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USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Andy Nesbitt

Jim Irsay and the Colts are an absolute joke for hiring Jeff Saturday as their new coach

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The Colts didn’t shock anyone on Monday when they fired head coach Frank Reich a little less than 24 hours after a humiliating loss to the Patriots. That was expected and absolutely the right move for the franchise that continues to get in its own way.

Speaking of getting in their own way, Colts owner Jim Irsay waited until shortly after the firing of Reich to announce a move that had everyone laughing at them while saying such things out loud as “they can’t be serious!” or “you have to be kidding me!” or “what are they doing!?” and many other sayings with words that I can’t type here or I’d lose my job.

Seriously, even the anchors on SportsCenter couldn’t believe what they were reporting live on air.

You never want to become a laughingstock in life because when you are a laughingstock people aren’t laughing with you, they are laughing at you and this morning everyone is laughing at Irsay and the Colts.

If you missed it – Irsay and the Colts hired Jeff Saturday to be their new interim head coach. Saturday played center for them back in the Peyton Manning days and has his name in the Colts Ring of Honor. He was a very good player during his years in the league and that honor was vey well deserved.

What is not very well deserved is his new job title. Saturday has never coached at the college for NFL level. He has only coached a high school team. Now he’s in charge of a professional football team and it’s all such a bad joke that will most likely go horribly wrong for Irsay and the Colts.

Irsay defended his decision during a bizarre press conference Monday night in which he said Saturday could be in charge of the team for more than this year and that he actually liked that he didn’t have any coaching experience in college football or the NFL because he lacks the fear or leaning on analytics.

I mean, what could go wrong here, right?!

Well, a lot. A lot could go wrong here.

This isn’t some Pop Warner football team where someone’s father who once played football can jump in and lead a team out on the field. This is the NFL, where professional coaches with years and years of experience as coaches run teams and also work tirelessly on finding ways to beat other teams.

Just last week Saturday was an ESPN analyst tweeting about how bad the Raiders are. Now he’ll be coaching against the Raiders this week and his team will be underdogs on the road.

If you’re a player on the Colts you have to be wondering what in world your franchise is doing. I can’t imagine the confidence level inside the team’s practice facility is very high today. What would you think if your team’s owner treated your team like it was some pickup league where anyone can grab the whistle and be the coach?

Irsay is wild for making this move. And not in a good way. It could end up being one of the dumbest moves in NFL history that could backfire in a way like we’ve never seen before in this league.

And if/when it does everyone will still be laughing at Irsay and the Colts.

Quick hits: New NFL Power Rankings… Mahomes headbutts wall… Fantasy football waiver wire options… And more. 

(AP Photo/Daniel Kucin Jr.)

– Week 9 is in the books and it’s time for our new NFL power rankings, which have Kirk Cousins and the 7-1 Vikings moving up again.

– Patrick Mahomes headbutted the wall after his game-tying 2-point conversion and NFL fans had Gus Frerotte jokes.

– Charles Curtis has 6 players you should be looking at on your fantasy football waiver wire, including Bears TE Cole Kmet.

– Christian D’Andrea ranked the 7 best possible landing spots for Odell Beckham Jr.

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