Wish the Colts would have played to win

ARTICLE: On football: Shame on the Colts for tossing away perfect record, By Bob Kravitz, USAToday, December 28, 2009

I agree totally with this analysis. I watched the game and was very excited to see the Colts leading deep into the 3rd, with the Jets doing nothing to suggest a comeback other than the luck of a KO return.

I got very mad when the coach pulled Peyton. I think it was a deliberate attempt to throw the game and do it in an obvious, we-don't-care fashion. I thought it was disrespectful to the game, and patently dishonest to the players.

Benching Peyton for one quarter, when he faced no hits, was totally meaningless in terms of playoff preparation.

This was all about the coach believing the team was better off without the pressure of perfection, but now he's created, as one ESPN analyst (Trent Dilfer, who's good) put it, a big pause in the team's sense of history and inevitability and invincibility, and that can be crucial in a sport as emotional and momentum-driven as football. You just don't mess with mojo, and you don't take off two weeks and then skip a week of playing and suddenly place the first serious game in a month and not risk a collapse, which happens all the time to college teams in the big layoff before bowl games.

So I thoroughly disagreed with the decision, and I sure as hell hope it doesn't come back to haunt them in the divisionals.

Comments

[Jeff J]

Colts fans, we are so spolied. The Colts win the division for the fifth time in six years, are in the playoffs, have home field advantage throughout and that's not enough. I went to the game Sunday and was dissapointed that they could not hold the lead. Caldwell gave them a chance. He certainly let number 18 play longer than Dungy would have. I would have been more dissapointed if someone had rolled up on Manning's leg and took him out for the playoffs. I know the Colts have been mediocore performers in the playoffs and many say it is because they tend to shut it down late in the year but all the teams that make the playoffs are pretty good in their own right. The Patriots are always tough and San Diego has won ten in a row. A win in the Super Bowl will make this all go away. How many games do you think the Patriots of a few years ago would give up for a Super Bowl win? I think just enough to still make the playoffs.

[Cliff Graham]

I basically agree, and will add this: If you're going to loaf into the playoffs with protecting your stars as the MO, why have Manning or Freeney play past the first quarter?

[Tom Barnett]

Easy for Colts to finish game and then pile up big lead in Buffalo in first half and then sit all for second.

That's how the 49ers (winners of all their SBs) did it. You take off just the last half of the last game.

That way, no sense of wasted weeks and the long passage of time with meaningless games.

Peaking is everything. Much better to be pushed through the last game. Too bad the Chargers didn't do that until it was too late to matter.

[Andrew in DC]

I was extra upset about this because I started the Colts D instead of the Jets D in my fantasy football final, figuring that Peyton was a lot bigger threat than Mr. Sanchez. Needless to say, that didn't work out for me.

[Cliff Graham]

I came across an interesting idea via SI's site- ""Do you think once the Colts saw the Jets got their miracle and all the teams lost they needed to on Sunday, that the Colts threw the Jets a bone and lost on purpose? The rationale is it stops two very dangerous teams, the Ravens and Steelers, from entering the playoffs."

[Tom Barnett]

I had wondered about that too, Cliff, seeing that big bulge there at 7/8-7 last weekend.

It is quite possible.