New forum member here, Colts fan (obvious when you see my name) but not here to troll at all.

Just thought I'd add a little insight as to what our team looks like this year, and why we're going to be better than last year.

First off, we got lots of guys coming back from injury. I know many teams do, but we had some really key ones, Reggie Wayne and Dwayne Allen being the most obvious.

I still believe Luck is developing his game. With our big questionmark at o-line, Luck will need better decision-making and check down his pass every once in a while instead of going downfield.

On the offensive side of the ball we potentionally have one of the strongest receiving corps in the league with Reggie, Nicks, TY, Fleener, Allen and Richardson (say what you want about him, but he's great as a receiver out of the backfield and strongly underused in this regard imo). There's a big IF related to this though because it requires all of the above players to be at 100%, and who knows if Reggie will be great like pre-injury, and which version of Nicks will we get? The one who dominated in 10-11 or the one who became invisible and injury-phrone in 12-13?

I think the dark horse of our awesome and a guy who could become a key this year is Ahmad Bradshaw. He was running like a BEAST before injury last year and that especially showed in the SF game. The dude is a walking injury waiting to happen, so I wont get my hopes up that he lasts the entire season, which is why it's crucial for us that Richardson finds his inner strenght and lives up to his potential pre-draft.

As I said earlier our weak link on offense is o-line, and if the o-line plays like last year, our running game is going to suffer badly and Luck is going to get hit too much, especially as the Jags and Texans are getting stronger on D. I hate us relying on Andrew Luck too much, because as amazing as he can be, he'll also throw some weird balls at times and as the playoffs showed, decision making is key in limiting turnovers.

 

On defense I think we added some solid pieces through FA in Arthur Jones and DQ Jax. Our d-line should be average to above average with Redding (although he's getting older), Chapman and Jones. Our linebackers are an exciting group with Mathis, Freeman, DQ Jax and probably Walden as the other OLB. Our biggest problem is that all of these guys (including DL), except for Mathis, excel at run support so we desperately need another rusher to help out Mathis.

Our secondary might be the weakest thing about our team atm. Again injuries are key because we got schooled last year when we got hurt. If Davis, Toler and Butler can stay healthy our starting CB group looks good, but we're pretty thin depth-wise. Our safety position is a big mess right now. Landry is the starter at SS, but he didn't really play up to his standards last year and now that Bethea's gone we'll need a FS whose more the ballhawking type. I hope we can snatch a guy like that in the draft as this seems like our biggest need right now.

 

So on offense, Luck's decision-making has to improve, running game needs to improve as we'll still have the power-run philosophy and we need to protect Luck better.

On defense, our pass rush needs to improve, our CB's need to stay healthy and we need to draft a S to help Landry out.

 

I agree that you shouldn't fear us, but potentionally we could have one of most explosive offenses in the NFL. With the additions the Jags made through FA and if you have a good draft I think you could compete in a year or two when your future QB develops and gets used to the pro-level. Your defense is already getting there. Key is to get a franchise QB though because counting on your defense through the season is not a reliable solution. The key word is balance.

 

So basically I just wanted to say hi and share my thought on the Colts and how we stand next year. I think we'll win the division but I also think it's going to be alot tougher than most Colts fans think.

 

Have a nice day!

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