TRICKS NOT WAY TO TOP PATRIOTS
Colts again learn hard lesson in loss to Belichick & Co.
Quick, somebody call Ted Wells to launch an investigation.
For some odd reason, the Indianapolis Colts tried to catch Bill Belichick’s team napping Sunday night by springing a crazy formation in a punting situation.
Bad move. The New England Patriots were stunned but hardly fooled.
With the execution even worse than the design, the botched idea deflated in the faces of the Colts.
It was the defining moment of the so-called Deflategate grudge rematch at Lucas Oil Stadium.
The Colts hung tough against the defending Super Bowl champions and even led at halftime against the team that had routed them in the last four meetings.
Then they got too cute while taking coach Chuck Pagano’s aggressive approach a bit too far.
Another lesson absorbed by the wannabe champs.
In a six-point game in the third quarter, the Colts had no business risking what happened: Griff Whalen, a 5-11, 190-pound receiver operating against common sense, snapped the ball to Colt Anderson with seven Patriots hovering on the other side of the line of scrimmage and four hovering near the Indianapolis duo. Anderson was enveloped. Six plays later, New England was back in the end zone.
The Colts blockers were aligned way outside to the right, which was part of the deception. Funny thing, they lined up illegally, not even on the line of scrimmage. The play was a disaster from multiple angles.
We’ve seen Belichick get creative over the years, such as in the playoffs last season when he made normally eligible receivers ineligible, sparking a rule change. His stuff usually works.
But Pagano’s attempt to out-Belichick the New England coach could lead any Wells investigation to reach the following conclusion after New England’s 34-27 victory: Pagano has cable, Belichick has DirecTV.
Sure, it’s not all on Pagano. Whalen, when he saw the Patriots positioned to snuff out the play, wasn’t supposed to snap the ball.
“Just a miscommunication,” Whalen told the media members who surrounded his locker after the game.
Did someone tell you to snap it?
“That was the part that was miscommunicated,” Whalen said. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
Miscommunication. That was the official company line. Apparently, the Colts devised the play last year and have worked on it since, waiting for the right time to spring it.
Yet now we know it was the wrong time, against the wrong team. And when make-or-break details such as proper alignment and the pre-snap decision to abort or not are not handled, then, well, it’s destined to fail.
This won’t help when it’s time to weigh Pagano’s long-term future with the Colts. He’s in the last year of his contract, so that probably shouldn’t be the case given the three consecutive playoff berths, but that’s the fact. That lingering circumstance, which reportedly includes a sticky relationship with general manager Ryan Grigson, creates even more pressure on the coach.
In any event, as high-character coaches are prone to do, Pagano took the blame for the botched call.
“It’s not on those players,” he said. “I didn’t do a good enough job coaching it.”
Maybe not. But this breakdown in execution falls on Whalen, who could have called a timeout rather than snapping the ball while staring at such danger.
“The punt, that’s on us,” Colts linebacker D’Qwell Jackson said. “That’s the players. We’ve got to know what we’re supposed to be in.”
Give Pagano credit for being aggressive in the effort to topple the unbeaten Pats and to close the gap after seeing his team routed repeatedly in these matchups.
He went for it on fourth down on Indianapolis’ first drive, which quarterback Andrew Luck converted into a 5-yard touchdown pass to Donte Moncrief. Pagano called for a pooch kickoff in the second quarter, and the Colts nearly recovered it.
But there’s no good explanation for the swinging-gate play on fourth-and-3 from the Indianapolis 37.
In the end, the Colts’ self-inflicted blunder, contrasted with the Patriots’ poise, provided another reminder of what it will take to progress to a higher level.
“That’s why New England is New England,” Jackson said. “They make those handful of plays that make the difference.”
Someone asked Luck whether the Colts could beat the Patriots without resorting to gimmicks, and he seemed taken aback.
“With all due respect, I think there’s creative things every week versus every team you play,” Luck said. “I think it takes us playing better football at the end of the day and less mistakes.”
What a tough way to learn that lesson. Again.