Frustration was clear at Lucas Oil Stadium after the Indianapolis Colts lost to Buffalo on Sunday.
Fans booed, and both coach Shane Steichen and quarterback Joe Flacco took responsibility for their mistakes. Pro Bowl cornerback Kenny Moore II even questioned the team’s effort.
With the Colts’ playoff hopes slipping away, they find themselves in a familiar position — trying to turn things around midseason.
“I don’t think everybody is working as hard as possible, and obviously it’s showing,” Moore said after the team’s third straight loss. “I’m not the type to sugarcoat it. I don’t think the urgency is there, I don’t think the details are there, I don’t think the effort is there and I don’t see everything correlating from meetings to practice to the games and it shows.”
Steichen addressed these concerns in Monday’s team meeting and said Moore’s comments were mainly out of frustration with the team’s losing streak.
“They all want to win, everyone wants to win and people want to see results, right?” Steichen said. “And we want to see results as bad as everybody else.”
The defense has mostly done its job since getting healthy, playing better than an offense that has struggled to score touchdowns. This was true even before Steichen decided to bench second-year quarterback Anthony Richardson, who had a 44.0% completion rate, in favor of 39-year-old Flacco.
Steichen confirmed that Flacco will start again on Sunday against the New York Jets.
The coach has tried different approaches to fix the team’s struggles. He gave Richardson and running back Jonathan Taylor time to recover from early-season injuries before bringing them back into the lineup. He also let Michael Pittman Jr. play through a back injury that was supposed to keep him out for weeks — until deactivating him on Sunday.
With an injury-plagued offensive line, the Colts (4-6) have struggled to sustain drives, score points, and now, they’re turning the ball over more.
“We’ve got to give them something to cheer about,” Steichen said, referring to the boos on Sunday. “Obviously, we’re not moving the ball. We’ve got to be better. We’ve got to go back, and freaking get it cleaned up. We’ve got a lot of football left.”
They have seven games remaining.
The good news is that, except for a tough game against the one-loss Detroit Lions, the Colts have already faced the hardest part of their schedule. They are tied with Cincinnati, just one game behind Denver for the AFC’s seventh and final playoff spot.
Can the Colts still make a playoff run? Anything is possible. But first, the Colts need to fix what’s causing their growing frustration. “Not winning,” Moore said. “Period.”
