The Indianapolis Colts missed the playoffs five straight years and selected the wrong guy to be their next franchise quarterback. On Monday, Chris Ballard paid the price for it. Team co-owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon announced she had fired the general manager who had run the team since 2017.
The move comes one day after the hometown fans booed resoundingly during the second half of Sunday's game, chanted "Fire Ballard" and left early as the Colts lost 26-20 to previously winless Tennessee. She said the decision could not wait until the offseason. "Our standard is to compete for championships, and I believe a change in leadership is necessary to meet that standard," she said.
"Making this change during the season was a deliberate decision. Waiting would only delay the important work that needs to begin now." She said a "thorough search" for Ballard's successor will begin immediately. Irsay-Gordon made her position clear in January when she thwarted fan requests to fire Ballard and coach Shane Steichen.
Instead, she said she agreed with the fans' desire to field a championship-caliber team and that she was bringing both back with the understanding the urgency to make the playoffs could not be higher. Ballard's revamped defense yielded 1,029 yards, the second-highest two-game total in league history, as Indy lost its opening two games. Victories over the then-winless Houston Texans and a Washington Commanders squad playing with a backup quarterback briefly quieted the calls for changes.
But another poor defensive performance in a loss at Pittsburgh was followed by Sunday's debacle — blowing a 13-0 halftime lead with the Titans defense holding Indy to only one second-half score. A 58-yard punt return in the fourth quarter set up Tennessee's tying score and a blocked punt that was returned for a touchdown less than three minutes later gave Tennessee the lead. "We’ve got to give them something to cheer about," a feistier than usual Steichen said.
"I don’t blame them for booing one freaking bit." Steichen was asked Sunday about whether turnover-prone quarterback Daniel Jones would keep his job and whether he would make any changes on his staff. While Steichen said the Colts need to find a solution to the giveaways, he did not promise any personnel changes. Ballard's decade-long tenure included some unusual twists and turns — the sudden retirement of Andrew Luck in August 2019, seven straight years with a different opening day starting quarterback, the firing of coach Frank Reich and subsequent hiring of Jeff Saturday, and last year's decision to bring Philip Rivers out of retirement while he was on the Hall of Fame ballot.
And while the Colts routinely hovered near the .500 mark, they never could quite get over the hump. They've won only one playoff game since reaching the 2014 AFC championship, a wild-card round victory at Houston in 2018. Indy lost the next week at Kansas City, where Ballard previously worked.
They returned to the playoffs in 2020 with Rivers but lost 27-24 and haven't been back since. Indy also has the longest title drought in its division. They haven't won the AFC South since 2014 — every other team has won it at least twice since then.
But it was the decision to draft quarterback Anthony Richardson with the No. 4 overall pick in 2023 that ultimately undid Ballard's tenure. Richardson's inconsistent play and recurring injuries through his first two seasons prompted Ballard to sign Jones last season.
Jones then beat out Richardson for the starting job and led the Colts offense to a historic start as they went 8-2. But a broken bone in Jones' left leg derailed the season, and his season ended in December with a torn right Achilles tendon. Indy finished the season by losing its final seven games and missing the playoffs.
This season's poor start, apparently, was the final straw for Irsay-Gordon. "I also want to be clear: this decision does not change our goals for the season," Irsay-Gordon said. "We have a lot of football in front of us, and I expect us to compete, improve, and win football games." Reporting by the Associated Press.
