Nothing Goes Right For Colts As Cowboys Roll

Well, I guess I shouldn’t say nothing went right. DeMarco Murray, his broken hand appearing for the most part to be a non issue, managed to get only 58 yards on 22 carries. Consider that a plus. The rest of the game? Not so much… Evidently the Colts just forgot that the Cowboys still had 10 more players on offense.

All of Indianapolis is still trying to figure out what happened yesterday. If you could blame the lopsided loss to the Cowboys on one thing, the most likely thing would be effort. The Colts failed in every single aspect of the game, and nothing they did Sunday afternoon in AT&T stadium even resembled a playoff team.

Starting from the very first Cowboys drive, the wheels started to fall off early, as a three-and-out Cowboys possession turned into a touchdown a touchdown after a ill-timed taunting penalty on Colts linebacker Jerrell Freeman. 

The next Colts possession, the madness continued, as a fake punt from deep in Colts territory ended win a thud when Dewey McDonald dropped a perfectly thrown pass by Colts Punter, Pat McAfee, prompting  some nice work on Wikipedia , and this tweet from IndyStar’s Gregg Doyel:

I have to say I applaud the effort. Laughter warms the soul.  Little did we know that Colts nation was about to need as much of it as they could get. We were about to see a clown show. On the next play, Dallas scored again. 14-0, there’s nothing to worry about. The Colts start slow all the time. Surely  the rest of the game couldn’t get any worse, right? Think again… Two Dallas scores later, and it’s 28-zip. The Colts make their longest drive of the game to end the half, only to have Andrew Luck throw an interception in the end zone as time expires. Yeah, was that kind of night for Colts fans; The kind of night where fans are ready to choke coaches, players, and referees, just to make them feel better (I know I can’t be the only one).

Granted, the Colts came into the game pretty banged up, playing without two starting O-lineman and they’re best playmaker, T.Y. Hilton. Vontae Davis played with an injured groin muscle. All that considered, I find it hard to believe that these injuries caused the rest of the team to suddenly forget how to play the game. I felt like entire Colts roster had fallen prey to the Monstars. Tackles were missed, balls were dropped, coverage was blown, blocking assignments were seemingly completely ignored. The guys wearing the blue jerseys and the Horsehoes on their helmets looked completely uninterested in the most uninspired effort I’ve seen from an NFL team in some time. The offense? Coming into the game, the Colts had statistically the best passing offense in the league, averaging more than 300 yards per contest. Dallas, 23rd worst in the league, held them to just 228 yards in the air, and one, yes I said ONE rushing yard for the game, on 10 attempt. I’m not even sure I’ve ever seen an NFL run for one whole yard in 60 minutes of football.  While it certainly didn’t help that our offensively line was banged up, the play calling continue to drive me nuts, and Colts running backs made the Dallas defensive coordinator look like a genius (based on the stats from the rest of the year, he’s not).

I don’t always link to my own tweets, but when I do… I just may need to vent a little. For the first 55 minutes, it looked like the Colts would suffer from their first shutout in over two decades, until rarely used Colts backup QB Matt Hasselbeck found Zirlon Tipson (yeah, I had no idea who the guy was either) in the end zone. Defensively, it wasn’t much better. Tony Romo is no slouch of a quarterback, but the Colts defense made him look all-century. While the Cowboys starter only passed for 22o yards in the game, he completed 90% of his passes (18/20), and threw for four touchdowns.  Romo reached a big milestone today, surpassing Troy Aikman for the all time Cowboys career passing mark. Although he did it against my Colts, congratulations are in order.  Coming from being Drew Bledsoe’s backup that no one had heard of, to a three-time pro bowler, you have to give the guy some credit. Dez Bryant was did OK by his standard with five receptions for yards 73 and 1 touchdown. Although Vontae Davis’ injury was a concern coming into the game, he held his own against the big  Pro Bowl receiver. The rest of the Colts really had no excuse for their abysmal play. As a rabid Colts fan, the game was painful to watch. Dropped passes seemed more contagious than a cold at a daycare.  I started having flashbacks of sir-drops-a-lot, Darius Heyward-Bey.  In a week where many people said that the Colts had basically nothing to play for, it certainly appeared that way.

JMV’s  tweet echoed the sentiments of about every Colts fan yesterday afternoon. Normally, I would be furious, yelling at my TV, stomping on my floor, and causing my 10-year-old to wonder why her dad was acting like a stark raving lunatic. Yesterday, all I could do was laugh. It was so comical, I considered muting my TV and watching the second half while playing <this> as the audio track.

I’m trying to look for something positive to take away from this game, and the only thing I can come up with is that it’s over. I love my Colts. While they’ve been winning games up until now, the last several weeks haven’t produced the Colts’ best football. I love my Colts. I really do, but yesterday’s performance was the epitome of “mailing it in.” Coach Chuck Pagano has to find a way to inject some life into this Colts ball club, so they can at least try to have some sort of momentum going into the playoffs. Hopefully T.Y will return next week, the Colts will get their starting O-line back intact, and we’ll see a throttling of Jacksonville Sunday. The Colts and their fans need to be able to put this low spot behind them.

Something tells me though, that my good buddy, @WestonLawless (a huge Cowboy fan) will make sure to remind me about this train wreck of a game as soon as make it into work in the morning… Meanwhile, I’m just going to pretend this game never happened.

It might be a good idea if the Colts do the same…