Sinking feeling
Since blowing the whistle in the Deflategate controversy, the Colts are the team that has fallen flat,
When the New England Patriots are through with their latest rout of the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday night, the reversal will be nearly complete.
Yes, that’s a when, not an if, sure as Tom Brady, Bill Belichick and the Krafts will relish every second of another nationally televised laugher at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
Because if anything seems apparent out of the Deflategate mess, launched by Colts general manager Ryan Grigson’s email to league officials and a knock on the door of an NFL suite during the second quarter of January’s AFC title game, it’s this: By trying to take down the Patriots dynasty, the Colts might have done more to take down themselves.
Think about what has transpired since Grigson’s gripe about the Patriots playing with a small ball sent NFL executives and officials scurrying to assess whether something untoward occurred.
Playing with balls reinflated by officials at halftime, Brady and the Patriots scored 28 unanswered points in a 45-7 triumph (and went on to beat the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIX), one year after routing the Colts 43-22 in a divisional playoff.
Smarting from those defeats, the Colts offered just a one-year contract extension to coach Chuck Pagano, who turned it down, leaving Pagano and his assistants in the position of trying to do their jobs with no guarantees beyond this season.
Grigson broke his rule about not signing players over age 28, adding four 30-something free agents — Frank Gore, Andre Johnson, Todd Herremans and Trent Cole — in various stages of decline and enhancing the Super Bowl-or-bust feel of 2015.
Before the season even began, Pagano and Grigson had to address reports of discord on personnel and the makeup of the coaching staff, issues that never would’ve gone public had Colts owner Jim Irsay picked a side or extended both already.
The Colts stumbled out of the gate, losing 27-14 at the Buffalo Bills and 20-7 to the New York Jets in mistake-prone outings from quarterback Andrew Luck, while Brady and the Patriots have raced to 4-0, ranking first in the league in offense and averaging 37.2 points a game.
Maybe nothing would be different had the Colts kept their suspicions about the Patriots’ footballs to themselves. Grigson reiterated in February that he just wanted to ensure a level of playing field. Fair enough. Plenty of other teams were rooting for the Patriots to get busted, too.
But what did the Colts get out of it? Besides an enhanced look of desperation to close the chasm between them and their rivals from Foxborough?
Little more than an annoying offseason for the Patriots, who were fined $1 million and docked two draft picks, and Brady, whose four-game suspension was overturned by a federal judge. (The NFL is appealing.) On the field, the tangible impact has been nil.
If anything, Brady looks more fired up than usual and the Patriots have reason to really shove it down the throats of a Colts team they’ve trounced four times by a combined 189-73 since the current regime came to Indianapolis in 2012.
It’s the Colts who have gone sideways, even if they have rallied for three consecutive wins — including two without Luck, who’s dealing with a shoulder problem — by 12 points total against foes from a comically bad AFC South they’ll probably win again by default.
Irsay’s inaction has spoken louder than his words on Pagano, whose defense (assembled by Grigson) has been mediocre. Irsay has said he expects to win multiple titles with Luck, 26, so any further evidence that the quarterback’s prime years could be wasted won’t sit well.
Now the Patriots go into the Colts’ building Sunday as 6½- to 9-point favorites, and it would be an upset if the game’s that close. The Patriots won’t let up.
Grigson couldn’t have known that every detail of his protest would become public. But if all that matters is “what’s best for the horseshoe,” as Pagano and Grigson say, the ’ shoe the Colts hurled at the Patriots turned into a boomerang and hit them square in the nose.
When, not if, the Patriots roll Sunday night, all that will be left is perhaps one more playoff embarrassment for the Colts on their way into what sure looks like an offseason of upheaval.