Sloppy Colts lose 8th straight preseason game

Another preseason down, and another Colts loss. They just don’t play well in the meaningless games and never have. Indianapolis was defeated by the Redskins 16-3 in front of about 40,000 at Lucas Oil Stadium.

It was the Colts eighth straight preseason loss, and they are now 4-24 in the preseason since 2005.

Below are my observations after watching the game in person.

Quarterbacks Mike Hartline, Dan Orlovsky and Curtis Painter look over plays. (Courtesy: Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

QB dual
The franchise, Peyton Manning has yet to take a snap in the preseason. He is arguably the best quarterback in the league, but he’s not perfect. Manning needs reps with the offense, especially the new running backs and lineman. Nobody can emulate his act at the line and he is all about timing. Without quality time on the field, there’s no question he will be rusty–whenever he returns to the field in pads. He watched both preseason games from the sidelines in a Colts polo and hat.

Curtis Painter got the start and played the first half accomplishing nothing. The Colts offense had just 1 first down compared to the Redskins 16. Painter was 5 for 10, for 40 yards and just one rush yard. In his time at QB, the Colts O’ earned just one first down and 41 total yards. Ehh.

Dan Orlovsky played in the second half and while he wasn’t stellar, it was definitely much improved. His timing was satisfactory with his receivers and he moved the team down the field. He had a couple of badly thrown balls that were over the head of the receiver but with the third string line, he didn’t have much time.

It was interesting, when Orlovsky took the field in the third quarter, he received a loud cheer, as fans were happy to an alternative to Curtis Painter (please cut your hair)…let’s just say Painter isn’t a fan favorite.

Young O’ Line
Peyton’s first line of defense was upgraded this offseason with rookie draft picks Anthony Castonzo and Ben Ijalana. Those two did alright for just their second game, still getting comfortable. The group seemed a bit out of touch and lacking communication, receiving eight flags. Mike Pollak false-started a couple times, as did Ryan Diem. It’s imperative that this group comes together and gets comfortable with their individual assignments.

Rushing game
Not many bright spots here. Joseph Addai had just six yards, Donald Brown carried the pigskin just once for a loss of five yards. Delone Carter played the best of the tailbacks, tallying 25 yards on four carries. Unfortunately locals Darren Evans and Chad Spann didn’t add anything notable. The group finished with just 55 yards on the ground. Lots of work to do on this front.

Kicking
The lone bright spot from preseason game No. 2 was the kicking game. Adam Vinatieri drilled a 55-yard field goal with about 10 yards to spare…that was Indy’s only score. Pat McAfee was tremendous punting the ball–he averaged 57.3 yards on four punts with a 46-yard net average. He also forced a touchback on each kickoff, taking full advantage of the new NFL rule moving kickoffs to the 35 yard-line.

Caldwell wasn’t happy at all about the team’s performance and here’s what he had to say (via Tom James).

“I’m not real pleased with a lot of the things that went on out there. We had a bunch of penalties, which is not like us. I thought Delone Carter ran well when he was in there. He had a couple of nice runs, kept his legs moving. He did some nice things when he was in there.

We had a situation where we got pressure on the quarterback. We had four sacks. So there were a couple of bright spots out there. But there were also many things that we didn’t do right. We went from not having any offensive penalties last week to eight penalties.”

Oh, and congratulations to Reggie Wayne who became a father this week. He missed the game to be with his wife.

No big injuries to report tonight, so from that standpoint, it was a successful preseason game.

Follow Scott