in the league.

That's scary. So they are giving up a 43.6% first down rate. That's second to last in the league, 31st. They've allowed 24 first downs. That's 27th in the league, and they're one of seven teams without a pick and are just one of six teams with a single sack or less. The Colts did not get a sack this past week. Their pass rush is putrid. I will say that Akeem, I think I said this yesterday, Akeem Ayers did a pretty good job. We didn't see much of him. It was nice to see him actually defend a ball. Not just him, but anybody at the linebacking position really do something of note other than, you know, make a couple tackles along the sidelines in

pursuit. So that was nice. But, you know, this is, is this not amazing to you guys? I mean, whether people are actually legitimately giving Luck Guff, you know, for not carrying his team even more, this shows you his defense is doing nothing in the fourth quarter to help him. In fact, they're just laying down and allowing the opposing offenses to just run over them. His offensive line isn't helping him, but luck is coming through. He's hitting T-wide down the field. He's able to escape the pocket and get some yards with his feet, with his legs. I mean, this is, I think it's just amazing, to be quite honest with you. And there's a lot of good quarterbacks out there, but I'm telling you that I don't think that there's many, if any,

that have been quite as amazing as Luck has been, especially in the fourth quarter. And I think that it's easily said that he's the best quarterback at the moment in the fourth quarter. Now, as I told you, we're sponsored here by Mike Ernest of Century 21 Sheets on this show. And let me tell you a little bit more about Mike. Are any of you in the market to sell your home? If you are, call Mike, Century 21 Sheets at 317-285-9691. Mike is an expert in the greater Indianapolis real estate market and has helped people just like you achieve your real

estate goals. As a professional realtor, Mike will not only help you navigate the real estate market and has helped people just like you achieve your real estate goals. As a professional realtor, Mike will not only help you navigate the real estate market, but he guarantees that he will sell your house for full market value or he'll pay you the difference. I want that guy on my team. I don't know about you guys. If you live in Indianapolis or any of the surrounding communities, you probably know that the greater Indianapolis area is currently experiencing a major seller's market. You need a real estate professional on your team who will get you every dollar of what your home is worth. Mike Earnest is just the guy you need. Listen, folks, when it comes to selling your home, knowledge is power. The first step you need to take is figuring out exactly what your home is worth. Call Mike for a no-obligation, hassle-free market analysis of your home. Mike will not only

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Mike and his team can help. Call Mike Earnest at 317-285-9691. Find him on the web at MikeEarnest.com. Again, that's 317-285-9691 or MikeEarnest.com. You can get him at MyRealtorMike on Twitter. Call Mike Earnest today. Now let's get into these pro football focus grades real quick. Andrew Luck is still standing at third. He's technically fourth if you want to count one game from Tom Brady, but Andrew Luck is still at third with Carson Wentz and Derek Carr ahead of him, just barely. This is, you know, the top five is pretty fantastic if you think about it. Just to kind of continue the conversation here, it was Sam Bradford at fourth and Matthew Stafford at fifth.

I don't think that anybody I know would have assumed that Carson Wentz, Sam Bradford, or Matt Stafford would have been in the top five. Frank Gore, he's up from 32nd, I believe, last week to 30th this week with a 64. That's an improvement. So that's nice. He's been running the ball pretty well. It's been nice. And I think the effectiveness of Luck has also benefited him in the running game.

I think that they're starting to loosen up that box a little bit. And he's doing a good job. I'm excited to see Frank Gore actually having a good season this year. It's kind of nice to see not only that, but some chunk runs of 15 yards, 14 yards every so often, you know. If he was getting the ball more, you know, than like 14, 15 times a game at most, I think we would have our 100-yard rusher. But at the time, at the, you know, current time, the Colts really just can't afford to hand the ball off any more than they already do because they're either trailing or they have to

find a way to keep and contain that lead. So we go to the wide receivers. T.Y. Hilton's seventh in between Antonio Brown and A.J. Green. I think that's pretty phenomenal with an 83.6 overall. The next active Colt on that list is Quan Bray, and he's right there at 84th kind of tied with 84th he hasn't gotten enough receptions either but Phil Dorsett is at 89th with 53.1 someone's gonna have to explain some of this to me I mean I know he's not burning people consistently but he's only getting a handful of targets a game so maybe that's it I don't know know, but that seems a little low for me as far as how effective he is in route running, getting open, catching the ball. I think he's done a pretty decent job. He's had a few drops and such, but I can't imagine if there's anybody ahead of him that hasn't. Now, the Colts' tight ends have taken a major drop. Jack Doyle, who was near the top 10 last week, is all the way down to 25th

right now with a 64.6 overall grade. And Dwayne Allen's all the way down to 39th with a 52.4 overall. So the Colts tight ends, you know, haven't had it, didn't have a great game this past week. You know, nothing that they were going to get four or five catches or anything on. But, you know, it is what it is. It's going to happen. It's going to fluctuate from week to week quite a bit, especially at that position where in games like that, especially, they're not going to see a ton of targets. So at tackle, Anthony Costanzo is at 84.2 at ninth. You know, there's a lot of complaining about Anthony Costanzo thus far in the season, and I don't necessarily know that I get it. I know that

he's had some bad games, but he is doing his job. And something to take note of is that Taylor LeJuan is the number one overall tackle in the league per pro football focus and their right tackle Jack Conklin is number eight for all those people who said he was awful when he came out of the draft it doesn't appear that he's all that awful so Costanzo is at ninth playing pretty decent overall he's had some bad games but the Colts don't have a tackle in the top 50 outside of that. Now, the next one is Joe Haag, who is coming in at 56th with 53.9 with enough snaps to be graded accurately. So that's not a great grade for him,

but it's about as good as you can expect from a rookie stepping in and kind of taking that over. So we're going to have to see. That right i think it's going to be kind of fluid i'm wondering if they actually thought that rights was not going to be you know uh fully healthy that he was going to be kind of the backup guy because he was healthy enough to play if he had to but they didn't want him to start or if it was a performance type thing they assumed that haig was going to be better than uh rights in that regard. So I don't really have the answer to that, but I'm curious to find out. Jack Muhort is eighth

amongst guards with an 84.2 overall grade. And again, there's a big drop down to the next one. And this is kind of depressing for me because I really like Denzel Good, but Denzel Good's all the way down to 66th with a 44.8. He's got to get better. And I don't think that that's something that, you know, PFF grades aside, these are just kind of, you know, they are what they are. They're not everything, but they are something. You know, the fact that he's ranked below Zane Beatles and, you know, some of these other guys on here is a little bit concerning, I think. But Denzel's got to get better. I don't think that anybody would dispute that.

But something also that's kind of funny is that a guy that came out of the same draft there, who everybody was hooting and hollering about, who ended up going to Dallas and went undrafted because of the issues that were surrounding him at the draft. Lyle Collins is below him at 69th. Now, a lot of Colts fans were screaming for the Colts to go after Collins, and it appears that the seventh round guy out of Mars Hill is actually better. I don't know if you want to go tell everybody that one's a 45 and the other is a 42. And I don't think you're going to get a whole lot of high fives for that. But still interesting anyhow. Ryan Kelly's all the way down to 28th among centers at 68.6. He had an off week. I think that's what dropped him but that's you know that is concerning because

I mean guys there's only 32 starting centers in the NFL okay now there's a few that have been hurt recently in fact there's you know a ton of them that haven't taken a snap there's only 35 that have been graded out with enough snaps to give an actual grade to and an actual rank to and he's 28th among that group. Granted, there's a very big difference between 28th and 35th on this list. Ryan Kelly's at a 68.6, and Jason Kelsey, who's the bottom of the barrel here from Philly, is at a 42.5. So there's a drastic difference between he and the bottom of the pile,

but that doesn't change the fact that he's 28th in the league, and that's something that needs to get better. I wouldn't say that I would have thought he was going to be that low, but there's only so much you can do with the way these guys are graded throughout the pro football focus's scale. Cornerback is a big issue now for the Colts. Their top cornerback is still Rashawn Melvin at a 67.2, and that's 70th, 7-0 amongst all league corners no siding of Vontae Davis up in the top you know uh 70 I mean that's that's unheard of and he's

playing good football I'm not really sure what the deal is with all that typically you see him you know and people are arguing whether he's top five or top ten in this and whether he should be higher or lower or whatever, but he is clearly not. In fact, he's all the way down to 82nd. He and Darius Butler are right there with each other at a 57.2 and a 57.1, respectively. So that's a little concerning, I think, maybe a little more than a little concerning. But I'm just not concerned in general with Vontae's grade. I think Vontae does a fantastic job, and I kind of refuse to be worried about how he's playing. Now, safety, the Colts still have Mike Adams, who's tied in there with Antoine Bethea of all people at 80.8 for 15th in the league. Clinton Gethers has moved up to 19th. He's tied up with Kenny Vaccaro with an 80.1.

I think that's solid. We've got two solid safeties back there. They are also both higher than Dwight Lowry last year's safety. So that's nice. You know, got leaves as top five on another team. The Colts look to be, have a pretty good setup back there. And that's nice to see. Now, I don't even know if it's worth going through the linebackers, guys, but I will give you, go ahead and give you their grades. And something that, you know, we've been talking about, I mentioned it today and I mentioned it yesterday, is Akeem Ayers. Now he doesn't have enough snaps to be officially graded and ranked, but he is right in there between 36 and 38 with his grade at the moment, and it's a 74.9. I think that's noteworthy. I think that should get him some more snaps for sure, and I just don't think we're going to see it just because of how

the entire Indianapolis Colts process is about getting guys playing time you know they don't want to take Robert off the field they don't want to take this guy and that guy off the field because they're this or that but you know what you got to do something because these guys are terrible at the moment and Josh McNary's the next guy there at a 45.2, and that's about it. Nothing real great from the guys who have got enough snaps to actually get an official grade and to be ranked. Now, interior defensive lineman, we did see kind of a surge from Henry Anderson. He's very good technically.

So whether he's actually getting pressure through the interior of the offensive line or not, I think might be one of those things that kind of gets not pushed aside necessarily but is not an extreme issue with his. But they got him ranked right there around 29th, 30th. He hasn't taken enough snaps either. He's only got 68 snaps for the season so far and they got him at a 77.8 i'm okay with that grade considering that an 82 would put him in the top 10 so how close is that how far is it away i think it's pretty close considering

that the top of the line here aaron donald and he's at a 94.9, whereas the next guy in line is Calais Campbell at 85.7. That's a huge drop. And there's only four between the top 10 and all the way down where Henry Anderson's at, around 29th or 30th. So there's not much of a difference between that. So I'm going to go ahead and say that Henry is having a pretty good start to his season so far. He's had some silly penalties like he did last week. But overall, he's playing pretty well. Now, as far as the edge goes for the Colts, Eric Walden is the next Colt down the list,

all the way down at 62nd with a 49.8. And, you know, Robert Mathis is a 46.9 with zero sacks still this season so nothing impressive from the Colts anywhere along the defense necessarily I think Henry Anderson might be one of the lone bright spots at safety it looks like those are the bright spots in the secondary obviously the corners are apparently quite a weakness here for the Colts, but it looks like that there's a lot to be done, and some of these grades are a little scary. I mean, outside of T.Y. Hilton and Anthony Costanzo, Jack Muhor, and Andrew Luck, you know, there's a lot of work

to be done. It looks like the obvious strong points on offense are Andrew Luck, T.Y. Hilton. I'm going to go ahead and call Doyle a strong point despite his grade, but Anthony Costanzo at tackle and Mew Hort at guard. And then defensively are our safeties and Henry Anderson as our interior line. I do want to touch on, again, make sure that you guys are going to iTunes, please. And Stitcher or anywhere else that you listen to our podcast, rate and review the show, please. That helps so much. Share the show, tell a friend, you know, I've got tons of Colts friends. I tell them all, but you know, it's my show, but you have friends who are Colts fans as well. So tell them about the show, tell them where to get the show. You know, a lot of people that I

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Tell your friends about it. Things are going to continue to get better. And tomorrow I am going to tell you guys about our giveaway. So with that, the Colts will travel to Houston to take on the Texans. It's a pretty big game. The Colts can be right back in the mix, top the AFC South with a win in Houston. We have Andrew Luck. We've got a few pieces in a few different spots, offensively and defensively, that are going to

hopefully give us enough consistency to win. The other positions are at their best and on their game, then the team can come together quite well. Also, I want to remind you, if you are buying or selling a house, get with Mike Earnest, Century 21 Sheets. You can reach him at 317-285-9691. Call Mike Earnest today. Like I said, tomorrow I'm going to tell you guys about our giveaway. Subscribe to the podcast. Rate and review.

Keep listening, folks. I appreciate you all. You all have been great. I love going back and forth with you guys on Twitter. It's really good. Also, you can check out our partners at FanRag Sports and more specifically, Today's Pigskin. I'm also an Indianapolis Colts analyst for Today's Pigskin, so you can check out my work there. But I appreciate you all for listening. Thank you for coming back. check out my work there. But I appreciate you all for listening. Thank you for coming back. Come back tomorrow, and I will talk to you all on Wednesday on Locked on Colts.

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