The Draw Play

This year has been full of surprising QB situations. So many QBs changed teams this offseason. Brady, Rodgers, Russ, and Ryan, arguably the “old guard” of the league, have all been playing poorly. Russ is probably the biggest surprise out of that bunch, but I think few would argue Matt Ryan was the least surprising regression.

The latest rental for Frank Reich and Chris Ballard has underperformed. The Colts as a whole have a ton of problems, starting with a sharp regression of the very offensive line built to protect Ryan, but Ryan himself hasn’t been good. His throws are off. His arm is weak. It takes all of his effort to huck that sucker 5 yards shy of the target. This hasn’t come as a big shock to anyone who paid attention to the Falcons last year or the year before that. Whispers of Ryan’s downfall have circulated for a while and not every QB is going to physically last as long as Brady and Rodgers.

But the Colts paid a hefty fee to sign him this offseason after the Falcons basically spurned him in the Watson sweepstakes. Ryan apparently has a shoulder sprain, but the Colts history with accurate reporting and fixing QB injuries is hilariously untrustworthy so that might be a cover. PFT speculates (and I largely trust Florio when it comes to legal contract analysis) that his hefty bag might be the reason Ryan has more or less been deactivated. In fact, he might even be traded by the time you read this. I doubt it, he’s old, rusty, and who would take him? But I’ve jinxed myself before.

More importantly, this feels like the death toll for the current regime. This team has been going in mediocre circles ever since Andrew Luck died and then later retired. They ran with Jacoby Brisset at first because they didn’t have any other real option on such short notice, but Brissett is the plain cheeseburger on the dollar menu of quarterbacks. He’ll do in a pinch but if you can afford it you are definitely ordering something better. They tried buying the twilight year of Philip Rivers, the crunchwrap supreme of old QBs, the kinda guy who tastes so good in the first few bites and then by the end you feel sick, and it kinda worked! Rivers was a good QB and he did his best only to fall short in the wildcard round, but Rivers also has an entire navy of children to command so he also retired. They tried Carson Wentz, the KFC Double Down of QBs, in that he could be theoretically brilliant and maybe sometimes was, but then…cardiac arrest. Matt Ryan comes in as the big mac. Classic, reliable, and bad for you in the end. None of these options have worked. The team remains in flux, constantly trying to find the round peg for the round hole.

Now they are turning to an unknown quantity in Sam Ehlinger, a sixth-round QB out of Texas. I don’t know much about Sam. Apparently, he’s more mobile than Ryan, but a cement mixer is more mobile than Matt Ryan. Nick Foles will operate as the backup. Ryan is gonna warm the bench all year unless injuries or a trade happen. I guess now we wait to see what happens. If this doesn’t cause a miracle turnaround, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Reich and Ballard let go.