Patience with Colts' QB Anthony Richardson is a Must
On April 27, 2023, the Indianapolis Colts made a franchise altering decision by selecting University of Florida phenom Anthony Richardson.
Richardson was arguably the most polarizing player in the entire draft as people debated about whether he would be successful or not. While I always leaned toward the side of he would, I could certainly understand the argument against it.
Whether you believe he was going to be successful or not, I think we all can agree that no matter what, a lot of patience was going to be required for him to develop into the best player he could be.
As fans we want microwaveable things. The instant cook, the air fryer, nobody has time to wait on things anymore. If you take a look at the top-six young quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes, Joe Burrow, Josh Allen, Justin Herbert, Lamar Jackson and Jalen Hurts, half of those guys needed to be developed into a star at the next level.
I spoke with a coach who was on the staff for one of those guys' rookie year and he said, “In training camp you can tell things was moving at a 1000mph, he wasn’t even playable during his first preseason but eventually it clicked at some point during the following off-season and he was an entirely different person”.
Richardson is a guy I see having a similar trajectory with his development. He has things to clean up from a technical standpoint. But the flashes are there, and if you been watching training camp, they have been on full display.
This is how I see much of his pre-season playing out: flashes of greatness but struggles with consistency as he adjust to the speed of the game.
Take a look at the rookie seasons of those six guys I mentioned earlier. Whether they played or not due to health, or the team already having a capable starter in place, none of them played great with the exception of Herbert. Mahomes and Burrow clearly erupted in their second seasons, but those guys are special, and it still took a year to get acclimated.
This time last year we were arguing if Hurts was a starting quarterback in this league. In Allen’s second year, he was improved from his rookie season, but people still questioned whether he would be accurate enough to be a long-term starter, let alone an all-pro. Richardson will be no different, but the amount of rough patches you are going to see from him will be broader because of how deeply you follow the team.
What we can do as fans is allow him the room to grow. Take lessons from those fanbases that crucified players who were working tirelessly to get better and making incremental improvements from day to day.
Currently on Richardson’s plate is learning an entirely new offense and having his first full-padded practices this calendar year, all while throwing to some guys he just met. He is going to make mistakes. He is going to have bad reps, bad practices, and bad games. But it’s how we react to it all that will determine if we’ve learned anything from the past.
When in doubt, remember Peyton Manning broke the record for interceptions as a rookie, and he turned out just fine.
