With the addition of many new players, as well as the returning starters from last year, the Indianapolis Colts look dangerous to make a run at the superbowl.  The Colts led the league last year for the most number of selected Pro Bowlers from one team.  With those players ranging from league leading rusher Jonothan Taylor to long snapper Luke Rhodes, the Colts seem to be loaded with talent.  Some of the new additions for the Colts this season include; Matt Ryan, Yannick Ngakoue, Stephon Gilmore, and rookie Alec Pierce.  This new group of players brings the necessities that the previous Colts team were lacking.  Matt Ryan, former Atlanta Falcons QB and former NFL MVP brings the Colts phenomenal decision making skills and he is an exquisite leader.  Yannick Ngakoue, former Oakland Raiders edge brings the Colts the much needed pass- rush presence that has been nonexistent ever since Ray Lewis and Dwight Freeney retired.  Stephon Gilmore was a pickup not very many Colts fans or Indiana people in general expected.  This is because of his former team, the New England Patriots.  Everyone that watches football knows that the Colts and Patriots do not like each other due to their history.  Nevertheless, Gilmore is now a Colt and the former five-time pro bowler helps aid our secondary in coverage.  The only question mark the Colts had was their special teams.  Punter Rigoberto Sanchez suffered a torn achilles just weeks before the 2022 season began.  Also, Colts kicker Rodrigo Blankenship was re-signed after dealing with injury the previous season.  

     Last Sunday, these new faces as well as previous ones were able to go head to head with the Houston Texans.  The Colts got off to a rocky start in their season opener.  In my opinion, it was because the starters decided to not play during pre-season, and therefore, lots of timing was wrong.  From muffed snaps to miss timed throws the mistakes started to pile for the visiting Colts.  As a matter of fact, the Colts only had 3 points going into the 4th quarter in a game that was supposed to be an easy win.    From there, Matt Ryan flaunted his late game experience by putting together three jaw dropping drives.  These drives took place in the 4th quarter and featured MVP candidate Jonathan Taylor and savvy veteran Matt Ryan taking over the game.  They were able to bring the Colts back from a 17 point deficit to force overtime.  What took place in overtime has been a reoccurring nightmare for the Colts.

     Sadly, the Colts lost the coin toss and did not receive the ball first in overtime, which is very important.  Most teams that don’t get the ball first end up losing.  To make things worse our kicker who already kicked one out of bounds, did the same thing to start the extended period.  This meant the Colts chances got even slimmer due to an unforced and unnecessary error.  The Texans now had great field position to win in overtime.  Thankfully, the new defensive additions were able to escort the Texan offense off the field.  After this, the Colts put together a 13 play drive which ended with the chance of victory.  All that needed to happen was a made Rodrigo Blankenship field goal.  Unfortunately, Blankenship made another error in a game that hightled his many mistakes.  His possible game winning field goal was not even close, which led to a tie between the teams.  I don’t understand how someone is able to get paid millions of dollars to kick and have such a poor performance when needed the most.  The one unknown facet for the Colts led to be the reason for the Week one tie.  Overall, the Colts were able to put together enough drives to have a chance to win although they played so poorly.