The Colts' primetime loss exposes the offense in the midst of a quarterback change

The Indianapolis Colts made a huge move at quarterback last week, choosing to select 39-year-old quarterback Joe Flacco over 22-year-old Anthony Richardson. Head coach Shane Steichen said he owes it to the veterans in the locker room to play the best option right now, and that best option is Flacco.

Well, that best option led to the Colts having their worst offensive performance of the Steichen era. The offense was simply terrible in all phases on Sunday night, setting season lows in points (6), total yards (227) and rushing yards (68) in the embarrassing loss.

In many ways, this loss highlighted that the Colts' offense was in disarray this season, aside from the quarterback position. Richardson has been far from perfect in his starts this season (far from good, even), but a performance like this in prime time shows he wasn't the only problem struggling on that side of the ball. The entire offensive function is in a disgusting state right now and it starts with the game manager/head coach.

Richardson served as the perfect cover for the Colts' failures on offense, both as a scapegoat and someone who sent the unit into disarray. It's easy to blame the player having trouble hitting every receiver in a timely and timely manner, but the plays weren't really there to be made. Richardson's issues were clear on film, but the play call, play sequencing and receivers' difficulty finding open spots were all major issues that reared their ugly heads on Sunday night.

The fallacy of launching Flacco is that he is merely an addition to the offense and does not replace the only aspect of the operation that actually worked. Under Richardson, the Colts had a dominant rushing attack (Jonathan Taylor averaged 5.2 yards per carry with him at quarterback), strong early down success (Richardson had a positive EPA on early downs), and one of the more explosive Offensives in Football.

An offense led by Richardson had inconsistencies and was far from a sustainable formula for success, but an offense with him at the helm at least had a stable foundation despite his terrible accuracy issues and his troubles on third downs. These game-changing aspects of the offense with Richardson not only carry over to Flacco with him as the starter, they disappear completely.

By switching to Flacco as the starter, the Colts did not add third-down efficiency to the offensive puzzle; They sacrificed the ground Richardson gave them in pursuit of Flacco's completion percentage and unsustainably high third-down play. When Flacco's success inevitably faded in the third period against an outstanding Vikings defense, the Colts offense lost all identity and rhythm and looked completely inept.

The offense wasn't nearly as good as you'd like under Richardson this season, but it at least had something to offer. Under Flacco, the offense simply had nothing to offer without the unsustainably high third-down conversion rate. Taylor is averaging nearly 2.0 fewer yards per carry this season with Flacco under center. With Flacco in the game, the pressure-to-sack rate increases from 16% to 22%. The explosive speed of the game completely collapses with Flacco.

Sure, Flacco completed a few more passes and made a few throws that Richardson ultimately would have missed, but was it worth sacrificing the explosiveness and running game for a nicer completion percentage?

This ultimately brings me back to the main point of this conversation; Sting. With a mobile quarterback at the helm, many issues with play-calling and play-making can be covered up. Mobile quarterbacks naturally influence the running game, creating enough variation that a play-caller doesn't have to be inherently perfect because the quarterback can save him.

That’s not the case with a pocket passer like Flacco. For Flacco to work, everything around him has to be perfect in order to be successful. The running game has to be creative and varied, pass catchers have to be open, and there has to be answers to what the defense is throwing at the offense at all times or disaster will ensue. A game like this without a mobile quarterback to cover up the problems showed how flawed this offense is right now from a playmaking perspective.

Steichen is a smart coach who has been doing this for a long time. He's a much better play-caller and play sequencer than what he's shown this season. I don't know how much of the Richardson decision ultimately came down to him, but regardless, he made his bed at quarterback with this move. He needs to find an answer to this offense going forward or he'll be the one to pay in the offseason.

Steichen is too good a coach for this offense to seem so inept. Even with substandard quarterback play, the results on the field simply aren't good enough. The Colts have asked Richardson all week to look in the mirror at his own flaws, but perhaps it's time for Steichen to do the same with himself and find some sort of identity or cornerstone for his future offense.

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