The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - ‘Locked On Colts’ Host Derek Shultz Joins Ahead of Texans vs Colts Match Up

Episode Date: November 25, 2025

‘Locked On Colts’ Host Derek Shultz Joins Ahead of Texans vs Colts Match Up

11.02 Sports Talk 790. It is the Matt Thomas show with Ross. We're coming to you today from Phoenix, Arizona, with the Rockets beat the Suns last night in the city of San Francisco tomorrow to play the Golden State Warriors. But now we're going to spend some time talking about the football scene, and we'll do that with our friend. Longtime front of the show, Derek Schultz 9 at Schultz 975. He is with Locked on Colts. He's Golden Black Com. He's life at Purdue. I mean, how many jobs? I mean, I ask you this every year. Are you up in like nine jobs? now, Derek Schultz? Yeah, it's probably too much. I have an 8-year-old son, which would be, I guess, the biggest job of all, right? But, yeah, it's getting up there. I think I'm reaching my approaching my bandwidth maximum, for sure. Really quick, 30 seconds on this. You go from the Indiana Pacers winning the Eastern Conference with a team that might lose 60 games in one year.

How brutal is that for a transition? It's brutal. But the hope is that, you know, they're the 97 spurs all over again, right? and then everything gets back to normal right away. But, yeah, they've lost all the momentum and buzz, and it stays. It stinks for the fan base, and the Colts are pretty good again. So it's been a tough slot for the pace, there's no doubt. All right, Derek, tell me about the Colts.

I don't think anybody anticipated them being off to the start they are. And look, they have been on top of the AFC South or about since the start. What did you think about this team going in? And I'm going to assume that you are beyond elated on how they've turned out so far with a handful of weeks left to go in the season. Yeah, I think I thought what most people thought, okay, here we go. Here's another team that is not devoid of talent, but they've got enough talent to go 8, 9, 9, and 8, and not matter for the 10th straight year, 11 straight year, however long it's been. You know, they haven't won this division since 2014.

They've won one playoff game over that span, and they've largely been stuck in the NFL's purgatory. You know, the old saying is, be good or be bad, just don't be ordinary. and the Colts have been really ordinary over the last couple of years. So, you know, for them to jump out to a 7-1 and 8-2 start was a very nice surprise around these parts. And, you know, they're still in good position now, even struggling a little bit over the past three weeks. But, you know, the fact that, Matt, they were the most efficient offense in the NFL this entire century through the first eight games. If you're asking me, if I had any idea that they would be better on offense than the 2007 Patriots, albeit over an eight-week stretch, I would have laughed you out of the room.

Yeah, I mean, this success so far, for the most part, has come out of nowhere. But then you kind of look at it at, you know, Jonathan Taylor's been a good player for a long time. The Forrest Bukter has been a good player for a long time. It's a lot of the same names and faces. It's just, you know, Daniel Jones really stabilized a quarterback position that had been grossly unstable over the last decade or so to say the least. We have seen a fair amount of the cult so far this year. And obviously a lot of folks saw the game against the Chiefs on Sunday. Daniel has been excellent.

I wouldn't give him a 10, but I'd give him an 8 out of 10, and I think going in, people thought Daniel Jones was just trying to hold on to his NFL career by signing a deal with the Colts. Yeah, I think 8 out of 10, 8 out of 10, I'm sorry about my dog, let me go somewhere else.

No, that's all right, we like the dog. A lot of Amazon deliveries here to the season, right? I think there had been a lot of, you know, when you look at Jones and playing in New York, there was a lot of a special, you know, the section of his game. And you wondered how much was the player and how much was actually the organization. And I think it turns out that probably a lot of it was just the fact that the Giants are one of the worst run organizations in American pro sports. But, yeah, Jones being a solid B has been better than what the Colts have had because, frankly, you know, Anthony Richardson has been a D or an F.

and, you know, to upgrade a couple of letter grades the way that he has, again, it's about stability. It's not even really about raising the ceiling, which is all that we talked about in this time of Richardson. Oh, just wait. He's going to hit. And, man, is athleticism and watch up for his ceiling. Well, the problem is, is that the floor was so far down that, you know, you couldn't even see it. And with Jones, at the very least, you knew that the floor was solid. Your footing was going to be solid. And he's not. even more than that. I mean, at times, he's looked like a, you know, a pro bowl level, I guess, player. Now that hasn't happened the last three weeks. But when you just look at his

numbers and the efficiency and the way that he's commanded the pocket, he's been all the things that he was not in New York. Even in 2022, he never played to this level through the first 10 games here that he has in Indianapolis. Derek Schultz locked on Colts with us here on the Matt Thomas show at 11.06. All right. So, You've mentioned the last three weeks, come from behind win against the Falcons of Berlin, the road loss at the Steelers, and then a road loss at Kansas City. Are there chinks in the armor? Is it the moment is too big?

It's not Daniel Jones' fault exclusively. And the one thing that I noticed, and granted, again, I watched the game on Sunday on the red zones. I was only catching the parts of the game. It felt like that Jonathan Taylor could have been used a lot more in the second half against Kansas City to keep the chiefs off the field. Are you suggesting that Jonathan Taylor should have carried the ball more than once in the fourth quarter? Matt, is that what you're saying? I'm not a football god, but I'm going to kind of go with that if it's okay with you. I mean, come on.

Yeah, you're 150% right. And that's been the main takeaway from this game, you know, as we've been kind of looking back on Sunday, on Monday and Tuesday in sports talk, radio circles and podcasts and all that has been the fact that they just, they, they, they, ignored the best player that they have. And that's what Taylor is. Look, you know, Steve Segalon decided, and he's a Hall of Fame coordinator, he's done an unbelievable job. He decided that he was going to die before he would let Jonathan Taylor beat them. And that's fine. We've seen teams do that and stack the box and all that.

But even running into a brick wall, when you've got an 11-point lead in the fourth quarter, the utility of running the ball means that you're also eating clock. So even if you're not necessarily gaining yards in big chunks, you can at least take some time off the clock and not give Patrick Mahomes more. chances, more bites at the apple, if you will. So it's, you know, I think Shane Seichen is a gifted offensive mind. He's done a wonderful job scheming up this team. And there's a reason why they were the most efficient offense in the 21st century through the first eight games. A lot of that had to do with Scyken and his smarts. But I do think that just like all NFL coaches, he out

thinks himself sometimes. And I think he outthought himself a lot on Sunday. The ball absolutely should have been to Jonathan Taylor's hands more. And the Colts went three and out, four straight drives. And that allowed the chiefs to sneak back into the game and eventually, you know, kind of save their season by winning that game in overtime. I'm presuming that the Colts are preparing for C.J. Straout, we certainly are. And again, he's got a clear concussion protocol. We think he would have done so if the Texans' Bill's game was on Sundays compared to Thursday. With that being said, described to the audience back here, your general thoughts about the past rush that the Colts have provided their team so far this year?

can i can i give you a phrase for the colt's pass rush because i have a phrase that pops into my mind and it's eh um it's fine uh you know it's not bad it's certainly not good um i'll give you some optimism well i guess not optimism if you're in houston but optimism for folks here in indianapolis is that leotu latu has six sack or five sacks in his last six games which i know doesn't sound like much but that's a big step forward for a guy that they used the first round pick on two years ago and who they really wanted to pop this year. He's really starting to show some signs

and he's not only pressuring the quarterback where he's getting home. Quitty Kay's just the guy. He's a first round guy that they took out of Michigan a couple years ago who's a perfectly adequate NFL player but not a guy that's going to keep anybody up at night. And they have filled out their depth and injury-wise they're going to get Samson

Ebecombeck. You know, Tyquon Lewis might come back as well. So they have some veteran depth as well. But I think overall, I mean, if you're grading all of the pass rushes in the NFL, the Colts would probably be somewhere squarely in the middle. That said, which are various ward and now Soss Gardner, they're much more apt to be successful in the defensive secondary. And I think with better coverage, there's a chance that that pass rush numbers-wise does a little bit better than it has through the first half, through the halfway point of the season.

All right, for a let you run. So how does things play out? I wouldn't say it's a pivotal game, more so for the Texans and it would be for the Colts. Indianapolis still holds on a one game lead. I'm not sold on Jacksonville. I don't know how you feel about him, Derek, but if I'm a Colts fan, I'm not worried about it. For that matter, the Texans shouldn't be worried. But how do you see this thing playing out? I like to get to the crystal ball for you.

I agree with you on Jacksonville. I like these conversations because we're in the trust tree so we can just both talk about the Jaguars behind their back whenever we get together like this. Look, I think it's, I understand from a standing standpoint, you're right. It's not a critical game for the Colts, but in a way, it is. You know, they've lost two of three. They have a murderous finishing stretch here where they have Houston twice, Jacksonville twice, a good San Francisco team, and then they have to go at Seattle. So all their layups are done.

There's no Raiders, there's no Dolphins, there's no Titans game that's coming to save the Colts. They're done with all of that. So they really have to protect their home fields and win a division home game if they're going to want to hold on here. So I do think it's a big game for the Colts. And this is what I always do with the Smash Up. I lean towards the home team. Colts are unbeated at home. Their offense has been much, much better at home than on the road,

albeit against some of those same teams I just talked about, Raiders, Dolphins, Titans, teams like that. But I do think the Colts find a way to get it done at home. But I'd be lying to you if I said that people in Indy, Matt, weren't sweating right now. They are sweating big time. And they're sweating Houston much more than they're sweating Jacksonville. That is for sure. Happy holidays to you, the family, and the dog.

And we will talk again probably closer to the final week of the season. I hope for both sides, it means something, honestly, because those week 18 games that you bring in subs, you're like, nobody cares about this game. So hopefully it'll mean it'll mean something. Thank you for the time, friend, as always. Thanks, back. Take care.