Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -11/16- Indianapolis Colts Midseason Award Winners

Episode Date: November 16, 2016

The #IndianapolisColts have had some really good performances from a handful of players despite so many who have been bad at times this year. We haven't gone through them quite yet, and everyone has to, so here are the Colts midseason award winners to this point. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Learn more about our healthy benefits at fepblue.org slash getmore. No, I'm not for sale. You are lockeded 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. Today we are going to take a look at what I feel are the Colts midseason award winners. I think a couple of these are fairly obvious. However, I haven't actually gone through it myself, so I think I'd be a little bit remiss

if I didn't actually touch on them before we started in the second half of the season and the Colts started getting in in their post-buy week schedule. So I'm going to go through these and we'll see how much of you guys actually agree and disagree and see kind of where you guys are at when your thought process gets into these and all these different categories. So, you know, the Colts have had some real issues this year in various places, but one of the areas they haven't had any issues as, at least in any kind of a consistency standpoint, is at quarterback most definitely. Andrew Luck, hands down, offensive MVP.

Not only is he kind of the obvious choice, but he's close to being in the discussion for the league's award, in my opinion, as well. Granted, he hasn't actually had those consistent three and four touchdown games with no picks or anything like that. But in my opinion, Andrew Luck's definitely having one of the best seasons of his career he's at a 63.7 completion rate on pace for more than 30 scores and and around 12 touchdowns or so I'm sorry around 12 interceptions and it would both be his that would both be his second best

totals in his career so he's definitely doing pretty well, especially for as often as he's getting sacked in the pocket. So I guess if you consider it logically, you know, this team goes as luck goes, and very seldom does the supporting cast rise above the team, and luck's definitely the one that's carrying the team on his shoulders. So I gave honorable mentions to T.Y. Hilton. I think you could mention maybe Jack Muhor just as a lineman who had been playing pretty well, although he hasn't played very many games.

But other than those two guys, those are really the two people that have stood out on the offense and have really done what they're supposed to do and have made real significant impacts. So going to the other side of the ball, the defensive MVP, I did go ahead and give it to Eric Walden. I understand that kind of some of his sacks have been cheesy, but how do you determine that? He's been the one consistency on that side of the ball for the most part this season, and I don't really see too many other people on that side of the ball that have been that consistent and have really stepped up. You could talk about Vontae Davis, who's had a solid season,

but he's not got like three or four picks or anything like that he might be the most important on that defense Fonte Davis but he's not the one that's making necessarily the biggest noticeable impact so I'm with Walden um he's got he is responsible for 41 percent of the team's sacks with his seven. It's almost simultaneously impressive and pathetic at the same time because the team should be getting to the quarterback more often than that. He's been one of the best free agency acquisitions for the Colts in Grigson's tenure. Again, that's both saying something and that's

pathetic because of all the amount, the sheer amount of free agency signings that Grigson's had. And he's the one that stands out as actually being somewhat consistent and a pretty good ballplayer for the Colts. He's not somebody that the Colts want to have to rely on, but he is somebody who's stepping up for the Colts and playing pretty well. So I also gave honorable mentions to Clayton Gethers. I feel he's been the best, one of the better coverage safeties on the team. He's also been one of the best tacklers, one of the best sure tacklers for the Colts this year as well.

And I think you could probably, in that regard, as far as tackling and such, give maybe an honorable mention to DeQuell Jackson as well. Other than that, there really hasn't been anybody on the defense that stood out that's made a serious, like a noticeable impact or anything like that so we'll go on to who I felt was the Colts biggest surprise and I'm going to say Jack Doyle now Jack I if you guys remember at the beginning of the season I said that Jack Doyle was going to be a really good tight end for the Colts I mean I knew that he was going to be good. He's very reliable, catches everything. It seemed like everything he does catch either is a clutch catch or a touchdown,

one of the others. I just didn't expect him to be somebody that teams were going to have to game plan for, I guess. Somebody who was going to be getting as many targets as he was throughout the season because of having T.Y. and Moncrief and some other guys who were going to take the lion's share of the catches. And I thought that Luck would be targeting Dwayne Allen a little bit more. But Jack Doyle's been phenomenal. From his 2013 season to 2015 with the Colts, Doyle caught 35 of his 43 targets with an 81.4% catch percentage and he had 209 yards and three touchdowns this season alone Doyle has like completely blown up almost has the same numbers 36 of 45 for 80% catch percentage with 379 yards almost double his total yardage in the first three

years for four touchdowns and he's completely solidified himself as luck's security blanket he's one of the most important guys on the team right now and that cannot be understated there's i mean especially on the team that's scratching and clawing for every single win jack doyle's been fantastic i don't think that too many other people are surprised about a whole bunch else you know that, that's, again, who's made an impact. I hadn't mentioned it, Frank Gore, and I think that's just because I wasn't sure what to expect from Frank coming into this season. I wasn't sure if he was going to come back and do what Frank does, you know, but he's been better than last year and has been pretty reliable himself.

Efficient, getting yards, especially huge first and second down yards at times, and has really helped luck out when there's not a lot of help on that offense to be had. So he was one of the biggest surprises for me. I didn't think it would have been a surprise at all if Frank Gore had fallen off the map this year. We all saw what happened with Andre Johnson last year. You know, at that age, anything can happen. You just never know. So I had Frank Gore as my honorable mention in that regard.

Biggest disappointment, Philip Dorsett. And I won't say it's not even close because it was kind of close. He hasn't really done much at all except for the fact that you can see the potential in him. And it's just so sad that he's not been either a more approachable target for luck or he's not getting open. And, you know, there's a couple different things at times. He's a more concise, poignant route runner as opposed to, you know, he and T.Y. Hilton are similar in the way they are built. And Dorsett runs more geometrical routes, cutting them off, and T.Y. is rounded off a little bit more.

But Dorsett, either way, just isn't getting a lot of Lux attention, and that's something that is disappointing because you want to see him get open, but at the same time, he's had some costly drops. He's had some times he's not getting off the ball. He's getting manhandled with the line of scrimmage from opposing cornerbacks or safeties, whether if he's in the slot or just otherwise. He's just not been any kind of an impact guy, and he's a first-round pick. You want to see him this guy showing real explosiveness like continually throughout the season you want to see him dominating people and we're just not seeing that so Dorsett's definitely my biggest disappointment I gave honorable mention Robert Mathis and the only reason I didn't give this probably to Robert Mathis

is because of his age I don't think that you can necessarily expect him to come back with a 10, 15 sack season. So, Matt Mathis has been really bad, and I didn't expect that. So, with what, just a couple sacks this year, he's shown a couple times that he still has a little bit left in him, but ultimately he gets manhandled by even mediocre offensive lineman tackles. He gets inside and he's just pushed aside for the most part a lot of times. He's undersized anymore, and when you get to his age, undersized and old, compared to some of these 22- and 23-year-old superior athletes, that's something that just is going to happen eventually.

But still disappointing no matter what. My rookie of the year is Ryan Kelly. This is not close. He's a fantastic addition to the Colts. The Colts definitely needed help on the offensive line. He's running this offensive line right now as if he's a three or four year veteran already keeping guys in tow he's made very few mistakes doing a nice job in pass protection not quite as good a job in the running game but he is a center very center is the very seldom is the center

pulling and leading any uh any sweeps or anything like that. He's second only to Jack Muhor on the team with pro football focuses grades. He's earned 81.6 in protection and is one of only four centers with 600 snaps on the season. He's been given a serious workload right off the jump as a rookie. He's played just everything. Currently, the Colts are second in the league in adjusted line yards on football outsiders. When running the ball in Kelly's direction, they run that ball up the middle

and to either side of him to the guard. That's pretty impressive for the running game, first of all, for the Colts. But when you consider that it's when they run in his direction and the numbers outside of that are considerably lower and less deficient, he's definitely a huge, huge impact. There's a lot of edge rushers that the Colts could have wanted, myself included, Noah Spence, several of those guys out of this draft. But Kelly was clearly the right pick. It's not the pretty pick,

so to speak. But you can see what he's going to give the Colts year in and year out. And that's absolutely pertinent to the Colts' future success. There's no doubt about it. And Luck definitely needs his, if you want to call it, the key thing here is to say the Jeff Saturday, his new Jeff Saturday. So the Colts definitely need that. Andrew Luck definitely needs that. Any sort of a running game or protection certainly needs that. So that's huge. And he's been fantastic, you know, overall for sure.

Audible mention, I went ahead and gave it to TJ Green. TJ showing some flashes of, I wouldn't even say brilliance, but he's showing some flashes of, I wouldn't even say brilliance, but he's showing some flashes of competence, and he could turn out to be quite the decent safety. He's not quite there yet. In fact, his coverage is really kind of pretty bad and below the belt, so to speak. So we'll see what happens with T.J. Green, TJ Green, but TJ is definitely one of the better rookies for the Colts this year. I am still impressed with him because I wasn't that high on him when the Colts drafted him. I thought it was a wasted pick almost immediately. I didn't

understand why you would select somebody that you thought was ultimately probably going to only give you like special teams help. And that was kind of where I thought T.J. Green was going to be in his rookie year it just didn't make any sense that they would put that kind of a draft stock in his in a limited limited player especially a guy who couldn't make an instant impact but T.J.'s had some impactful games he's a good tackler he's he's done a good job in other aspects of his game now when it does come to coverage, he needs a ton of work, but that's nice because they bring him in behind Gethers and behind Adams, who's probably in the last year with the Colts, maybe as old as he is. So we'll have to see how that turns out, but I think he'll be a quality safety in the next couple, three years. And it may turn out to be,

I think, I still think it's kind of high for his pick, but it turned out to be a pretty solid pick either way. Guys, that's about all I've got for our mid-season awards. I think that there was some bright spots and some low spots, definitely. I think our low spots are more noticeable than our high spots, other than Andrew Luck and a couple other small areas. The Colts will host the Titans this weekend, and it starts now. The Colts have a really good chance to make an impact in the second half of their season. The second half of their schedule is really not, we've talked about this, is not as bright as it once looked. So the Colts have an opportunity here.

The seven games that they play, those teams have a combined 10 and 18 in the last four weeks. Colts need that. The Colts could escape here with some wins that they desperately need. And I'd say there's five wins on that schedule, possibly if the Colts put it all together and really knock it down. So, well, thank you guys for joining me here on Locked on Colts. As always, go to iTunes or anywhere you get the podcast and subscribe give us a rating and review get a hold of me at Locked on Colts on

Twitter on Facebook and also on email at Locked on Colts pod at gmail.com and as always I really appreciate you guys listening here every single day here at Locked on Colts. And you guys give me a shout out whenever you like. Let's get some listener questions going here in the next few days or whatever. If you guys have any questions, hit me up on one of those platforms and we'll get it done. So thank you guys for joining me again. And I will talk to you all on Thursday right here on Locked on Colts. You are Locked on Colts. Your daily podcast on theed on Colts. You are Locked on Colts, your daily podcast on the Indianapolis Colts,

part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day.