Locked On Colts - Daily Podcast On The Indianapolis Colts - LOCKED ON COLTS -3/14- Colts Steadily Building Roster - Re-sign Turbin, Add O-line & D-line Help

Episode Date: March 14, 2017

Chris Ballard is steadily adding depth and competition to the #Colts roster again on Monday. Robert Turbin was re-signed, and there was some additional offensive and defensive line help added as well. Who will be next? Another starter, or just more depth and rotational pieces? 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. And thank you for joining me here on a Tuesday, March 14th. And we're going to kick it off again. The Coltsts Chris Ballard and the Colts have made some more moves adding kind of to

the depth the whole competition mantra that he's got going on now I mean there's no build the monster you know it's all about competition we've heard it restated and said over and over again since Bauer has said it, and that's exactly what he's doing. So, I mean, when we look at the Dontari Poe situation, he's left. He's been down to the Jaguars. He's up to the Falcons, and he's kind of making his rounds. I don't know really what the situation is with that, but, I mean, it almost just makes you feel like he's going to go through all the gauntlet and find out who's interested, try to figure out what they want,

what they're willing to shell out for him. And then he'll make his decision, I would assume. Like I said, I think that the Colts will be better suited with Hankins, but Poe is not a bad option. That's for sure. So I wanted to make sure make sure I didn't come off in that, in that way. But I also wanted to thank all of you guys, uh, for all your listenership, for your feedback and stuff like that. I really enjoy, you know, the, the messages that you guys are sending, all the ratings and the reviews on iTunes. They're fantastic. Uh, if I can get you guys to just, uh, share or tell a friend about the show or something like that. If each of you do that, we'll double our listenership and it'll just continue to grow from there. And it's doing

fantastic stuff. So I just want to say thank you guys for that. It really is improving and getting quite a bit more attention every day. So thank you guys for that. And I just want to make sure I passed on that I appreciated it. So let's jump in. What did the Colts do today? The Colts did sign three guys. They re-signed Robert Turbin. That's a good thing. We've talked about that. That was something that we kind of had been speaking about throughout the offseason.

We kind of figured, I think everybody kind of figured, that that would be a wise decision to bring him back. He's a good short yardage back. It definitely doesn't preclude anything from happening through the draft at the position or anything like that. It's a smart move, familiarity. If anything happens with Gore, you've basically got a similar running back in Turbin. Obviously not with the background and all that, but he is still a quality running back and is really good in that short yardage stuff. Had 164 yards last year on 47 rushes, seven touchdowns. That's huge. He had another receiving touchdown and that's basically his game. He was real effective in the red zone and Turbin gives us familiarity at the position. So

that's a great re-signing. I don't want to say that he should feel lucky, but there's just a lot of guys. They didn't do much at all of re-signing their own guys. If you look at the roster now and the way it was a week or two ago, there's a lot of guys. Butler, Walden, even Jonathan Harrison, some of those guys. A lot of those guys aren't there. They didn't tend to occur. He's with the Broncos now, I believe, and stuff like that. So we've had quite the turnover and not so much bringing a ton of guys in, but there's been some change,

that's for sure. So Ballard's definitely finding the people that he wants and that he likes, and he's going to bring in the competition that he wants and thinks that the defense and offense and everything else should have. Also signed Margus Hunt. He spent the past four years in Cincinnati. Very much adept signing here. I mean, similar to Turbin, you know, as far as that goes, but he is sort of a defensive end. And I want to say how proud I am of like all of you Colts listeners out there. I was able to see the signing and kind of re I think I just retweeted whoever put the initial agreement out and then went to eat, got back, and next thing I know, I'm scrolling through Twitter and through all the mentions

for the Locked On Colts Twitter page and everything, and everybody's talking about how this guy's a 5-tech and all this. I'm so proud of you guys. You guys pay attention. I mean, this is good stuff because that's what he is. He's a guy who's going to be moved around on the defensive line. He's not a guy who's going to be an edge rusher or anything like that. He's huge. He's 6'8". Lots of length. And that's something else. When I was looking through some prospects,

as far as for the draft that I thought that Ballard might be interested in at the edge or along the defensive line, He likes the long guys. So this is no surprise, even though I don't think that you or I, very many of us anyways, had any idea who Marcus Hunt was 24 hours ago. I did not. I'm free to admit that. I have no problem with that. But he's a big dude. He had some passes defended last year and wasn't a huge part. I mean, he played a lot of the season, but he didn't start any games and only had 14 total tackles. So this guy is not like an impact player.

He's not a guy who's going to tear it up by any means. Any of the clips that I had watched, he was solid at the point of attack and stuff like that, but he doesn't seem to be overly athletic, you know, he was solid at the point of attack and stuff like that, but he doesn't seem to be overly athletic. I mean, he is huge. So, I mean, you kind of want to give him the guy a pass for it, but he is big and long and he's got long arms. And that's what I think, uh, for depth that you want up there, you want a guy who can get in the passing lanes and a guy who can disrupt the ball, you know, at best. So, uh, this guy's a depth guy, you know, at best. So this guy's a depth guy, you know, but that's what he's doing. He's bringing in his guys, not only for rotational pieces, but for depth and to bring in the

competition. And he's bringing in some guys that he thinks are mean and nasty and are going to get after it and are going to fight to try to earn themselves a roster spot. I think that he is a guy who is down in the bottom of that 53-man conversation already. I mean, we'll just say that to be honest with you. But that's sort of dependent on what comes into the draft, what finishes up coming in in free agency and stuff like that. So you never know. Maybe this guy, similar to Barkevius Mingo. Maybe these guys turn into a little bit something. Maybe these guys are used a little bit

more judiciously for their skill set with the new regime. So we'll have to see. It's something that I think I just want to see this guy at 6'8 running the defensive end. So I think that would be interesting in itself. Another guy they brought in, I think this is going to be a little underrated. I think this is immediate depth. I mean, especially, like I said, with Harrison and some of those other guys not being around right now. Brian Schwenke had spent his first four years in Tennessee. A lot of these guys are real similar age. 25 years are going to be 26 years old next year. He's played in 41 games. He started 28 there for them. This is a guy who was a center the first few years and then went to left guard last year. I'm getting the sense from what I read up on him

just briefly is that he's more of a run blocking uh left guard uh center or lineman we'll just put it that way so he's going to be a guy who's going to come in that is somewhat i want to say established but that's what he is bringing to the table immediately how he does in protection you know i don't know that's you know it's so hard to see stats and stuff like that and find stats on guys especially depth depth guys, kind of how effective they are. We'll just have to see in camp. We'll have to watch footage and game film and stuff like that. That's something that's going to take a while to find out. But from what I'm reading and from what I was seeing just in the immediate aftermath of him being signed was that he is primarily a run blocking guy, which is fine. We could use that too. So

Schwenke, Hunt, and Turbin all signed today. Those are good signings. All three, you know, depth for all intents and purposes that are going to be coming in and fighting for roster spots, fighting for backup roles. At least Schwenke, I think, will probably be fighting directly for a backup role, and that's fantastic. I think that's a little, like I said, I think that's a little underrated signing. I mean, the guy's 26. Marcus Hunt, he's only played four years, but he's going to be 30, so he's one of the older guys coming in, and Turbin's going to be 28. Trying to stay under that 30 threshold is kind of crazy. You know, how many times have I told you guys they can't have everybody be under 30? But so far, Chris Ballard is like really consciously, it seems like, keeping everybody underneath that 30-year-old threshold.

So that's kind of fun and interesting to see that it's actually turning out that way. And in kind of the way that the day started off, we see that Kevin Minter, he either did come or he is coming for a meeting with the Colts. So that's very good news as far as the inside linebacker position. In fact, I believe just last night we talked about that a little bit and kind of expressed that that's one of the areas they need to pick up. You know, a couple more need areas and then we can kind of go through the draft after that. They do need some desperate help at the inside linebacker position. I don't think Edwin Jackson and Morrison are going to be starters. I just don't. I think possibly they could grow into it, but if they're starters on our defense, then our defense isn't

going to be very good next year unless they take leaps and bounds improvements between now and then. Look, we deal with what we've got at the positions that we've got, okay? But the reality is those guys aren't starters on 28 of 32 NFL teams right now, and that's just the way it is. I mean, Mentor comes in. He is an instant starter, 175 tackles the past two years, played all 32 games, started all 32 games the past two years. He's going to be 27 next year. Only five career sacks, but that's really not his game. And I tweeted out the conversation that we had, man, I don't know,

a month, month and a half ago with Jared Brown about potential inside linebacker free agents. Mentor was one that I had brought up to him, and he kind of gave us a lowdown, is that he'd be a cheaper option. He and Hodges, and I think he mentioned a couple more as well, that would be better options for the value that you're going to get. And Mentor is a quality football player playing on a top-level defense the past two years, that's going to help him.

He's only 27, or going to be 27 next year, but he's going to bring in a skill set that is absolutely pertinent to the Colts' defense right now. And the Colts need that. The Colts need a lot of that. They need a guy that can cover. They need a guy that can stop the run. And they a guy who can cover, do just a little bit about everything. I mean, six foot 245, that's kind of, but he's got the speed to, you know, got the speed of a 235, 240 pounder. So that's nice. That's kind of a big deal to bring those guys in. He's an immediate

starter, especially on the Colts defense, the way it stands, if he comes in. And if they do hire, or if they do bring him in, you know, depending on what the Colts do, I suppose, through the draft, whether they bring in a starter or whatnot, over the next couple years, the idea is to have depth, like real depth, like could be secondary, real good starters type of depth on that defense. And that's what he's doing now. And that's why I said that they're bringing in foundational pieces. They're bringing in good, good guys that can play football, are hardcore defenders,

against the run, are versatile, that can do everything. They can, you know, Sheard and those guys like Simon, I said, they can get both down on the line and they can be outside everything. And that's nice because you need those kind of guys to play in your system. Whatever the sub package is, whatever the alignment is, you need to find guys that may or may not fit in a certain spot, but in certain type of packages in a game, you need guys that can step in and make a versatile defense that can do just about everything in every way. And that's what these guys are.

They're eventually going to be probably not the starters, you would think, in a few years. They got three-year deals, at least Sheard and Simon did. And I would assume that Minter would get something right around that area, wants to get them until they're 30, and then hopefully by then, the next couple three drafts will be producing starters. So that appears to be the plan, and Bauer does have a plan, and that's nice. I mean, it's nice to see that.

And it was, like I said, I continue to be impressed that he allowed Poe to leave. You know, maybe that was Poe's idea. No matter what happens here, I'm not signing a deal. We don't know that one way or the other. But the deal, the idea that he's not going to just throw money at a free agent, that tells you right now that Ballard's calling the shots. Okay. Contrary to what some people are saying or assuming as far as that Irsay

is trying to dive in and stick his nose into it, if that was the case, we all know how Jim is. He's emotional. He gets excited about these guys. If Poe was in the building and Irsay was the only one making the decision, he'd have been signed and he'd already be a Colt. Ballard's the one calling the shots. Use your head. Think about it. It's not that difficult to figure out. On the other hand, you know, it's a daily routine now. They're going to be bringing guys in. Maybe some will get,

you know, the pub on by Schefter or Rapsheet or whoever, but some of them may not. We may just be hearing about them through the Colts Twitter account or Ursae's account, whichever. The idea, though, is that these guys are going to be coming in. I mean, if you were to look at the Colts roster right now, I'll kind of just break it down a little bit position by position, and I'm going to start defensively because I think everybody understands that really the only thing that we've done is we've added a left guard or right guard, you know, an extra offensive lineman, and we've maintained Doyle, and Allen's no longer there, and Turbin is still the backup. So we haven't done a lot offensively or anything like that, so we'll stick with the defense on

this part of it. But if you look along the defensive line, guys like Hassan Ridgway did a really good job last year, I felt, in his rookie year, stepping in and doing what he was supposed to do. He's only going to grow. That's something that we all hope that he's doing anyways. And then you look at Henry Anderson, now Margus Hunt along the defensive line. Arthur Jones is still there. I kind of described that to you guys. The way I understand it is if they don't cut him now and they cut him and they give him a June 1st designation, all that does is kind of – it's a little cheaper, so they may do that, but it's not going to be significantly cheaper.

He's only got $2.2 million left on his bonus money, which is the dead money that I talk about every now and again. That money would – not all of it, but some of that money would get pushed back to the 2018 cap. So that's how they would save a little bit there. Part of it would come off the 2017. Part of it would go to the 2018. I don't really think that that's a big deal, to be honest with you.

If he wants to cut him, he's going to cut him. Maybe they may try to make it a little cheaper. But either way, I don't think that we really expect Jones to be on the roster. But here he is, okay? So we'll just keep going. Kendall Langford is still there. I like Kendall Langford. I think I've made the, you but here he is. We'll just keep going. Kendall Langford is still there. I like Kendall Langford. I think I've made the, he's 6'6", got a lot of length. He's good, did pretty well against the run. He is, however, 31 years old, got to be 32 next year. That may be

the issue or this will be his last year more than likely. T.Y. McGill, love T.Y. McGill. Love him, love him. He's going to be a fantastic player for the Colts, I think, this year. I think he's going to really break out, especially if they were to bring in another nose tackle or something like that. For the time being, David Perry's on the roster. I don't see that continuing, just personal assumptions. But that's basically, aside from a couple like Christian Sokoli, and that's about it along the defensive line. But I don't think that many of us know about him. He's in his second year out of Buffalo. So moving back to the linebacking core, and I'll go through outside and inside as well.

Akeem Ayers, Alex Bazzie, LeVar Edwards, Edwin Jackson, Deion King, who is a guy who's primarily special teams help but he did get a little bit of time last year I believe and uh was was solid nothing special but uh probably going to be uh extreme depth and more than likely special teams Kurt Majit, Barcavius Mingo, Antonio Morrison, Deontrez Mount, Luke Rhodes another guy that not many of us know about, similar size, 6'2", 240. Then Jabal Sheard, John Simon. And so we've got a nice little linebacking core there already in place. They definitely are going to need another edge rusher, and they definitely need one that's in the top two rounds, in my opinion. They need to, I mean, corner is one of those issues, and we'll get to that here in just a second,

but outside linebacker is definitely one that they need a pure edge rusher out of this draft. A guy like Sheard and Simon to work off of each other is going to be a nice piece. So now we get back into the secondary. We still have Vontae Davis. We've got Matias Farley, Clayton Gethers, Charles James, who's an undersized corner, Rashawn Melvin, Chris Milton, Tevin Mitchell, Daryl Morris, Larry Scott, and Frankie Williams. And Duke Williams and Andrew Williamson as far as safeties, Stephan McClure, Lee Hightower, TJ Green, kind of about wraps it up for our secondary.

Now, a lot of that is not going to make the 53-man roster. I mean, Green, Gethers, Vontae, Rashawn Melvin, I definitely believe that, probably Daryl Morris, but there's going to be some more work in that secondary through free agency, and if not much, definitely through the draft. They have to get another number one corner out of this draft. I really believe that. Is that more of a need than edge rusher? I'm not really sure.

I think that they're kind of one and the same. They're definitely complementary to each other. We know that. But I think that you, I mean, in the long run, you've got two guys right now, at least, who can get to the passer. You don't have anybody who can shut down anybody in that secondary. So you got to weigh that. I don't really know where to go from that. Now, if I'm going to go, you know, we've had pretty good luck. A lot of the people we're bringing up on this podcast have been either signed or have come in for an interview for the most part, aside from Hankins.

I'm still kind of beating the table for him. But we spoke about Ross Cockrell the other night. That's going to be like my dark horse right there. I really want him to come in. And I definitely, like I said, I think that's worth a fourth-round pick without any hesitation for the most part. And I think that if Bauer obviously views him as such, then it won't be a problem. I don't see, you know, just in case the conversation comes up around the water cooler with some of the older folks that you guys work with, the Colts are not going to put in an offer sheet for Butler out of New England. Don't

fall for that. He is not worth a first round pick. He's 5'9". He's undersized. He is not worth that to the Colts. Make no mistake about it. I think you guys probably know that. Like I said, I know you guys are smart, but that's just something I want to make sure I reiterate because I see little hints of it on Twitter and stuff like that. You can hear people talk about it a little bit under their breath. That is not a good idea. That is not something that's going to happen. And if it does, I'll eat it. But that's just impossible to me. It makes no sense whatsoever to waste that kind of draft capital in this draft to do anything like that when he doesn't fit the scheme at all at least his size doesn't so if i gotta pick another guy i mean i'm pining for hankins a little so much and i've still heard nothing about

that guy going anywhere getting any talks or anything like that and i'm almost uh assuming that i should just say that i think Poe will come back around, the Colts will sign him. And I think that's more realistic. I think that if the Colts didn't have still some sort of negotiations going on or at least a link, I think they're waiting for Poe to make a decision. Maybe they talked mutually and said, hey, by Thursday next week you'll have my answer. That's risky in free agency if you definitely feel you need a nose tackle.

You know what I mean? But it's all right. I mean, I think that they're going to end up signing Poe more than likely just because they're not looking for other nose tackles. And we have not heard anything. But I'll tell you what, this organization, especially under Ballard, has kept things under wraps pretty good. So kind of impressed with that as well. So moving forward, I think we're down to about, other than a lot of these depth type signings

that we've had today and stuff, I think we're about one or two, maybe one larger move and one maybe midway move from being done with the free agency pull for the most part, which seems like a lot. But right now he's just plugging holes where they need plugged, and he's plugging them with young guys who are able and willing and can play football. So this is a good thing. Ballard's doing his job. He's putting the pieces where they belong, and he's doing it for a good price. And also he's doing exactly what he said he did, which is creating competition.

There's going to be a ton of that in camp this year. We're going to see almost a whole new roster. It seems like, I mean, it's not, but it really does. I mean, when you've got about 15% to 20% of the roster is overhauled, that seems like a big difference, you know, and it actually, it is a big difference, but they're going to have, you know, another seven draftees in there. They're going to have the undrafted rookies. It's going to look like a whole new roster. So it'll be interesting. And I'm excited and fascinated to kind of see where it goes from here.

So we'll see what happens in the next couple of days, but I would look for maybe one more signing. I think obviously Bauer knows that if he does sign Minter that he needs either a corner in free agency or a nose tackle. One of those two signings are still left on the board, I think, and then we're going to go to the draft. I mean, for the most part, outside of the depth stuff. So it'll be interesting, and I'm looking forward to it. I hope you guys are too as well. Like I said, please get to iTunes and give me a rating and review. Those have done fantastic, by the way. I appreciate all of you that have done them. They absolutely make a huge

difference in the show. Every show blows up a little bit more than the previous one. And you guys are awesome. Like I said, share the show. Tell somebody about it. If you all do, we'll double our size every week. And we'll keep going from there. So thank you guys for listening. I truly appreciate it. I'm here every day.

Depending on what happens this week, we'll do a fifth show. If we have another signing tomorrow or another two signings, I'll at least drop in here for 10, 15, 20 minutes. And we'll chat it up for a little bit. But if nothing happens by tomorrow, our next show will be Thursday. So thank you guys for listening. We also have a really cool guest coming up this week. I'm not going to spoil it right now, but you guys will like it. I may throw that in for an extra show of the week, maybe on the weekend or something like that. We'll just have to see how it goes and kind of see how long that interview goes.

But it'll definitely be something you guys are interested in. Not necessarily Colts related, but it's very interesting point of views that we'll be getting from this interview. So just hang tight. But thank you guys all for listening. I'm Matt Dainley, and I'll talk to you guys all 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.