Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -11/4- Indianapolis Colts, Green Bay Packers Week 9 Locked on Crossover

Episode Date: November 4, 2016

Matt and Bill Huber (Locked on Packers) discuss this Week 9 battle between the #IndianapolisColts and the #GreenBayPackers. They'll be looking into whether or not the Colts can get hot and come up with a big win before the bye week, if the Packers can continue their play from Week 8 and dive into every facet of the game to get you ready for this matchup. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Talkspace.com slash BOOM. B-O-O-M. 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 to this Locked On crossover with Locked On Colts and Locked On Packers. I am here today with Bill Huber. He is the host of Locked On Packers.

And I am your host of Locked On Colts, Matt Dainley. Bill, how you doing, man? I'm great. How about you, Matt? Excellent. Glad to talk to you. Glad to kind of get this game kind of worked out and see what we're going to come up with. We bang our heads together and see kind of what we're going to see this Sunday with the Colts and Packers in Lambeau. This is kind of an exciting matchup for me. I always enjoyed watching games in Lambeau and so on, but to watch my Colts go up there and see what they can pull together against a Packers team is going to be very interesting, to say the least. Should be a good game.

You know, obviously Green Bay is in the thick of a bad NFC North and kind of a mundane NFC.C. What's Indies feeling? There were three and five, obviously, and we had the conference calls. Obviously, everybody's disappointed there, but what's the feeling big picture-, I think that they feel they have a realistic shot at the game. I think they do, too, so long as about three or four things go their way, specifically. And then I think a lot of others have to be pretty helpful as well. It's a different team this year to where they've been close in almost every game. And at the end of the day, you really start wondering at times how they kept the game so close, whether the Colts are a bad team and teams are playing down to their matchup, or if the Colts are actually doing something that doesn't just jump off the screen at you that's keeping the other teams kind of at bay and just doesn't, you know what I mean,

just not one of those things that's like, oh, they're getting a lot of pressure on the quarterback or this or that, you know, it's just something that's keeping these games close. It's really hard to tell. With the remaining schedule, you know, there's a lot of things for the Colts that come up to where they have an interesting second half of the season. They start the second half of the season with you guys, and then they take their bye. And then they've got the Vikings and the Raiders among the other AFC South games in there as well, and a couple others. It's just interesting to see how the rest of the schedule, those teams, how they're working out with their schedules and so on.

With the Vikings kind of taking a dip, the Raiders are kind of back and forth and so on. Nobody knows really what's going to happen in an AFC South game. We've already seen that over the past several years. But this game against the Packers, I think the Colts bring an interesting matchup into Lambeau. But there's so many differences in this Packers team than we've seen in years past. For example, Aaron Rodgers is only throwing the ball about six and a half yards per attempt right now, which is pretty low compared to what he's been. In fact, it's like 6.3 yards per attempt, which is one of his lowest in his career. In fact, it is the lowest in his career.

But like I said, they've got those guys, the receivers, coming in the backfield, and they're using such a revolving receivers, coming in the backfield. They're such a revolving door so much in the backfield, it seems like. Where are the Packers going to find their success against this Colts team? I want to hit on the yards per attempt. It was funny. We had quarterbacks coach Alex Van P pelt on thursday evening up at lambeau and he was asked about that and you know they're not worried actually was uh offensive uh associate head coach tom clements was asked about it and it is i mean he entered after the 2014

season he was number three in nfl history in that number like 8.3 so where he is now is it's it's a remarkable drop-off but you know at least for public consumption they're not worried about that number um Tom Clements said that if you start chasing stuff like that then you just get things worse but he at least figured out something and as odd as it is to to say I think losing Eddie Lacey might have actually been a benefit to him now the game is it's in Aaron Rodgers hands and there's no more for Rodgers I mean I think losing Eddie Lacy might have actually been a benefit to him. Now the game is in Aaron Rodgers' hands, and there's no more for Rodgers. I mean, I think for the first six weeks, I swear he just looked in the pocket trying to make big plays and extending plays and buying time,

just trying to make the big play, the splash play. I think losing Lacy has forced him to, you know what? It's okay to throw the ball three yards. You know what? I'll throw the ball three yards, my guy will run for five and I'm going to gain eight. So I think there's some benefit there. So how do you attack the Colts? Well, I guess I'll throw it back to you here in a second,

but I think it's going to be a lot of the same stuff. It's going to be a lot of the quick hitting stuff. I think they'll get Randall Cobb back. Who's their, you know, slot receiver. They'll probably get Ty Montgomery back because the receiver has been playing running back. So I think there'll be a lot of the same kind of stuff that Packers fans have seen the last couple of weeks. I'm curious about Vontae Davis. Do you think he's going to play with that concussion?

I'm going to say no at this time. It's so hard to tell how quickly they come in and out of the concussion protocol anymore. I wouldn't even venture a guess, to be honest with you. But the fact that he was limited today, so whether that means he was in there with a no-contact jersey, it's just hard to tell. It really depends on how, you know, because that first day back, basically when they get them on the field at all, they just want to see if they can go through some sort of a vigorous workout and not suffer the reoccurring symptoms. And then, you know, the Friday after that is going to be used to see, you know, can the guy do this and maybe hit a little bit.

It just kind of depends. If they still have a no-contact jersey on him tomorrow, he's not going to practice. Or he's not going to play this Sunday, I don't think. Obviously, he's key. One of the Packers receivers called him one of the premier corners in the NFL. The Packers think very highly of him. Looking at Green Bay secondary, where they have three starters out, you don't have to look too hard to figure out the default

when you're down your top guy. Then you saw your number two guys moving up to the number one guy and the number three corners moving up to number two and sets off a whole avalanche of things. Green Bay is pretty tight-lipped like most teams are about not having to bowl them more material. But they look at the colts passing numbers and and they see opportunities what what's gone wrong there besides just

injuries or is that it well it's been a little bit of everything i mean when you add injuries some of its poor play calling now defensively it's just the the passing game uh for the most part now the colts aren't exactly known as a run-stopping team, that's for sure. I don't think anybody would accuse them of that. But this year, it's been a lot of downfield passing. They've struggled quite a bit in the secondary with the passing defense. I mean, they're, I think, 31st or 32nd and either dead last or second to last in the league in passing yards and passing defense and so um they they have a multitude of trouble getting

their linebackers to cover uh basically anybody for that matter but the majority of it is tight ends and running backs obviously but their secondary is struggling as well they've you know they've had some. Vontae's done pretty solid, but he got torched by a tight end last week. So, I mean, he's just as capable of being beat as anybody. And they've just had a lot of inconsistency. TJ Green is pretty bad in coverage for the most part. And Mike Adams had a bad game last week and he has he had been to that point probably the best uh member of the secondary best defensive back in coverage so it's just hard to tell they're just so inconsistent you can't really get a read on any of their on any of their play i

mean it's one week it's one thing they look good and you think that they're on a roll and then the next week they look terrible and it's like what happened you know um but that was another thing i wanted to ask you about about the i mean you have some or you have uh some corners that are going to be out this week as well or i mean that they're they're in trouble not so much that they're out but you uh let's see who you have uh dimitri uh goods and i'm not sure how much he plays. Is he a starter? We'll start from the original starters. Gordon Lear was, including last year too, Sam Shields is a veteran guy. He suffered a concussion in week one.

He's on IR. He's never going to play for the Packers again. He's done. Which made Demarius Randle last year's first-round pick. Then he became the number one corner. Well, he hurt his groin. He came back a week later after missing him. He came back, re-entered the groin. Then he needed surgery.

So he's out for five, six weeks. Their number three corner is Quinton Rollins, a former basketball player from Miami, Ohio. He got a groin injury. He's out. They've gone a couple games here without their top three. So that put Dimitri Goodson, another former basketball player who had just come back from suspension.

He became a starter. Ladarius Gunter, an undrafted guy from Miami. He became a starter. And Micah Hyde, who was our number three safety, he became a starter. So that's not good. No. I really liked Rollins coming out of school. He was one of the guys I really hoped the Colts would get.

Yeah, he's been banged up some. So he's probably going to play. He seems to be healthy, which is good timing because Goodson has a suspension. I mean, it's been a concussion. So they're going to go. They certainly have one of their top three. So they're going to have one of their top three playing, and then you firmly draft the guy, Gunter, who's actually a pretty darn good player. But this matchup worries me because

he's not fast. That's the one thing that you guys have in an abundance of speed. There's an issue there. And Micah Hyde, he played corner Iowa, but he's playing safety because he's not fast enough to play corner. Why is he playing corner against a bunch of speedsters? It looks like a lot of matchup problems from Green Bay's perspective. And that specifically is where I was going to go next. When you get to maybe the third receiver on the field, the tight end and running backs, the Packers have been covering pretty well, at least in comparison to the rest

of the league. They're in the top 12 of covering third wide receivers, tight ends, and running backs. But then you get to the number one and two receivers, and they're 25th and 26th in the league, or 25th for the first wide receiver, and 26th in the league against the second wide receiver. That's something I was going to ask you about now. I know T.Y. Hilton is, well, he was practiced today, so that's a good sign for the Colts with his injury. But what do you think that does for this weekend specifically against Andrew Luck being able to get the deep ball. Yeah, it's a big problem. Gunters played really well against the Giants. He was responsible for

shutting down Beckham. Then he played the Cowboys, and he just got destroyed. Then he played the Bears, and they threw nine passes at Elshon Jeffrey, and he caught three for like 30 yards. Against Julio Jones last week, Jones got hurt in the second quarter,

but he didn't do anything. But, of course, he's hurt, so that comes with the big asterisk. So Gunter's done pretty well, but one of those guys I have in common, well, Jeffrey doesn't run. Jones on a bad wheel doesn't run. So I would assume because he's the big physical guy. I would assume that he'll take Moncrief because 6'2 compared to 5'9.

I think he goes there. He'll probably feel pretty good about that matchup. Man, I don't know how Quentin Rollins, who's not a speed guy, he's coming back off of Greenwich. I don't know how he stops Hilton if that's the matchup. I don't know how Micah High, who's usually been their third safety or their dime guy, I don't know how he stops Hilton if that's the matchup, and I don't know how Micah High, who's usually been their third safety or their dime guy,

I don't know how he matches up with Dorsett. So really, their hope is that they've got to stop the run, because if they can't stop the run, then Luxia's going to go play action and kill them. So they're going to have to stop the run with a bare minimum of resources in the box and then hope the pass rush can get there, which is obviously where the Colts are very vulnerable. Right. Oh, absolutely. You know, they had three sacks this past week,

and it's kind of interesting to see. I actually wrote a piece today for Today's Pigskin about Eric Walden and how he's been basically the best pass rush option for the colts and he you know that you guys know about him you guys know about him in green bay and he was everything i mean anything but a pass rush uh extraordinary there and it's not so much that he is here it's just that should tell you how bad the Colts pass rush is across the board. They've brought in Akeem Ayers, who's gotten some good pressure. They've gotten some pressure inside from a couple different guys. But if they can't, especially with a guy like Aaron Rodgers, he presents one of the biggest issues for the Colts,

getting out of the pocket and so on. But if they do a lot of those short passing plays that they've been doing the past several weeks, I don't know that it's going to matter if they get a good rush or not. If he's already got the ball out of his hand, the Packers' skill position guys are very good in space. When you put a wide receiver in the backfield and some of that stuff happens, then you've got real issues for this Colts defense,

who also struggles to tackle quite a bit. That's not good. Yeah, Walden's got six of the 14 sacks. Has Mathis kind of hit the end of the line, do you think? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's got two sacks now, but there just isn't a

whole lot there to him anymore, I don't think. I don't know how to explain him. You think that he looks good in a couple of plays, but he just looks so much of a pushover. When you get him against a solid, a good tackle, and he just looks overmatched almost every single time, like almost every play out of the gate. He really has to be on top of his game, and it's almost as if the tackle has to have a bad drop or doesn't anchor well or something like that, and Mathis can get a beat on him or some leverage at some point, but he really doesn't look good this year. And the Colts really need multiple pass rushers, you know, which is why they've had to depend on their interior to get so much pressure up the middle. It's just a, it's a bad situation in that regard, but they are improving. I'll say that, but that's, you know, that's, that means nothing virtually when you're, when you're so bad that you're improving and you've still only got 14 sacks on the year yeah and you've only got eight from other people than

eric walden things are not good yeah in green bay's old line has played really well i know if you look at rogers rogers has been sacked some but a lot of that was back from his early season where he was just holding the ball for an eternity waiting for someone to get open um but their old tackle is a really good left tackle david bakhtiari is a heck of a good player from his early in the season where he was just holding the ball for an eternity, waiting for someone to get open. But their old tackle is a really good left tackle. David Bakhtiari is a heck of a good player. He was vastly underrated for a couple years, and now he got paid a lot of money.

And I think people finally realize just how good of a left tackle he is. Packers don't help him, and they don't help just don't help him, period. Home, road, you're facing an all-pro, not me. It's Bakhtiari goes one-on-one and is expected to win. Right tackle Brian Blogg is a pretty good player.

Is that the Colts going back to your O-line? Is that the vulnerability? Is it tackles between Costanzo and Haag? Well, Haag's been – Haag lately with Muhhor being out has been playing left guard okay and they've had uh uh joe writes at right tackle but he's out with a concussion right now so how they manipulate this line now uh with not really having a great uh idea of what muhor's done when you muhor hasn't practiced this week. So he's more than likely not playing this week either. So, uh, with those two out there, they have a rookie in Austin

Blythe who could come in and play a guard spot and they could probably, you know, uh, Denzel Good, who has played the right guard position, uh, when Hague went out to right tackle. I think those two need to flip-flop because I think Haig's a very good for his tenure, so to speak, for a rookie at the guard position. He's not great yet. I mean, none of these guys are great. That's why they've given so many pressures and sacks. But they're young, and they have a lot of potential. But I really think that right side of that line,

Good is better served as a tackle in my opinion. He just looks lost a lot of times in the interior. And Ryan Kelly is anchoring that line at the moment right now, and Anthony Costanzo had a bad week last week. So it's a very makeshift line, it seems like more weeks than not. Hague could be a good option there, but they have Austin Blythe, Jonathan Harrison, who's not very good. He could be playing right guard. They may move Hague over to left guard again.

We just don't know. And that's probably the most likely scenario. But it's their interior for the most part. It's really a whole, the entire line. Ryan Kelly has really been the strong point in that offensive line for the Colts, but Costanzo's been fantastic some weeks and been really bad others. And then you have the right side of the line who, if they don't, if they're not on point, man, they give up just pressure after pressure after pressure. The consistency issue is where it's at because you see the potential with this team. They'll go on a full drive and Andrew Luck will just be chilling in

the pocket back there and picking defenses apart. Then on the very next drive, he's hit three out of the four times he gets the ball snapped to him. It's just very inconsistent, hard to gauge. They're a young team with a ton of potential up front, and that's about it right now. So it's a scary thought when you get into a team that is good at rushing the passer like the Packers can be. We'll put it that way. How has Andrew Luck handled all this? I mean, pressure is a quarterback's number one enemy, and he's got the dickens beaten out of him.

The numbers look pretty darn good, all things considered, though. How has he handled it? The same way Andrew Luck always does. You know, the common right answer, you know, to questions about it never throws his guys under the bus. In fact, the coaching staff this week didn't want to say – didn't want to talk about anything about the offensive line. In fact, they pretty much, when they were asked about it –

and I'll be honest, some of the local media that was asking the questions or asking some very closed-ended questions, didn't really give a solid question in order to get any kind of an answer back. But at the same time, they did bring it up. And the coaching staff, especially Pagano, wanted nothing to do with it. He just simply ignored the question and said something about we're on to Green Bay. You know, it was pretty weak. but it was at the same time. Andrew's handled it fantastically, but that guy can't, I mean, my God, how many bruises does the guy have on his body right now? You know, if you could see under his Jersey,

I mean, he probably looked like a leopard, you know? I mean, cause he's just getting tagged all the time, but he gets back up and, uh, that's the kind of the thing with him. You know, I don't think too often you're ever going to see him sit out because he's got an ouchie. He's going to have to rupture his, uh, kidney or whatever, you know, just like he did last year in order to go out. And that's a scary thought because he takes a lot of hits. And the good thing about this year, though, is that typically he was inviting pressure. A lot of times he would move out of the pocket into other pressures. You know what I mean?

He's not been doing it this year. It's been very much on the line, in my opinion. And the other part of that, though, is the offensive coordinator. Chudzinski's got to, you know, back when in the days of Bruce Arians, they had a very downfield approach and they didn't have a great offensive line, but a lot of people, you know, didn't really give Luck the benefit of the doubt at the time as a rookie. They wanted to test him naturally. Well, they had one of the biggest downfield attacks in the league that year. And there are a lot of these, uh, receivers routes are very downfield again, and that's killing, uh, Andrew Luck in this

offensive line. They need to shorten that up quite a bit. And they've, you know, they're, they're doing a lot of seven step drops and that's not good for a line that's leaky and a quarterback who's getting tagged, you know, seven, eight, 10 times a week. That's interesting because if you look at their, their skill guys, I mean, they are downfield guys, right? I mean, you're not going to have your five, nine guys be underneath guys. It's just a, it's just a mismatched roster at this point and they need to figure out the

direction and build it or to how you see it. Or am I just totally wrong on that? No, it's not wrong. The only thing is, I think it's somewhat of a stigma if you were to give that to T.Y. Hilton about that he struggles underneath or not so much that he struggles, but that he doesn't get that underneath passes very often. He's a downfield guy, but that's not actually the case. T.Y. Hilton gets a ton of yards after the catch. Often it's on a backside crossing route or something like that to where a lot of the other guys are opening it up downfield, even for him,

because we've got a lot of speed with Moncrief and Dorsett on the other side. And even Chester Rogers is proving that he's somewhat of a vital part to this receiving core who nobody knows anything about. But he's been very good. And with T.Y. in there and Dorsett, they run, they're just pushing a lot of things downfield and they're relying on their tight end to cover all the short passing game. And you just can't do that. You've got to have more guys at different levels of the field, and they're really just oversaturating the deep routes within the offense. I wouldn't even say that it's a mismatch. I'd say that it's a pretty good group of wide receivers, and I think that they've got a nice

core of skill set and abilities, but they've really got to use, you know, you've got the physical guy. Dorsett's ultimately a more physical and a bigger version of T.Y. Hilton. If you look at speed and stuff, I'm not talking about skill level, but you have Moncrief also, who is a physical guy who can take some of those routes across the middle. They really like Moncrief doing, who is a physical guy who can take some of those routes across the middle, they really like Moncrief doing a lot of the comeback routes and a lot of the deeper stuff to come back and run secondaries off. But they're going to have to switch that up with him coming back, and they're going to have to use really intelligent play calls. When they brought in another defensive back, Frankie Williams, this week off the practice squad, they got rid of Chase Kaufman, their other tight end. If Dwayne Allen comes back this week,

that's a huge help because otherwise, they're really light on tight ends. This could be a disastrous week for this offense, I think, if they don't get their play calling in order. You just simply can't run a ton of seven-step drops and expect Andrew Luck in this offensive line, who's already struggling, to improve on that. Andrew Luck's going to do what he can do, but the offensive line's letting guys in that often. He's going to be running for his life. I was looking at Luxemburg. He threw a million interceptions last year in seven games. He seems like he's got a handle on that.

What's he done better in that regard? Honestly, I think a lot of that has to do with the quarterback, Coach Brian Schottenheimer. He's been fantastic for him. When I was watching him in training camp, you could really tell that they were making a legitimate push to improve both Luck's eye discipline and his footwork. And it was key because you could really tell. In training camps in the past, Luck's been on point, always accurate right away, you know, from the very first practice, you know, until the end. And then the first few practices of the first week of training camp,

he was sailing balls and everything because he was learning new footwork. You know, he was really, it was just retraining his muscles, you know, to react a certain way. And they were making sure that he was staying on reads long enough and then coming off of them and going to the next one. They really were pushing that. It was really interesting to see because it was so obvious. You didn't need the coaches to tell you what they were doing. In fact, they didn't say anything about it until about the third week of training camp. But I could tell, and I know others around me could see it as well.

I think that Schottenheimer has been fantastic for him. Schottenheimer has really brought his skills to the forefront and kind of polished them up, I think that Schottenheimer has been fantastic for him. Schottenheimer has really brought his skills to the forefront and kind of polished them up, I think. And when you add his raw ability to that, I think luck is just hitting his stride right now. I really think that Brian Schottenheimer is going under the radar as far as what he's underappreciated for what he's done for Luck, I think. You add Luck's skill set, and you give Brian the polish and the rag, and here you go.

I think that Schottenheimer's done a fantastic job with him. It'll be a fascinating matchup for sure. Given Green Bay's secondary is a mess and the speed concerns, but the one thing that the Packers have done is they've stopped the run i mean they are i think they're number two going into this game and and that's led them to have some success throwing it um but to stop the run i mean have you ever seen anybody like frank gore i mean the guy is what 33 yeah he's just it's it's a they don't they don't really tell them that running backs are old when they're 30? Yeah, he's something. He's not a guy who's going to get that 100 and some yards a game.

He could. And the Colts offensive line is a better run-blocking team than they are a pass-blocking team. But Frank Gore, man, he still finds a way to squeeze in between little holes that you don't even see there. That's what Mike McCarthy said today on Gore. He was never seeing a guy so able to get skinny and find the tiniest little hole and get you something or nothing.

It's weird because if you see him from the end zone and the offense is coming towards you, you see him disappear completely behind both lines and all the defenders. And then you see a little hole in between two guys' legs, and him just come with his hands almost on all fours, squeezing through it for another four or five yards. And it's like, man, I don't even know how he's – how do you see that? And he gets so low, and he's so strong too,

that if you don't get both hands on him or a solid hit on one of his legs and wrap, you're not going to bring him down. He's been knocking off some bigger runs this year than the Colts, I think, than Colts fans have seen in a long time. Not so much getting the 20 and 30 yard runs very often, but when you're used to seeing guys like, well, to bring up bad stories, Trent Richardson and some of the bad running backs that the Colts have had in the past, not to mention the bad run blocking that the Colts have had in the past. And you add those two together and, you know, it just seemed like you could never see a 10-yard run or anything. And in fact, he's been as explosive right now as the

Colts have seen since Donald Brown was there in his final year of his contract. He was really explosive when he was in. He wasn't getting a lot of snaps, but Frank Gore's getting a lot of eight and 10-yard runs. They're very picky, I guess, when they use him in the running. And the Colts really don't have a choice but to use him in the running game because their only backup is Robert Turbin. And they just simply won't give Jordan Todman an option as the receiving back back there, which kind of blows my mind a little bit. I think they're passing up some potential offense in that regard. They haven't gotten anything out of Josh Ferguson, who's supposed to be that scat back speed guy back there, and They haven't gotten anything out of Josh Ferguson, who's

supposed to be that scat back speed guy back there, and he hasn't done anything. And they just won't even put Jordan Todman on the field. I mean, not that he's by any means a franchise guy and you want Frank Gore on there as much as possible. But when you give him a blow, they need to give Todman, I think, an option. I don't know that he's had an offensive snap in several games. That's interesting. You know, Since Green Bay started going with the receivers in the backfield by necessity, it gave me an appreciation for those are the easiest yards in the football field. Oh, yeah. You just throw the ball five yards to a running back, and you let your running back beat someone,

and he can turn into 10. It's the easiest yards in the field, and the Packers had never done it because they've always gone, and for good reason reason they like big running backs here because you need a big running back in december at lambeau field but you know not that ty montgomery's it and every down running back but it's just such easy yards where you put a a guy who can catch the ball and and with some make you miss to it and a guy who can outrun linebackers it's just it's like stealing money well not like not to mention like you said the can outrun linebackers it's just it's like stealing money well not like not to mention like you said the Packers offensive line is nice so when they get to that second level those guys are cleaning up for him and he's getting a ton of yards after the catch

yeah and the receivers block too Jordy Nelson Devante Adams are powerful guys and they'll go block so it's really been a revelation and and it's made you wonder and makes you wonder why GM Ted Thompson has just never gone out and got a, a quote unquote third down back is a guy who can, you know, make something happen. It's always been, at least he's made a lot of plays in the passing game,

but there's no comparing Eddie Lacey to Ty Montgomery in the open field either. Right. No, absolutely not. And, and that's the thing. I mean, Robert Turbin is a power guy like Frank Gore. That's their style, so to speak.

And then there's Jordan Todman, who also has a little bit of power to him, but he's also the speedback guy. And he hasn't gotten a lot of opportunities in the past years. But like I said, they're just bypassing that part of the equation when they could be using that to improve their offense. I think the Colts offense is in pretty good shape right now when you kind of forget about all the hits that Luck's getting and the pressures that the offensive line are giving up, but at the same time, they're going to need to be an amazing unit in order to kind of cover up how bad the defense has been, especially in the passing game. defensively being able to create QB hits and actually getting constant pressure on the quarterback versus the sack as far as batting balls down?

Are they extremely active in that regard, or is it simply that when they get to the quarterback, he goes down? No, they've had pretty consistent pressure. They've got a lot of options. When they get in the third long you got obviously got clay matthews nick perry's had a had a hell of a good year on any proven contract season he's he's gonna make a boatload of money so those two guys and then then in their interior they got you know julius peppers who's you know he's 36 and he's he's got three and a half sacks and really, really, really limited duty. They're

all about keeping him fresh for the games and matters. He gets some pressure. They've got Dayton Jones, a former first-round pick, and Mike Daniels, who went up at D-Tackle and passed it down. They've got all sorts of ways to get pressure. What's killed them is their cornerback situation is just so horrendous. That defense

corner, Dom Capers, who loves blitzing. When he gets out of Capers, who loves blitzing. I mean, when he gets out of bed, he's calling blitzes. Well, you know how it is. If your corners suck, you can't blitz. So he's, you know, he just, he basically waved the white flag of surrender against Matt Ryan to Falcons because, you know, Ryan was picking apart their guys,

but he was so terrified to blitz that he didn't blitz. So it was just four-man rush and Ryan nickel-dominant down the field. But I think this is a big advantage in Green Bay's favor in this one is Green Bay's got a really good rush. And if they're not getting home, their D-line's betting on a pretty fair amount of passes, too. Right. And against what statistically is a pretty porous pass blocking, which you hit on earlier, I think that really is Green Bay's chance to hold up in the passing game. And the Packers are only giving up like three-point-something low threes, yards per carry, against opposing offenses.

And they've only allowed two touchdowns on the ground this entire season, which is tops in the league. Let's say the Colts aren't extremely successful on the ground early in the game and they do what they have done, especially in the second half and go to the air almost exclusively. Does that present a little bit of help for that struggling secondary of Green Bay with their linebackers being able to help out in coverage. Cause I mean, when you become a team that the opposing defense knows exactly what you're doing, it really doesn't matter where your strong points in your,

in your weaknesses are at. Those teams are going to just be like, okay, well then we're going to sit back and we're just going to play coverage all day. Does that linebacking core boost that secondary in that regard? If that's the case? They've got, you know, Joe Thomas, he comes in,

he's their dime linebacker slash he comes in and what in their, in their fast nickel, I call and kind of a fast announce. He's, he's a pretty good coverage player. Rookie Blake Martinez from Stanford is, is, is pretty good there. You know, Jake Ryan is their other starting inside linebacker, and he gave the touchdown pass to Sanu. I hate to say he lost the game for him. That wouldn't be accurate, but he was in coverage on that.

He's kind of a – it's not his strong suit, we'll say. You know, for Green Bay, if they can't stop Gore, they're going to lose because Ryan will go – or Ryan, that was last week's game. Love will go play action, and they'll get destroyed. They absolutely have to stop Gore and make it a second and eight and a third and five game. But second and five and third and two, forget it. I mean, they'll get worn out.

It would be – they couldn't get home on Matt Ryan and that quick stuff, and they couldn't match up with Muhammad Sanu, their number two receiver last week. If they can't stop Gore, they'll lose. The Colts have struggled on first and second downs, on early downs in games, mightily, and their third down percentage isn't great. What does Green Bay's early down success do to the Colts in this game?

You're talking Green Bay's offense? Yeah. No, their defense. Yeah, it's everything. I mean, you've seen this game long enough that if Luck has second and five, then he's at the mercy of a play caller. Or if Luck's changing the plays, you're just totally at their mercy. They absolutely have to stop Gore and give their corners a fighting chance. There's no way around it. Right, and that's one of the major strong suits of this Green Bay defense

is also that they're at 34% on third down. And that's pretty impressive. Yeah. You know, some of that though is that against the bears, the bears are like one out of a million in that game because they were down to third string quarterback, Matt Barkley,

a lot of screen, but a lot of Green Bay's defensive stats are skewed because of that game, because the bears were just, just so, so terrible. Right. But either way, they're still in there's either way they're still going to be in the top 10 percentage wise in third downs and with

the colts struggling so much on first and second downs that's what worries me is when you get into those third down and plus five situations the colts have uh struggled to to deal with those and if you're going against a team like green Bay, who's successful in those in large part, that's going to be, uh, that's going to be trouble. Yeah, it is green Bay.

The best part of green Bay's defense is stopping and Ron and getting after the quarterback. So that it's, that's been a secret to third down is, is creating third and long. And they've had so many third and eights this year where the, while they'll rush three and they'll drop eight and there's nowhere to throw the ball and the quarterback checks it down and they tackle them for, for a gain of four. And then they'll give up, you know, if it's third and eight, they'll go three and they'll drop eight and there's nowhere to throw the ball and the quarterback checks it down and they tackle him

for a gain of four and they'll give up. If it's third and eight, they'll give up six. Happily, if it's third and 12, they'll give up 10. They've been really good at that part of the game. The fans hate the three-man rush. They just drive them crazy. But it works almost every time. The only time people don't notice is when it doesn't work.

It's been a good defense for them. I think I'm going to like it if Green Bay does a three-man rush because that seems to be the only time that the Colts' offensive line is successful. So the more they want a three-man rush, I'm all for it. Now, what is Dom Capers especially good at when he comes into a mashup like this with a top level quarterback. Well, that's interesting that they have not had a whole lot of success against top quarterbacks, which is, I suppose, is why they're top quarterbacks.

You know, it's been a while ever since they lost Woodson, you know, once he was really good in 2010 and then he got old in a hurry. At least he got old here before he hit the fountain of youth. I mean, they've had a lot of problems against big-time quarterbacks. And, you know, Capers' deal is blitzing. But what makes great quarterbacks great? It's because great quarterbacks win the mental side of the game. And you can have all the fancy blitzes in the world,

but if the quarterback is so darn smart that he sees it coming, then he's beating your blitz before he can run it. So top quarterbacks have really had their way, maybe not just this year, but over the last several years. And I've been pointing this out since the schedule came out. Green Bay just faced Matt Ryan. They got this game against Luck. Next week it's – well, it's Wentz and Cousins.

I forget the order. Oh, it's Mariota next week, and then it's Cousins, and then it's Wentz, and then it's Russell Wilson after that. I mean, they were playing a gauntlet of top quarterbacks. Oh, no, you forgot Osweiler after Wentz. I forgot him intentionally. And then at the end, you get Stafford, who's been all world this year. You forgot Osweiler after Wentz. I forgot him intentionally. And then at the end, you get Stafford, who's been all world this year.

Stafford's been great. And Bradford, who killed the Packers in Week 2. They're going to run a gauntlet of top quarterbacks here. And I think the season might be defined in how they get through these next four or five games with Ryan last week, Luck this week. Mariota looks like he's a player. And then you get Cousins and Russell Wilson. I'm not sure if Wentz is going to be good or bad or what his deal is, but it's a bunch of good quarterbacks. And they've struggled because blitzing coordinators have struggled,

I think, against quarterbacks who can see the blitz coming. Just for our listeners here, Bill, whether you guys are going to the game this weekend in Lambeau or you're going to go to another game further on in the year, the season is halfway over. And one thing that you guys need to do is you need to get on SeatGeek. It's a free app on your phone. SeatGeek is the smartest, easiest way to find tickets for the football games that you want to see up close and in person this season. There's nothing like being in the stadium for the biggest plays of the year. And with SeatGeek,

it's never been easier to get the guaranteed seats you want for great value. Have you used this yet, Bill? It's great. Within one touch, it's like going to Priceline. You can price compare your tickets. It's unbelievably good. It is. I used it this past weekend for the Chiefs game, and it was the easiest thing in the world to do. And I love that you get all the taxes and everything all in one. I really do. I think that's understated. People try to downplay that, but that's nice. You don't want any surprise charges on your account. And this lets you know exactly what you're going to do. And like I said, both Bill and I both have the SeatGeek app on our phones. It's by far the easiest way to shop for tickets. You can be anywhere. And with just a few taps, like Bill said, you can instantly find seats for this weekend or

any weekends games, uh, this season with SeatGeek, you always get the best deal on every ticket because SeatGeek price compares for you. Like Bill said, again, uh, by searching multiple ticket sites, prices can vary depending on where you shop, but SeatGeek will always find you the lowest available price. SeatGeek wants to help you get the most bang for your buck. That's why every ticket on SeatGeek is given a grade based on value. You'll immediately see any underpriced seats and be able to find the best deals that fit your budget. Plus, every ticket you buy on SeatGeek is backed by their 100% guarantee, so you can shop for tickets on SeatGeek is backed by their 100% guarantee, so you can shop

for tickets on SeatGeek with confidence. Best of all, both Bill and my listeners get a $20 rebate off their first SeatGeek purchase. That's three beers, people at the game. Three beers. Oh, man. That is exactly what I was thinking when I was there. It was fantastic. I thought, this is great. Now I spend the same amount of money and I get me a little drink in the middle of it. And to get this $20 rebate, guys, download the SeatGeek app. Super easy. Go to your app store and download this app. Go to the Settings tab.

Make sure you do this before you start looking for your tickets or else you'll have to go back and start over. Add a promo code. Enter promo code LOCOLTS for the Colts or LOPACKERS. That's our shows. That's our promo codes. Use one of those. SeatGeek will then send you $20 after you've made your first ticket purchase. Boom, right back in your pocket.

Download the SeatGeek app and enter promo code LOCOLTS or LOPACKERS today. You know what, Packers fans? You know the schedule. They've got three straight road games coming up, which means the next home game's in December. Sunday's forecast, sunny and 64. You can leave your blaze orange hunting gear at home. Enjoy a nice sunny day at Lambeau.

So, by God, go to this game. And plus, it's Riders against Luck for goodness sakes. I mean, who doesn't want to see that? I tell you what, if it was any closer to home, we might actually be going to this one, too. I wish this past weekend was that game. Instead, I got Foles and Alex Smith, although they beat the Colts, not like the Colts did anything to stop them. But I would much rather have seen Andrew Luck and Aaron Rodgers.

That would have been fantastic. Luck should have played a little better, too. But that's neither here nor there. We're moving on. I'm trying not to look in the rear view too much more. That's right. It's on the green bay as Pagano told us in his conference call. Oh, yes. Yes. He was very much the same throughout the week with the media availability around here as well. He either didn't like the questions or he just simply wanted to stop talking about anything but that. Bill, something I want to ask you is, who is a guy on the Packers that the Colts

fans may or may not know much about that you would expect to be a big part of this game Sunday? Well, it's got to be Devontae Adams. You guys, if you're a fantasy football player, you know all about Devontae. By now, he had 13 catches against the Bears two weeks ago and then 12 catches last week against Atlanta. That's 25 catches. I want the pro football reference. Since 1950, that is five more catches than any Packers ever had over a two-game span. So he's been on fire. Part of that is because, hell, everyone else is hurt, and they're throwing the ball 100 times a game. But he's up.

You know what? Packer fans will know this. Coming into training camp last year and through training camp, Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy predicted that this guy was going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, future star. They call him the offseason mvp and they expected all these great things for him well then he hurt his ankle early in the year and his you know that was basically it and played but i mean he was mostly ineffective i mean there

there was a game in november against the lions where aaron rogers threw him 21 passes and he caught like 10 for like 60 yards it was just the worst thing you've ever seen. The last couple weeks, it's been the Devontae Adams that the Packers thought they were getting as a second-round pick a few years ago. He's not super big. He's 6'1 and change. He's not super fast, but he can jump. He's a big, powerful guy where he's got the conferences up where he's catching the ball.

He's hard to tackle, or if you get him down, he's at least dragging the guy for three or four yards of the act he's he's turned to a real murky player where all eyes were on jordy nelson you know coming into the season after the torn acl it's really been adams playing a big role in this offense and i would think there's no reason for the packers to deviate from that because he's the hot hand yeah he he kind of struggled last year uh with catches you mentioned that and this year it seems like he's kind of turned that because he's the hot hand. Yeah, he kind of struggled last year with catches. You mentioned that. And this year it seems like he's kind of turned that around.

He's done a pretty good job in rectifying that situation. Same question to you. Okay, go ahead. As Mike McCarthy called him, an uncommon opponent who we don't know a whole lot about here. Some of the guys you may not know about. T.Y. McGill up front, he was inactive early in the season for three or four games. He, along with David Perry, have been basically the

Colts' interior push, with Henry Anderson being sidelined for a good portion of the season so far. And I'll tell you, if he gets through that line, then he's going to wreak havoc for Aaron Rodgers because he is quick for a big guy. He can leap. It's crazy how athletic this guy is for as big as he is. And I would say that he runs as much of an issue of causing trouble as any pass rusher does for the Colts coming into Lambeau this week, especially, like I said, with Henry Anderson out. And another guy that I think maybe a lot of people don't know about, I mentioned him earlier in the show, but Akeem Ayers. He was a player for the Rams in the past, and a lot of people don't know about him, but he has been a very welcome addition to this Colts team. They picked him up not too long ago, and he wasn't

getting a lot of snaps in the first few weeks he was in town, but he got a lot of snaps last week. Another guy, I'm just going to give you a third, Edwin Jackson, inside linebacker. The Colts have struggled mightily with their linebacker coverages in space, and they got rid of a couple guys. They need a guy who can cover opposite to Quayle Jackson, who's largely the run stopper, but Edwin Jackson is a guy who was kind of the favorite, if you want to call him that, in training camp of the lesser-known guys because he can both cover and tackle, and he's really good in pursuit. He was actually, if you watched the game last week, he was the guy that put Alex Smith down and kind of hit him pretty good. He's a very solid tackler, and these three guys are,

especially with the injuries to this team, these three guys are ever pertinent to the Colts' success on defense. Since you did three, I'll give you a second one. And I've mentioned him earlier, and that would be cornerback Ladarius Gunter. Undrafted out of Miami last year, he played like eight snaps on defense as a rookie. Because of injuries, he's suddenly become their number one guy by default, but he's played well enough where he's going to have a role when everyone's healthy. He's still going to be playing.

He doesn't run very well. He's a press man, a great technician, and nothing fails the guy. You think if you're an undrafted guy going up against Odell Beckham Jr., you know what in your pants. Beckham didn't

phase him. Julio Jones didn't phase him. He's one mentally tough son of a gun. I think him against Moncrief, that's a pretty good size matchup there. I think that's going to be a great matchup. That'll be interesting too because Dorsett has struggled a little bit getting off the line against some

solid press coverage. And you say he's a technician and that's ultimately more important than speed when it comes to situations like that, especially when you've got a pass rush, uh, as you well know now, uh, Moncrief, uh, in the past, he's struggled against it and he's been out for, you know, several games this year. So it's hard to say where he's at in that. But in the first couple weeks of the season, he looked really good getting off of press coverage. So that will be something that I'll be watching, especially close now, especially since you brought it up. Because I don't know much about him either, the gunner. And I'll be interested to see how that pans out a little bit. That's an interesting

thing, especially if you say he's going to be in his face the entire game, because Moncrief's going to be essential to the Colts' success, especially in the passing game, the way that some of these injuries are playing out. All right, Matt, who do you got winning? got one in well i'm gonna i i have to uh keep my uh objective opinions uh going this year and you know i gave the colts the benefit of the doubt last week and said that i thought that they'd win now they've had a lot of close games the two teams that have beaten them the most handily the chiefs and uh the broncos the Colts were in both of those games, whether they deserve to be or not. And I think that the Colts will be in this game as well, but I'm giving it to the Packers and I'm going to say I'm going to go 26-17.

I think this is a little bit bigger of a loss than the Colts have had, have gotten used to. And Colts fans are usually seeing a three and four point game, whether it's a win or a loss. But I think this one's going to be a little bit bigger. I was talking to one of my colleagues, Rob Domaski from ESPN today,

and I said I'm tempted to pick the Colts because of all that speed against a bad secondary or not a bad secondary i mean a beaten up secondary and who they have them they're not exactly the most fleet of foot but rogers has gotten hot they're at home i'm gonna go green bay for reasons i'm not quite sure of other than i think rogers got things figured out and i look at a 31st ranked pass defense and a defense that can't rush the passer and a defense that doesn't intercept the ball.

I figure that what Green Bay's offense got going for a couple games will continue again and Green Bay wins like 30 to 24. I'd say that's good too and that really is where this matchup goes is between Luck and Rodgers and it's going to be ever exciting.

I just hope that I honestly hope that both teams play well and that it is a shootout because that is the most interesting game to watch and you want to see some some high level play in the defense as well but you really want to see these two go downfield. I think just fans want to see that in general. I want to see these two guys trying to carve up the opposing defenses, and both teams are successful. That is a good game in the NFL, and any of these games where you don't have two particularly great teams at the moment in the league, and they're just not scoring or putting up points, that turns people off immediately. Somehow, this past week when we saw Arizona and Seattle tie,

people loved that game. That is not a game that every team in the league can play and have people interested in it. The Browns and the Jaguars can't go 6-6. Nobody's watching that game after halftime. You know, but when you have two quality teams like Seattle and Arizona playing, that turns things a bit. Yeah, I just see this. Maybe this is the first team to make a mistake loses.

You know, it's a bad pass, a ball through a receiver's hands, and maybe a deflected pass to the line that just happens to go into the DB's lap. I just see this being a one-mistake kind of game. Yeah, I hope so because that means that the Colts have cut down on them if there's only a one mistake. I'll go with that. I like

your interpretation of that. Folks, thank you guys for joining us for this locked-on crossover between the Packers and the Colts. Always remember to subscribe to your locked-on Colts or locked-on Packers shows. Thank you for being interactive with us on social media, whether it's the Twitter account or Facebook or otherwise. Make sure you guys are hitting us up if you have any questions or concerns.

Talk to us a little bit. Tell us what you think we could do to make our shows better. Bill, thank you for joining me tonight, man. It was a lot of fun. Thanks, Matt. Enjoy the game on Sunday. I will. And thank you everybody for listening. We'll see you guys next week. Locked on Colts and Locked on Packers.

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