I’m still reeling a bit from the shock of watching Sunday’s debacle at Lucas Oil Stadium. While I don’t have to tell you what happened, I’m sure we are all wondering why it happened. The Rams have been rated in the bottom half of the NFL all season long. They lost their starting quarterback and were being led by a journeyman who had bumped around the NFL with little success. They had a defense that was ranked 27th in the league and dead last against the run. They were a part of the NFC West and were the third ranked team in that division. The Colts had already beaten the two top teams in the NFC West, the Seahawks and 49ers. One major poll had the Colts listed as number one in the power rankings. So not only did the Rams beat the Colts, they humiliated them.
Starting with the hit on Luck that caused the fumble that Ram defensive end Chris Long picked up and returned 45 yards for a touchdown, the Colts mojo was gone and the team endured one of the worst first halfs in the history of Lucas Oil. Andrew Luck seemed to be channeling Curtis Painter with poor throws and bad decisions brought on by panic. There was speculation by pundits during the previous week that the Colts might be able to get their running game up and going because of the Rams apparent ineptness against the run. Instead, the Colts gained 18 yards on 14 attempts, and 17 of those yards were made by Luck. Defensive Robert Mathis collected two sacks very quickly, but the rest of the defense seemed to be waiting for someone else to make a play. The Rams wide receiver Tavon Austin seemed to have personnel vendetta against the Horseshoe secondary as well as the special teams. Austin was the Rams top draft pick this year and while he has seen some action and put up some promising numbers in his previous nine games, he picked the Colts game to be his breakout game — it might be better to say that he took advantage of the opportunities handed him by the Blue Crew defense. Going into the second half, many of the faithful hoped that Number 12 might lead the Colts to another 4th quarter come-from-behind victory — the Rams quickly dashed these hopes with their fifth unanswered touchdown early in the third quarter. After that the Colts seemed to be playing just to get the game over and put the nightmare behind them. A touchdown pass from Luck to Donald Brown and successful two point conversion kept the Colts from getting skunked and made the score 38-8.
At the end of the game I found myself thinking that surely the loss of Reggie Wayne could not have effected the team that badly. The Colts have been able to absorb the losses of Duane Allen, Vic Ballard, and Ahmad Bradshaw so surely they could find a way to survive the loss of #87. Maybe not. The rest of the Colts receiving corps is fairly pedestrian at best and one particular receiver has the dropsies so bad that it is really questionable as to whether the team should keep him on the roster. Even at that, it’s the offensive line that is the glaring weak spot on the team. I’m sorry, but this group just ain’t gettin’ it done, either with run or blocking for the pass and is in need of a major overhaul. However, I don’t think these reasons are why the Colts lost. The Colts are 6-3 and their three losses came to Miami, San Diego, and now St. Louis — three teams that they had no business losing to. In my humble opinion, these three losses all came because the Colts were looking ahead to the games that followed these contests. Foolishly, the Colts and their fans took wins against these supposedly weaker teams for granted and found that their opponents were not nearly as weak as they were expected to be and they got spanked for it. Each time they were looking at the next game rather then the one before them. With Miami they were looking ahead to San Francisco. With San Diego they were really looking at the upcoming Denver game. With St. Louis last Sunday they were looking ahead to the Thursday night game with the Tennessee Titans which is an AFC South interconference game. The Titans are the only AFC South team that has any chance of catching the Colts for the divisional championship. It was also going to be a short week with only four days between games so it’s possible that some of the Colt players were “saving” themselves for what they thought was going to be a harder game and only put out a half effort. Ironically the Tennessee Titans lost to inter-division rival the Jacksonville Jaguars. Most experts have tagged the Jags as the worst team in the NFL right now so that was a bit like the Titans losing to a preschool touch football team. The Titans may have been guilty of looking ahead to the Colts game, too! So that means that the Colts are still two games ahead in the AFC South Division with seven games to go. Anyway, we all need to put this game behind us and move ahead.
Love for the Pacers
Our Indiana Pacers are off to a 8-0 start, which ties the best start of any NBA team since 2010. They are the top-ranked team in the NBA. The Pacers have the NBA’s number one defense and center Roy Hibbert has become a real monster in the paint, already having blocked 35 shots and holding opponents to 42 percent shooting. Third year forward Paul George is hitting 24.5 points a game and Lance Stephenson has grown up and become the shooting guard that Larry Bird hoped he would be when he drafted Stephenson three years ago. Keep in mind that Danny Granger, who is supposed to be the Pacers top player has been injured and has yet to see any game action. I shudder to think about how much stronger the Pacers will be with Danny Granger back in uniform running up and down the court.
The national media has been concentrating so much on the Miami Heat and LaBron James that the Pacers haven been almost an afterthought, which is the usual state of affairs with the Pacers. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing in that not having the media limelight shined in their collective faces allows them time for a certain freedom of action. Alas, the attention of ESPN and all of the other national media outlets is starting to focus on the Pacers as the basketball fans of America are starting to realize that the Indiana Pacers are the real deal and their 8-0 start is no fluke. With success, attention is inevitable and soon the Pacers will become diced, dissected and analyzed. Look for George, who is a good looking guy, Hibbert, Stephenson, George Hill and the rest to start showing up in Subway sandwich commercials eating fresh, and telling that you don’t know Buick. Ah…such is fame.
snicewanger@yahoo.com