With Anthony Richardson now ruled out of Sunday’s Week 17 matchup against the New York Giants, veteran Joe Flacco will make his fifth start of the season for the Indianapolis Colts.
Given where he’s at in his career as he nears 40 years old, this is not an opportunity that Flacco will take for granted.
“You can’t take for granted playing football games in this league,” Flacco said via The Athletic’s James Boyd. “So any time you get the opportunity you have to put yourself back in your shoes when you were 20 years old being a college player wishing to play this game, wishing, man, am I ever going to get a chance to play out my dream?”
In total, Flacco has appeared in five games for the Colts this season. He’s been efficient as a passer, completing 67% of his throws at a modest 6.9 yards per attempt with nine touchdowns to five interceptions.
Among quarterbacks who have had at least 120 dropbacks this season, Flacco ranks 16th in completion rate, 22nd in yards per pass attempt, and 19th in passer rating.
On the surface, while not great, Flacco’s numbers appear fine. However, in his most recent appearances against Minnesota and Buffalo, while filling in for Richardson who was benched at that time, the offense struggled to find any sort of rhythm and to put up points.
In Minnesota, the offense mustered just six points, while against Buffalo, the Colts were able to put up 20 total points, but seven came on a touchdown with two-seconds left in the game when the score was 30-13.
With Richardson not participating in any of the practices this week, Flacco did get all of the first team reps as the team prepared for Sunday’s game, providing Flacco and the offense with a bit of continuity after his last start came roughly six weeks ago.
As of now, the Colts’ playoff hopes are still alive–although that could change on Saturday depending on the outcome of the Denver vs. Cincinnati game–and Flacco will be in charge of keeping it that way by helping Indianapolis navigate their way to a victory over the Giants.
With or without Richardson this week, the recipe for success for the Colts’ offense should begin with Jonathan Taylor and the run game up against a New York run defense that ranks near the bottom of the NFL.
“You gotta remind yourself that, man, I’m getting a chance to play out my dream every time you’re put in this position,” Flacco added. “You don’t want to make the thing any bigger than it is, but you need to remember that this is a pretty cool job that we get to do and just go out there and have fun and let it loose.”
Moving the ball steadily on the ground will keep Flacco and the offense ahead of the sticks, out of predictable passing situations, and help open up some opportunities through the air–taking some of the burden off Flacco and the passing game.
One of the issues that the Indianapolis offense ran into the last time Flacco started in Weeks 9 and 10 was that the team struggled to consistently pick up yards in the run game.
According to ESPN’s Stephen Holder, Richardson’s injury isn’t expected to linger into next week. But if the Colts are going to get to Week 18 and still playing meaningful football, it’s going to be up to Flacco–and the Bengals–to help them get there.
“This is our profession, so it shouldn’t matter,” Flacco said. “But anytime you get a chance to play games this late in the season that means something, it definitely is good for the whole process of it.”
