Colts Complete Head Coaching Interview With Controversial Candidate
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We all knew it was coming at some point.
The Indianapolis Colts have completed their interview with Jeff Saturday for their head coaching position. Saturday marks the eighth candidate the Colts have interviewed for their head coach vacancy. The team announced they had completed the interview with Saturday on Thursday.
Saturday took over as the interim head coach of the Colts at the beginning of November after owner Jim Irsay fired former head coach Frank Reich. Reich and the Colts had struggled to begin the 2022 season, starting 3-5-1 before Irsay made the call to pull the plug. Irsay reportedly fired Reich over the phone the morning after a 26-3 loss to the New England Patriots.
The football world was shocked when Saturday was announced as the interim head coach of the Colts. Saturday was an All-Pro center for the Colts during his playing days but had no NFL or college head coaching experience. The only coaching experience Saturday had was at Hebron Christian Academy, a high school in Georgia.
Saturday started his tenure with a bang as the Colts beat the Las Vegas Raiders on the road 25-20 in his debut. However, things went downhill from there.
The Colts lost their final seven games and finished 4-12-1 on the season. Many of those losses came in blowouts or embarrassing fashion. The Colts gave up the most fourth-quarter points in franchise history (33 points) to the Dallas Cowboys and allowed the biggest comeback in NFL history (33-0) against the Minnesota Vikings.
Outside of the offensive line improving throughout the second half of the season, everything else seemed to regress under Saturday. The quarterback play was abysmal, as the Colts had trouble scoring touchdowns and securing the ball. The defense went from a unit that kept the team in games to a group that was gassed by season's end.
Although he finished with a 1-7 record, Saturday believes he is the right candidate to lead this team full-time.
"Listen, I have a very clear vision of how I can turn this football team around," Saturday said after the season. "I have a plan of attack, that I understand this is what I believe has to happen for us to turn a corner. I’m not one that wavers. I’m not one that gets disjointed very quickly. I’m pretty steadfast and I think I’ve shown that in the way that we’re going to operate. There are going to be principles of this team, just generally – like from a practice perspective, what does this thing look like? From a schedule perspective, what does it look like? From an organization, what does alignment look like from training, equipment, practice – all those different things. All of that stuff, I have a very clear vision on what that looks like and I’ll save the details of how I would separate that."
Saturday laid out those details to general manager Chris Ballard in his interview as he hopes to be considered for the full-time job. Saturday has the backing of ownership in Irsay, but it would be hard to sell the fanbase on a coach who made the team worse as the season went along.
Have we seen the last of Saturday as the Colts' head coach? We will know that answer in the coming weeks.
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