Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -1/07- Saturday Discussion With Rick McGlothlin (@DrafttekColts) On Colts Major Needs, Early Round Options and Much More

Episode Date: January 7, 2017

Rick McGlothlin of Drafttek.com swings through to discuss everything #Colts with Matt including major needs moving forward, some possibilities in the early rounds to fill those needs as well as the front office and coaching situation along with the strange silence from #JimIrsay Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

No, I'm not for sale. You are Locked On Colts, your daily Indianapolis Colts podcast. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back to Locked On Colts, ladies and gentlemen. I'm your host, Matt Dainley, and we are not stopping. We are going to continue into this talking about free agency, the draft, and just a bevy of other options of what the Colts can do to improve their roster. Hope you guys enjoyed the show yesterday with Ollie Connolly.

Always some great knowledge getting dropped from him. And today, another great guy with a great mind and a Colts fan also, Rick McLaughlin from Draft Tech. Rick, thanks for joining me, my man. Hey, great to be with you, Matt. Always a pleasure. Not only that, but Rick's a coworker of mine. That's right.

Rick and I get to talk about this stuff all the time. So, uh, you know, I went over the edge defenders and stuff like that with Ollie yesterday. We've got so much, like really, uh, so many needs that the Colts need. It's just, it's crazy right now. And there's some of those needs that we don't really even know if they are needs necessarily at this, uh, ex exact moment. I mean, we don't know if they're going to bring back Mike Adams. Um, if they do, he's going to be 36, you know, Darius Butler, he's over 30, but we want him back because he does a solid job as safety and corner. You know, he's still serviceable for sure.

Right. But, you know, outside linebacker, that edge defender with, like I said, we went through that a little bit yesterday, and there's not much of a free agent class for that. We want him to bring back Jack Doyle. Hugh Thornton's a free agent this year. A bunch of running backs, you know, basically that were brought in to just be supplementary guys, Todman and stuff. But Robert Turbin, you and I talked about him.

We really like him. What's your thoughts on Robert? Do you think they're going to bring him back? I think that they will. I know they have to have some depth behind Frank. If we plan on drafting another running back in the later rounds, even keeping Frank, you're still going to need that running back rotational depth. And I liked what Robert did this season.

He wants to come back. That's half the battle. I think right there somebody is eager and anxious and willing to come back at whatever role the team wants them to play. And I thought he had some pretty good work that he did for us this year. And I look for him to be one of probably four or five guys that the Colts do decide to keep. Yeah, I agree. I really liked what he offered, you know, and it is, I mean, if there is an offensive need, so to speak for the

Colts, I mean, and Turbin's still young for the most part. So, I mean, it's not like he's an aging guy at the position, but the Colts do need with Frank Gore, you know, coming up. I mean, like said, Turbin's only 27, but Gore, he's not 27. Right, right. But the guy, I mean, he definitely looks like he could play another year. He looks like he's 27, though, sometimes, doesn't he? Yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, is this year a need for running back? Because there's so many on defense.

You know what I mean? Is this the year that they can grab one in free agency? Yeah. Maybe to shore that up? And who do you like? I don't even know if we go free agency for one we could possibly i guess it just depends on what our what our money looks like if we try to to uh tap into free agency for somebody in linebacker somebody at an edge position with uh some notoriety behind him but you know i i would hate for us to use a first-round pick on a guy like Dalvin Cook as tempting as that might be for a lot of people.

Right. You know, I just – this defense has been so bad for so long that it just needs to be addressed. I think, in actuality, some of our cornerback play has suffered, obviously, because of the lack of pressure up front. And maybe we get a pass rush going up there that maybe some of those corners would play a hell of a lot better than has been the case to date. But I just don't see a need to go running back in the first two, three, four rounds.

After that, maybe. And like I said, maybe we could look around in free agency to find somebody, although it's kind of limited in that respect as well for free agency running backs coming off this year. But I would really hate for the Colts to go running back in the first round. That would be probably my naked bear. Yeah, I think that would be worse than the Dorsett pick, you know, as far as first-round neat.

You know, because I just think that would be an absolute waste to get a running back. I mean, don't get me wrong. You know, if you get Dalvin Cook, you got, you know, really high expectations for a guy like that or something. You know, I mean, just for example, not necessarily Dalvin Cook, but there are a couple running backs in this class that are wow guys. Sure, yeah.

But, I mean, yeah, point at it. But, I mean, yeah, oh, yeah. I mean, they make you salivate, you know, but at the same time, it's just, that would be such a waste when there's so many guys that we could probably seemingly pass and miss in the process that would serve a far greater need, obviously. Yeah, I don't even know if I'm worried about them doing either at the running back position this year, free agency or draft. I mean, bring Turbin back. You got Gore. I actually like Jordan Todman probably a lot more than most do.

He didn't get hardly any work this year. But if nothing else, you know, UDFA guys come in because there's just, with the Colts offense this year, they proved that, you know, first of all, the offensive line proved that they are a better run blocking team than probably anybody thought that they were going to be this year. And, you know, Frank Gore's thousand yard season proved that. So I'm not, I just wish – I just hope that they kind of take running back off the shelf and worry about everything else. Yeah, and I think that they will, and I agree with the offensive line.

Once the shuffling stopped there for a while, obviously, with Jack at the left guard position being out there with the injury, there was still a little bit of that. But I thought they got a lot better late in the season and did a pretty good job at run blocking. I think pass protection still has its moments and needs to be shored up. It's a young line. It's a reshuffling line at times.

So I look for them to be able to do better run blocking in the next couple of seasons as they become more cohesive as a unit. And with that, that might be the moment you start looking at that first, second round pick for a running back down the road, even though it's quite tempting right now to get a Delvin Cook or a Fournette in that first round window. But I just think defense is the key this year. You've got to start rebuilding that defense and make it a lot better up front. I agree. They also have some restricted free agents,

and I'll get to one of the unrestricted here in just a minute. But Jonathan Harrison, Zach Kerr, Josh McNary, and then Eric Swoop is an exclusive rights free agent. But I think that all those guys, including Quan Bray, who is exclusive, I think that all those guys ultimately will come back. I'm not a big fan of McNary at all. Yeah. But unless they address that inside linebacker position through the draft,

they're going to need him. You know, I mean, it's just they're going to need him for depth at a minimum. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I'm actually pleasantly surprised and happy for Jonathan Harrison to have, uh, look, look like a decent, uh, depth guy this year. And I think that's one of the things that we can all agree on that the Colts at a minimum thus far have built significant depth on the offensive line. I absolutely agree. Yeah. So I I mean, these guys that, you know, Kelly,

he's a definite starter for the next 10 years at least, you know, obviously and theoretically. Right. Right tackle, I think, is still up for grabs there, obviously. But I was pleasantly surprised with LaRaven Clark this year. Yourself? Yeah. I mean, for what we saw of him and how he was kind of tossed in there with, you know,

unexpectedly at that one point and with limited playing time before that, I thought he did pretty well. Now, obviously, we want to see him throughout a complete year and see what we got to look forward to with him or what deficiencies still need to be worked on with him. But I think it's, you know, pretty safe to say that he's shown them there's a potential there for him to be locked in at that right tackle spot. However, if one pops up, let's say, in round two or three this year or next,

the Colts have that option to pull the trigger on a tackle prospect that can also be a backup at the left tackle slot or vice versa. I think there's still issues with Costanzo not playing well. I don't know whether it's just that one year. Everybody has a bad year. Everybody has a few bad games. He seemed to have a significant amount this year, I think. But that left side for me is still kind of a question mark too. So you don't want to turn away top offensive tackles if you have a chance at them at any time.

But I think our depth is solid. The starting roster offensively along the line, though, there's a couple spots there that we could probably keep looking at, even if it's not a top need. But right tackle definitely, I think, is one we look at this year just in case. I absolutely agree. I would love to see them find, and I don't want to use the term necessarily diamond in the rough,

but I would love to see them find a guy who's kind of been overlooked, who people are like, wow, he's still there, type of guy in the fifth round or something. You hate to say that because at least, again, theoretically, you're probably going to get depth at that time in the draft, but you just never know. Stranger things have certainly happened. Sure. The thing with that though, Matt, is at this point, we've all agreed now that we've got a pretty good amount of depth at the offensive line. We don't have that on the defensive side of the ball. So if we went along the offensive line in later rounds and we're just kind of looking for a diamond in the rough, well, that's going to take some time to develop,

even if it turns out to be a pretty good player two and three and four years down the road. We need people defensively now that's going to step in and make a difference. Now, can we get somebody like that in the fourth round, the third round, the fifth round defensively? I think we can in the quarterback positions, safety positions.

I don't think you find a game changer up front in the fourth or fifth round. Those things have happened in the past, obviously, but by and large, your big talent playmakers and difference makers are coming in those first couple of rounds as it relates to the edge and outside linebackers and inside linebackers. And so now at Draft Tech, you have the Colts taking an edge guy in first, correct? Well, I did have until two weeks ago, and I've started looking at a couple of tapes on Reuben Foster. And this inside linebacker, of course, DeQual Jackson, as we talked before the show, it's really the only one we have that's dependable. And then we have a couple of young guns that had some playing time,

and obviously they have some things to work out. I thought Morrison did a pretty good job this year at times. But Reuben Foster is kind of intriguing because he's very fast. He's extremely physical. He's, he's, he's extremely physical. He's all over the field. And I have really got the listeners that don't know. Where's he from?

He's, he's from Alabama. And, and that team, the, the only drawback with looking at a guy from Alabama is they have so many great players all at one time. You're kind of trying to debate with yourself,

okay, who's making the other players look so good? Right. Because there's always three or four really good players on top-rated teams, and who's making who look better? Is it the front guys making the second-level guys look good? Is it a mixture? Is it the cornerbacks saving the butts of the guys up front that can't quite get to the quarterback?

So with Alabama, there's so many good, talented players here. You're always kind of wondering who's the solid rock that this team builds around. Especially this year with that group. Yes, yes. So you've got Tim Williams. I mean, so many guys to choose from on that Alabama defense to really go in the first round. But I have liked what I've seen early on about Reuben Foster on tape.

Still got to look more at that. But this latest mock draft that we did at Draft Tech, I've had Reuben Foster as our first pick uh an inside linebacker only because we've had some of our edge guys uh pushed down into the latter part of the of the first round into the 20s or late 20s uh guys like tim williams in fact and i've watched a little bit of demarcus uh walker at florida state who's been mocked to Indianapolis a couple of times in some other places. I just think he's a little slow, a little, I don't know, maybe he's taking some plays off and not putting 100% effort into it

each and every time. So I'm not really high on him. Charles Harris is interesting from Missouri, but he's slipped a little bit in the last few weeks. So as more tape is viewed and more information is gathered on these players, I think the Mocs will start refining themselves a little bit more in the next couple of months. But those are two names from the edge side that we've seen early on

for the Colts on draft tech. But the last couple of times I went with Reuben Foster as my top guy, just based on where the teams ahead of Indianapolis in these mocks have picked. I'm a little sour on Florida State edge guys. Yeah. I don't think anybody's, you know, if we hear that, oh, the Colts passed on Florida State edge guy, blah, blah, blah. I don't think they're going to be too upset. And it wouldn't even matter if he was the best edge guy in the class.

Exactly. I think they'd be like, yeah, we'll pass on him just in case. Yeah. I tell you who I like for the Colts off the edge in the second round. I don't know if Ollie got to mention him or not, but I like Solomon Thomas from Stanford in the second round. He's pushing towards the first round, but I do like his size and his potential. Right now we have him in the second round,

and I had him go into the Colts I think two weeks ago in our draft tech mock. But keep an eye on him. What about secondary? Now, okay, let me finish this up real quick here. Yeah. We did talk about Eric Walden pre-show a little bit. You're on board with them bringing him back. Yes, yes.

And I am too. I think that he's – I mean, look, if they don't, they're not going to have anybody at the position. And I don't mean anybody quality. I just mean they won't have anybody. Exactly. Yeah, I agree. I agree because you have to have somebody.

And if it turns out later that you're young guys that you've drafted and a free agent that you got for little or no money, relatively speaking, if they start playing lights out or even at an adequate level compared to what we've witnessed in the last few games with the Colts, then Walden is not much of a factor long term. But short term, you don't have really much of a choice. Right. I agree. And he may choose to go somewhere else, but I still don't think that he's very highly regarded throughout the league. That's just my assumption. I think that Akeem Ayers

was a really quality mid-season addition. Well, not necessarily mid-season. But a good acquisition, yeah. Yeah, in-season acquisition. I think he's quality. I think they're going to keep him. I thought he was, at least through pro football focus, he was rated the Colts' best edge guy throughout the season the entire year. Yeah. I mean, every year or every week that he played, and once he started getting some significant snaps,

he shot up the board as far as against the Colts' guys, which didn't surprise me at all. And, you know, I understand a lot of Eric Walden's sacks. You know, people are going to knock on him because a lot of his sacks weren't actual, and I don't even know what term to use, but as far as like created pressure sacks, I guess would be the best way to describe it.

A lot of his were coverage sacks or him running down the line of scrimmage and basically stopping the quarterback before he got back to the line of scrimmage, more or less. Right. And that's okay, too, but hell, you need those guys. Sure, yeah. You know, I mean, that's a guy – you want guys that can pursue.

And Walden has proven throughout his career in Indy that he can pursue. Right. You know, back in the day when we were all up in arms about his contract, $4 million a year throughout the duration, that was a lot of money then. The salary cap has exploded in the past few years, and that's going to be peanuts. I mean, he'll get more. And personally, I think he'll get more than $4 million a year. But in the larger scheme and the larger picture, he's not going to be actually earning as much towards the cap as he was in the past. So I don't think that's an issue.

And you know what? Like I said, we've got to pay somebody. It may as well be a guy that we already know knows what's going on around here, and I have no problem with that. But tell me about some of the secondary guys that you like because the Colts do need some secondary guys. Rashawn Melvin, I was problem with that. But tell me about some of the secondary guys that you like because the Colts do need some secondary guys. Rashawn Melvin, I was impressed with him for – and what I thought was another in-season quality guy.

Daryl Morris, he was okay, nothing great, but I thought he was serviceable. And then, you know, we're going to lose possibly Mike Adams to not only age, but free agency. I don't know that he would retire necessarily, but if they do sign him, they can't sign him for more than a year. He's just too old. You can't trust that age. Vontae appears to either be constantly injured or he's just considerably lost or lost a considerable step in his game, and probably both. Patrick Robinson, what's he going to give us?

Another injury-riddled season? I mean, we just can't buy a second corner on this Colts team. I mean, we went through the Greg Toler experience, and now we got this. So what do we need? I mean, we need another guy who can be a shutdown corner. But, you know, are the Colts willing, do you think, possibly do that in maybe a first or a second round pick to do something like that? Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I don't see a first rounder

that we would probably jump all over. Again, we're looking at where we're picking. You got Jackson from USC. I just don't see him as somebody that would be that type of a cornerback. Adoree Jackson out of USC, we currently have him as the 18th overall cornerback or the third overall cornerback in our big board, but 18th overall as a selection. Then you got Desmond King from Iowa. Both of those gentlemen are 5'11". Jackson a little bit lighter at 185, King's at 200. So he's a solid kid. He's moved up our board along with Sidney Jones of Washington,

who's about 6'180". Tell me a little more about him. What do you know about him? Because he's really – I've been hearing a lot about him. Yeah, I don't know a lot of him, and I didn't get to see Washington play this year. I didn't do the – I normally have the all the college uh football games on you know I buy every every sports package possible on DirecTV

all the time but this year I didn't because I was just I was just bogged down with other stuff that I couldn't do that this year so I'm about to go back and like I said earlier watch so much tape that I didn't get a chance to to view during the year to see this. But I have seen Sidney Jones a little bit, and his size is helpful. He's jumped up our board about 12 to 13 notches in the last probably last two weeks. In fact, he jumped over Cordrea Tankersley of Clemson, who was initially about third for our cornerbacks a month or so ago. So, like I said, there's still a lot of movement, still a lot of shifting going on as we settle down. We'll get to a more solid foundation after the Senior Bowl, the Shriner Bowl, and things of that nature.

Quincy Jones, let's talk music now. Quincy Wilson of Florida is the guy I have going to the Colts in the third round in this edition of our Draft Tech Mock. He's about 6'1", 210 out of Florida. I don't like his ability coming up to help support the run. On some of the tape I've watched, he's pretty lackadaisical. But he does have that new prototypical size that you want to match up against the bigger wideouts, and he does have great speed.

So he's somebody to keep on. And then Cameron Sutton out of Tennessee is another guy that's probably third, fourth-round material that the Colts could get some mileage out of. There are a lot of cornerbacks in that middle tier, third round, fourth round, fifth round that could help us out, starting, rotating in, nickel packages, whatever the case might be. Oh, Chidobe Awuze out of Colorado is another name that's popped up uh he's moved up about 20 spots in the last couple weeks on our on our big board top 300 it's currently 97th overall

so there's there's plenty of talent cornerback wise for the colts to pick from it's just a matter whether they want to wait till the latter third, fourth, fifth round to start picking him, or do they want to go high? And personally, other than Marlon Humphrey of Alabama and Tabor of Florida, I don't think I'd spend a first-round pick on any cornerback. Just because it's so deep as you get further down the board. Exactly. That makes sense. So we've definitely covered edge inside linebacker.

We've already kind of nixed the running back position, and we've accepted the cornerback position for a mid-round spot. What's your biggest other area of need for the Colts? Well, again, it's basically defense. We've got to look at the front line too. There's a guy that I liked out of uh auburn his name is uh montrevious adams he's a five technique it's about six four three twelve and if we wrote if he could if we do that hybrid four three three four shift sometimes and and to rotate him in with

perry off and on would be interesting to me. And I don't know whether they'd be willing to do that or not, whether they're even looking at him or not, but he had eight and a half tackles for loss. He had about four and a half sacks this past season. He recovered a couple of fumbles, forced one. He had an interception, believe it or not. This guy is 6'4", 3'12".

He had an interception, and he knocked down two passes up front. So the guy's got some height. Sounds like he's got some athleticism as well in this case. Yeah, he's athletic. He's tall. He's got long arms. He can move a pile. And he plays in a good conference against good quality opponents.

So he's a guy that you might want to keep an eye on it just depends on whether he's more adept at the three four than the four three and how much our our philosophy is going to change or not change depending on who actually is going to coach it was going to be pagano then things will stay basically the same with it were montecino i should say if he if he around under Pagano because now we start hearing about assistants being fired and not the head coach, so who knows. Right. You know, I'm so on the fence about D-line.

I think that a need, I think it's a – It's a lower need. Man. Yeah, but, I mean, because, look, I think T.Y. McGill's in it for the long haul with the Colts. I really do. And he is a guy that you absolutely – if you're not watching him, you have no idea he's on the field.

But he does so much that just doesn't get any credit, never shows up in the stat line. You know, only makes, like, what, maybe eight to ten tackles a year. But the guy just is grabbing two and three linemen, it seems at a time and creates chaos. Oh my God. And then you have, uh, Kendall Langford, hopefully he's back. He's kind of an underrated addition. I thought, uh, to the Colts, uh, over the past couple of years, the, uh, you know, uh, Hassan Ridgeway, I was really happy with. Um, I think that he's a guy that can really grow with

this team. So I'm not opposed definitely of bringing a guy in the D-line, but I am really excited to see the back end of the front seven and the secondary get considerably better. Those are two things that I just really want. I mean, the Colts have to manufacture their pressure on a quarterback right now. And, I mean, you can't dial up enough twists and turns and stunts in a game and not get just picked apart even by replacement level quarterbacks. Yeah. Yeah. You know?

Yeah. So, so I mean, so what, answer me this then at the, at the safety position, what are the Colts? Let's say the Colts don't bring Mike Adams back.

Um, or, I mean, you know, whatever, or let's see, they do bring him back and he gets hurt, you know?

I mean, so the Colts are going to have to have some kind of a backup plan. I don't trust T.J. Green at this moment. I just don't. He's just not one of my favorite guys. I just think he's awful in coverage. I do like that he's willing to come up and run support. I have no problem with that.

But really, Clayton Gethers is our guy at safety, but he's almost turning into an extra linebacker at this point. What do the Colts do there at safety? Are they going to trust that Darius Butler's body is going to hold up with some of those collisions? Because I don't think it's going to, although I think he's great as a ball hawk. I think as a single high, he'd be great. Yeah, I think they're're gonna have to go at least one safety and i actually have them drafting safety uh one in the in the mock that we just had uh there's several out there that are that look fantastic right now we have josh harvey clemons

from louisville who's a 6'4 23 234-pound safety, believe it or not. Wow. Yeah. That's a monster. He's a monster. That's right. And he's just a couple down behind Budda Baker of Washington. Remember that name, the little tiny guy from the University of Washington?

But, yeah, Josh Harvey, you know, as big as he is, he can do the same thing we're doing with the Gathers, too. He could be versatile enough to move up in a linebacker spot. So that's something to keep in mind. He takes care of two positions with one pick. Even though he's a safety, he's got that size and that ability to move up maybe into a linebacker position. But, yeah, I think safety has to be on the board.

I would even rate it ahead of a defensive tackle, nose tackle that we mentioned earlier in terms of a priority of need. And that's how I have it on draft tech right now is safety going before any D-line guy. Do you have any offensive needs other than running back, like we said, is way down the list? A slot receiver. I think we need to jettison Dorsett. That was a huge mistake.

It was a ridiculous pick. Dorsett might be a fantastic person, and obviously we don't mean any offense to him as a person, but when you get picked number one, you're supposed to put up number one numbers. Now, it was a bad pick. It was a bad first-round pick, no doubt about it. It was horrible. It was ridiculous.

But is he worth getting rid of, though? He's so cheap. Right. He's cheap, but, I mean, he's taking a roster spot, and he's also not doing what he's meant to do or at least what we need because we have Hilton, we have Moncrief, we have Rodgers emerging. He's a slot guy. I love Rodgers.

Yeah, I do too. We need a tough slot guy who's willing to do the dirty work and get down in the nitty-gritty, and Dorsett is not that player. He's the kind of guy that, you know, something that obviously is needed in that, in that regard. And not only that, but, you know, and I don't necessarily think that he is falling apart, but when you look at Moncrief, he worries me sometimes, you know, his, his ability to get injured, it seems like quite a bit. He's, he has that shoulder now that seems like that's going to be a recurring issue in my opinion he is a big or at least this year he was a big free or a free agent he was a big red zone target you know all of his touchdowns were caught inside the red zone

this year um but that i mean i guess maybe i'm just thinking about him wrong, but I don't think that that's what they brought him in to do. Right. And I don't think any of our receivers, if you look at the receiving core for the, for the Colts, none of them are legitimate. Number one receivers. TY has gotten masses amount of your heart each of this year leads the league. But I think more of that's due to the lack of additional production possibilities

from our other receivers and less to do with T.Y.'s overall ability. T.Y. also dropped quite a few passes and has disappeared in a lot of big games over the course of the last couple of seasons. So I don't think the Colts have played with the number one receivers since Reggie Wayne. And when Luck was here, Reggie, he was starting his ride out into the sunset, so he wasn't really a true legitimate number one at the time either for Andrew. So I think Luck has made the receiving core that he has look a lot better than it is. Moncrief might be a number two on some teams and a number three on other teams.

I don't know that T.Y. Hilton would be a number one receiver on some of the NFL teams around the league, but he is for the Colts. He's done a good job, but like I said, at times he's disappeared in big games when he gets press coverage. And I just – that worries me. Like you, Moncrief's shoulder injury, if it's a recurring problem, and then T.Y. getting heavy coverage in games that he can't get free and there's no production coming from him whatsoever.

Does great against Jackson him whatsoever does great against jacksonville and does great against you know tennessee on occasion but patriots pittsburgh we're not seeing much and that and that's right that's and you know i how do i i don't even know how i want to classify ty massive massive massive town yeah um i. I think that this year his drops weren't near as bad as they have been. But I think in the ultimate Colts offense, I guess you could say, or the one that you really want, you want T.Y. as your number two. You don't want him as your number one. I mean, think back to the Reggie and Harrison days.

That's what you want. Ultimately, that's who T.Y. is, the guy who's going to catch the ball, get as many yards as he can, go down and not take a hit. And then you're going to have, hopefully, Reggie Wayne being the ultimate route runner. And I think that's who they wanted Moncrief to be, to be quite honest with you. I think that they wanted him to be some precise guy that's going to run these routes. What, his rookie year, a lot of the routes that he ran were either crossing routes or they ran a lot of comebacks along the boundary. And then this year they use him almost exclusively in the red zone, it seems, or maybe it just ended up that way because he was injured in the other games. I can't really say.

But, I mean, it just seems like they need that other guy. I just don't know that it's worth anything in the draft, though. Right. Definitely slot receiver and wide receiver, it's way, way, way behind anything defensive in nature. So I'm not even really considering it. And if we happen to pick up a wide receiver, a slot guy late in the late in the fourth, fifth, sixth round,

because he just, somebody discovered him and has watched so much tape on him. That's too good to pass up. Then I probably wouldn't make too big a deal of it. Although again, we're, we're losing a defensive guy with a pick on an offensive. I wouldn't call it necessarily a birthday present or a Christmas gift, but it's not really a top priority need.

Right. And where do you stand on Dwayne Allen? I'm just curious. Man, he's frustrating. I mean, at times he's like, we know why we got him. We know what we saw in him to begin with. And then other times he just makes you rip your hair out. I want to trade him for a late round pick.

Well, and I have no problem with that happening. It was funny because about three weeks ago I got in a discussion with somebody over at Tide Inns, and I said if a new coach came in, it wouldn't surprise me if they took O.J. Howard with the first pick because that's a big old boy who can catch the ball. And your red zone and your third down designs immediately big time improve with with a body like og howard and then you have a guy like jack doyle on the other side you know i mean that that's that's pretty good you can go back to your two tight end sets and you can be assured that the block's going to be sealed right right right nobody's going to run through O.G. Howard like – although Dwayne's not a little kid, you know. O.J.'s not giving any ground, I don't believe.

Right. Well, not only that, but Dwayne's injured all the time. Yeah. I mean, if you can find a team that wants him and they can be convinced that he can stay healthy, then I think that you deal him. I really do. I mean, I'm not trying to say that Eric swoops the next, you know,

whoever at tight end. No, but he's serviceable. Oh, he most certainly is. I think you do that, but then you have Jack Doyle, and I think, like you said, that you can grab a guy somewhere else, and you're not going to lose anything in that core, I don't think. Because I just don't think that he does anything game plan-wise to give the Colts a leg up.

I don't think that there's a single defense that the Colts played this year that said, wait a minute, they've got Dwayne Allen. You know, we've got to do – I don't think anybody's game planning for him. No, and that's why I was so surprised he went ahead and had a three-touchdown game. Yeah, I think every – I was super surprised. I mean, he just happened to be wide open on two of those. Maybe that's the thing. He's not going to catch it.

Maybe they just said, let him run, man. Hell of a guy, though. He seemed like a fantastic pick early. He gets injured, and as far as I'm concerned, he's declined in his blocking prowess. Yeah, he never was quite the same after that first injury when he came back. He was pretty good the first year, I thought. I thought he was very, very good, and then that went on.

It just seemed like he struggled. But there's a couple other tight ends if we're on that subject. Bucky Hodges from Virginia Tech and Jake Butt of Michigan, that are possible. Of course, they're going to be in the second and third round area. Butt just tore his ACL, didn't he? Yeah, yeah. And the Colts aren't going to be picking up a tight end in any of the rounds. And if they do, there will be pitchforks and bonfires

and all kinds of problems down in downtown if that happens. Yeah, yeah. Old Jimmy Irsay may have to find himself a new home well jim speaking will be one of the guys carrying the torch because you would see that coming yeah well speaking of uh front office stuff yeah uh so so what's your take on on you know because i don't even think that is as often as as we do kind of toss things around about the Colts, this is something that we haven't really spoken about much. I guess let me just put it this way.

Fire Grigson, fire Pagano, or fire both? Well, Ursae said last year that they're tight at the hip. So I don't see how you do one. But that's lip service though, isn't it? Not necessarily. I mean, somebody in that meeting from a year ago decided that that was the case. I mean, that if one stayed, the other stayed. And whether they were fighting for both of their jobs and they agreed to do that

and they bought it, I don't know. But I don't see, you know, gritson has just missed on so many bad decisions free agents wise and he could never seem to put together an offensive lineman to save his life uh he didn't do too bad last year but you know what the clock's twice uh right twice a day is that how it goes or Whatever the case might be. Think about this. This is the most important offseason that the Colts have had probably since

the time leading up to the Peyton Manning selection or the decision to be made between Manning and Leaf at that time. You've got all these decisions that need to be made on who we're going to draft and and how we're going to recreate that a defense that's at least you know middle of the pack versus 30th in the league

overall but the organization on the outside looking in it's mia who's in charge who's doing what what's going to happen are Are they lame ducks? Are they just going about business as usual? What the heck's happening inside? So it's a really, really dangerous time for this organization to be not sure what the next step is. And you got to wonder whether Irsay thought Peyton Manning would bite and say, okay, I'll be your GM and then decided he didn't want it without a stake in ownership. Who knows what's going on on the inside? That really surprises me that he's even trying that.

Peyton knows that he's given the organization to his girls. Well, yeah, and that was the other thing. I thought, imagine the family fight erupting if dad was agreeing to give Peyton, you know, a quarter of the organization or whatever the case might be. Yeah. I mean, Carly's already assumed basically the takeover for the most part. But then we start thinking about, well, no wonder dad hasn't said anything publicly because he's in the middle of a free-for-all within his own family. Right.

I've been saying this since the beginning. I think that they should bring him in, uh, and whatever, I don't care what you call him, what label you give him, but just bring him into the organization, you know, however they decide to use him, use him because, uh, I mean, in a front office, uh, right, you know, Jimmy Ray, the Colts VP of player personnel, uh, Gregson's ultimate right-hand man, is getting GM offers or taking GM interviews right now, notably with the 49ers.

God, he's got to be smarter than that. You take the interview anyways. So I'm a little – I just think that if they can just get him in the door and then worry about the rest of it later. But there was also that discussion that Peyton was going to be part owner of the Tennessee Titans. And I think Bud said as much that he'd love to have him as part owner. So maybe that's what he's waiting for. And the leverage is you know

the culture want me and better make your move now there's so many things you don't really know what's going on behind the scenes that that play into this but the fact that it's all it should have been taken care of a year ago and i know ursa has a heart of gold when loyalty is involved and with people he knows. And it's been stated factually that he's fond of Ryan Gregson, as we've read many times from many different writers and many people. It's tough to fire somebody you really like, you know, even though your mind's telling you there's probably time. It's really, really a difficult time for this organization to be in neutral as it seems to be right now. So you think his lack of speaking up or his lack of anything public is – describe it. What do you think?

It's astounding. I mean, I don't know of an owner. Imagine Jerry Jones never hearing from Jerry Jones in a situation like this. Are you kidding me? I'm not equating Hersey with Jerry, but on everything else, in any other situation, on every other subject, Jim Hersey tweets something. Jim Hersey says something. He has an opinion. But now it's like radio silence for days.

It says a lot about what's going on. Either it amplifies that there's uncertainty all through the organization, or it's amplifying that he's got it under control. He's not worried. He's not going to listen to what everybody else says he should do. Which one is it, though?

Right. And you know, he doesn't, you know, God knows if Jim Irsay ever read his mentions on Twitter, he'd have a heart attack. So we know he doesn't pay attention to what people say as far as in that regard. So, I mean, and he's done this in the past. Just, hey, Colts fans, fans you know keep your chin up uh coach chuck and and and grigson are doing everything they can to get this organization back to a top five nfl uh team you know i mean something like that even puts everybody it may piss some people off yeah but well it you know what it closes the door on the conversation.

It would upset the majority of Colts fans as far as I know. I mean, in talking with, I would say at this point, at least 75% if not more of most Colts fans that I've talked to, they have to have a change. I mean, it's gone on too long. There's too many weird problems going on for that team to be that, I don't know, dysfunctional on the field to allow it to continue for whatever reason. And some of this defensive problems that we talked about,

these players that aren't doing as well as they should be or not playing very well, we don't even know if it's them or if it's the coaching or the behind-the-scenes stuff that's going on. Right. Who knows? Yeah, it's a crazy time and a weird situation. You know, I don't even know. I mean, I've talked about it a bunch, but I don't really know.

I mean, I wrote something yesterday for FanRagSports on it, and I put up there that I thought it was more than possible, basically, that Grigson outlasts Pagano. I personally, and this is all in my head, I just personally don't think that they're tied at the hip nearly as much as they made it out to appear last year. I just don't. I think that Grigson's got his ear a little bit more than people think,

although I think Chuck's charm is something that Ursae really wants to keep in the building. But ultimately, you know, he's had guys like that before that he's fired. Caldwell, I mean, you wouldn't have found a nicer guy. I mean, the guy is stone-faced as can be, you know, year-round, but he is one of the nicest guys, and I don't think that anybody who's ever met him would tell you any different. And he booted him, you know, after Peyton Manning got injured, basically, you know, and not only that, but Pullian had been a longtime friend of his, and if you're really going to fire one of the best GMs in NFL history over not

having a backup plan for losing Peyton Manning then I think that basically any time a firing is on the table for a bad performance right I think that was more of a cover story and then then it was reality I think that the main reason this is just my opinion I think the main reason, and this is just my opinion, I think the main reason that they had Bill go was because he was trying to force Chris, his son, into a role that a lot of people didn't particularly care for and appreciate. deciding that than just not having a quote-unquote backup plan because you can't be a top executive like bill pullian was for so many years and then suddenly one day whoops i didn't have a backup plan right yeah i agree that that seemed a little weird to me but you know at the time colts fans knew that we were going to be drafting andrewowe. We could see on the horizon that Peyton Manning was not going to be an Indianapolis Colt anymore. That was the strangest time ever. Now this is going to be rivaling second, and we're talking about

within a five to six year span. You know what? I was one of the few people who said trade the pick and keep Peyton. I was one of the very few that wanted that, yeah. Why did you say that? Because I'm a loyal guy too, and Peyton built this franchise, man. We wouldn't be talking about all the cool things we've talked about at Indianapolis as it relates to pro football without Bill Pullian and Peyton Manning.

You're not wrong. And that's why I'm loyal to a fault. So I understand where Ursae is coming from, but at some point you have to make the decision, and he did with Manning, to try to go the route that looks more promising. And probably the reason he didn't was because there was no second plan available that he could use until Peyton came back. And we got healthy plus the large money that he was paying for Peyton.

It's limiting his options as well. But anyhow, that's just a side note. I would have rather, and we would have, who knows, we might have a premier defense at this point for whatever quarterback was playing in Indianapolis had we traded the pick for Andrew Luck away to some other team that was willing to give us eight, nine, ten draft choices for the next three years. Cleveland was ready to give us the entire 2012 draft. I mean, that was actually on the table. Yeah, go back and look at the picks that were possible at that time and see if that would have parlayed into a fairly decent defense.

Yeah. You know, it's more than interesting to think about. There's no two ways about it. I mean, I don't know what you would have done with 15 draft picks in a 2012 draft, but hopefully that would have turned into maybe 10 draft picks. Well, you know what you start doing. And then 10 over the next two years. Well, you start trading down with those picks and accumulating more for future seasons like the Patriots do.

The Patriots have 30 draft choices every year and trade half of them away, and then they have 15 more for 10 years. I mean, it's incredible how many times they traded picks away and accumulate more picks in the seasons three, four, five years away. That would have been a massive draft capital pull, for sure. Interesting to think about. And I'll tell you what, I say this only half serious, but if Andrew Luck doesn't bring the Colts to the Super Bowl in the next five years,

they may wish they had traded that. I don't think it's his fault, though. I feel horrible for Andrew, number one, because they didn't do the job. And that's one of the reasons why I don't feel that it's proper for Grigson to stay and have Pagano go. Pagano, we all knew this, and so did Ursae when he hired him. He's, quote-unquote, a defensive-minded specialist-type coach, and Andrew Luck was not a defenseman. He was a quarterback, franchise quarterback. So who was responsible for getting him set up with protection and being kept safe and clean

and allowed to do what he does. That's Brickson's responsibility and the offensive coordinator. Well, if you ask me, both failed miserably for the last four years. Right. And I don't disagree with that. I think the things that I disagree with are the people that say he didn't do anything with the offensive line or he didn't ever try.

They brought in Donald Thomas, Gosner chairless early, and I'm not trying to say they were top-level guys. What I'm saying is that he attempted to at least push the problem down the road and make it a serviceable team until they could get some draft draft picks pulled back in and then when you add the Trent Richardson debacle and you add that how many how few draft picks from those first three seasons are still yeah not very many at all or you know what and forget that even in the NFL right yeah I know there's only two guys from the 2014 and 2013 drafts still in the NFL that aren't on the Colts roster. Three still on the roster and two others still in the NFL. Five guys total

from those two drafts. I just thought that Grigson didn't do a good enough job research-wise and make the proper decisions on those offensive linemen draft-wise or free agency-wise. I mean, he was bringing in guys that had knee problems. They were well-known knee problems. He thought he could get them on the cheap and make them serviceable for a short period of time, and it didn't work out. And then it became even worse, and that's why luck took the pounding he did early on in his career and even now.

And they paid a lot of money for those guys too. Yeah, overpaid for every free agent since he's been there basically until last year. How many free agents did they pick up last year? Over a minimum. It's crazy. I think there's blame to go around. Whether they're tight at the hip or not, I think there should be a minimum. Tons. So it's crazy. I think there's blame to go around. And whether they're tight at the hip or not, I think there should be a change.

The problem is how can you jettison one guy when you don't know who's available to take his place that can be better. Yep, I agree. And my thing is I don't think that they are. However, I think that that's how it needs to go down. If you completely wipe it out and you bring in a new GM with a new brain and let him find his coach. Hopefully that's Kyle Shanahan. Just saying.

But I don't think that it would be. Rick, we've been on here forever. Hey, how about that? We were worried we had some time problems. We might not make 20 minutes. That's right. Great show, man. Thanks for coming on.

Tell everybody where they can find your work. DraftTech.com is the website. Check us out. We try to have a new mock every week. It usually comes out on Wednesday afternoon, evening. And I cover the Colts, but I also have a secondary team, the New Orleans Saints, by virtue of the fact that Drew Brees, former Purdue quarterback, when he went over there, I had a special liking of that,

so I took over the chores for the New Orleans Saints analysis too. But Colts is my primary, and that's the team I love. Check out Rick's work and check out Draft Tech. They do a great job over there. And I'm telling you, constantly updating things and guys falling and climbing. It's really interesting to check out their work. So make sure you guys get over and do that. And as always, give the podcast a rating and a review, please.

Don't even care if you like it or dislike it. Go give it some sort of a rating and a review. Actually, I take that back. Five-star rating, but you can review it however you like. And that helps a ton. And obviously, you guys know you can get at me at LockedOnColts on Twitter, LockedOnColtsPod at gmail.com. And you can get me at

mdanley underscore NFL on Twitter as well. Thank you guys for joining me. This is an extra show. This is a Saturday show, but we want to keep this going and we want to give you guys as much content as we can. It just seems that the playoffs are going to be here, guys, but they're going

to be gone soon and then it's going to be all free agency and all draft, and we'll be back with a lot of these guys probably again in the next couple weeks. So thank you, Rick, for joining me. I appreciate it. Great show. Thank you, Colts fans, and we will talk to you all later

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