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November 23, 2009

Colts haven’t played as well as expected last four weeks, but wins count either way

By Tom James

INDIANAPOLIS — Don’t tell the Indianapolis Colts that they’ve been lucky the last four weeks.

Yes, the Colts have posted close wins over San Francisco (18-14), Houston (20-17), New England (35-34) and Baltimore (17-15). And, no, Indianapolis hasn’t played as well — especially offensively — has it did earlier in the season.

But the simple fact remains that Jim Caldwell’s team is 10-0 for the season and remains one of the National Football League’s two undefeated teams.

“Obviously, anytime your team is finding ways to win, particularly when things haven’t gone perfectly, you find some satisfaction there. And certainly you can attribute that to good team morale and strong character and a great spirit to win as well.

“You can also look at it as maybe there are some situations that occurred earlier in the game that could have put you in a little bit better position. But the reality and the fact of the matter is that typically in this league that’s what the games boil down to,” Caldwell explained Monday.

“The ones that we’ve been going through are probably more typical of what we see from week-to-week, as opposed to an anomaly that we might see with a two-touchdown lead going in toward the end of the game and things of that nature. I think that, obviously, there are a number of areas we need to improve upon, but at least we’re getting the bottom line done.”

The Colts, almost to a man, refuse to buy into the notion that they haven’t earned each and every one of the last four victories. Especially Sunday’s road win over the Ravens.

“Every game ain’t going to be 1,000 yards. Every game ain’t going to be 1,000 points. It’s football. Those guys [at Baltimore] are on scholarship too. They’re trying to stay in playoff contention, so you know they’re going to play [hard],” wide receiver Reggie Wayne said after the Baltimore game.

Despite the fact that the offense has only produced one game with 30 or more points over the last four weeks, there has been no panic along the Indianapolis sideline. Or on the practice field.

“Not a lot of panic. And no finger-pointing. We don’t point the finger at the defense if they’re giving up touchdowns. They don’t point the finger at us if we’re turning the ball over,” quarterback Peyton Manning said. “That’s team football. Good teams are the ones that aren’t divided. We’ve truly won 10 games as a team.”

• Manning getting challenged — Manning may be in his 12th year as the starting quarterback for the Indianapolis Colts, but the three-time league Most Valuable Player is being challenged by a few defensive schemes that he hasn’t seen before.

He is having another MVP-type season, having completed 271 of 388 passes for 3,171 yards, 21 touchdowns and nine interceptions. Four of those interceptions, though, have occurred in close wins over New England and Baltimore the last two weeks.

“You’ve seen a lot of [defensive] looks, there’s no question. Two weeks in a row. I could show you some defenses from New England and from Baltimore that I would say aren’t normal,” Manning said after Sunday’s game. “They would not be in your Defense 101 first day of training camp installation.”

It’s the first time this season that he has had multiple interceptions in back-to-back games. Manning has always said that his personal goal was to throw no more than 10 interceptions in a season.

“Every interception has a story and nobody really wants to hear it,” he halfway joked after the Ravens game. “[In the New England game], it was a little bit of different example. The one to Reggie [Wayne], we were just kind on different pages. I’ll take the blame for that. That just doesn’t happen very often. And the other one [against the Patriots], it was just a poor throw. The ball truly got away from me on that one.

“But I’ve got to protect the ball better. If you throw two interceptions two games in a row, those are games that a lot of times you don’t win. I need to protect the ball better. I make no excuses for two interceptions two games in a row. That’s something that I need to do a better job of.”

Caldwell understands what Manning is talking about.

“I think teams are looking at Reggie and [tight end] Dallas [Clark], and trying to find creative ways to handle those guys. We’ve seen both of those guys being doubled and single coverage on [wide receivers] Pierre [Garcon] and Austin [Collie]. The doubles come from different directions sometimes, inside-out, outside-in. So, they’re trying to get a bit more help on them to try and keep them under control,” the Colts coach said.

“I don’t think we’ll ever stop seeing those [new defensive schemes] for quite some time because [Wayne and Clark] have been highly productive for us. That’s why big catches like Pierre had [against the Patriots and Ravens] are so important for us. When they do get single coverage they have to take advantage of it.

“Typically what happens with [Manning] is that once he has an opportunity to see it, you may affect him once. But the next time around, he’s going to have a pretty good idea on how to best attack that situation as well. So what you see are a number of teams now trying to give you a multiple of looks. But he’s been able to adjust, too.”

• Hayden may get work this week — Veteran cornerback Kelvin Hayden has been sidelined with a sprained knee since the Colts’ Oct. 4 home game with Seattle. He might be able to get some limited practice time in this week.

“Hayden possibly — underscore that — will do a little bit of activity this week. We will see what happens after that. How much activity, the doctors will have to let us know,” Caldwell said. He added that he won’t know about any injuries from the Ravens game until Wednesday at the earliest.

“[The Colts had] the normal bumps and bruises. I haven’t gotten word of anything significant, as of [Monday]. Last week, as you saw, our list of guys that didn’t practice the first couple of days [of the week] was fairly long. I would anticipate that it will probably be similar. But I think that’s probably not unusual for this time of year. A lot of guys are banged up.”

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