D'Qwell Jackson Arrest Caps Off His Season as Latest Colts FA Bust

Indianapolis Colts general manager Ryan Grigson has received quite a bit of praise for elevating the Colts from a 2-14 train wreck to a consistent playoff team, even if a bit of that is tinged with the idea that you and I could have made the no-brainer selection of Andrew Luck at No. 1 overall. However, as he has continued to try to fill the Colts' needs with middle-class free agents, he has produced his share of strikeouts. LaRon Landry. Ricky Jean-Francois. Samson Satele. And now, "Pro Bowler" D'Qwell Jackson.

Jackson was arrested for assault last week after reportedly punching a pizza delivery driver. 

It, uh, gets worse. Jackson allegedly threatened the driver as well:

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The alleged victim joined the Kent Sterling Show on CBS Sports radio in Indianapolis on Wednesday and tried to explain what happened.

"What happened is that a crazy guy tried to choke me," [Jose] Bonilla-Fuentes said.

The pizza delivery driver also added that Jackson said he was "going to kill me."

According to Bonilla-Fuentes, Jackson became remorseful after the cops got involved.

"He come to me and say 'Please, please I'll give you whatever money you need, but don't do nothing, don't let the police take me,'" Bonilla-Fuentes said.

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While it's often wise to avoid peering too deeply into these things, it's true that the Colts have been prone to off-field controversy of late between substance-abuse suspensions and a few bad eggs making their rounds. Jackson was the first starter of note to find himself arrested but hardly the first Colt to have done wrong. 

Jackson played his part in an ultimately disappointing year for the Indianapolis defense. Brought in to help supplement a run defense that was taken apart by the Patriots in the 2013 playoffs, Jackson was not a panacea. The Pats again bowled all over the Colts in a game that wasn't even close enough to make deflated balls an actual controversy. According to Football Outsiders, Indianapolis' rushing DVOA went from minus-0.1 percent (22nd) in 2013 to -6.6 percent (19th) in 2014. It's an improvement, but not much of one. 

Jackson paired that lack of impact in run defense with being one of the worst coverage linebackers in the NFL. Most fans will probably remember that Jackson spent Week 1 riding in Broncos tight end Julius Thomas' pillion while he embarrassed him. Things didn't get much better over the rest of the season:

Year	Team	PFF Coverage Grade	Passer Rating Allowed
2012	CLE	+8.5	85.0
2013	CLE	+1.3	91.3
2014	IND	-8.4	130.9

If you're anything like me, you're probably wondering when the Colts are going to drop their foot on this sort of behavior. Linebacker Josh McNary, a more expendable player, was put on the commissioner's exempt list after his rape charge. Wideout Da'Rick Rogers was released, but his future was murky before his DUI arrest. 

Well, you probably shouldn't expect Jackson to be released either. Unfortunately for the Colts, the structure of his deal is one that puts them in a bit of a bind. Barring some sort of contract punishment, the Colts are only going to save about $370,000 in cap room by releasing Jackson, although they can get to almost $1 million by designating him as a Post-June 1 cut. 

Year	Base Salary	Bonus	Dead Money	Cap Savings
2015	$870k	$4.63 million fully guaranteed	$5.38 million	$370K
2016	$5.5 mil	$250k	$500k	$5.25 mil
2017	$5.5 mil	$250k	$250k	$5.5 mil

Thus, even if they're able to replace Jackson in the starting lineup, the Colts aren't going to reap much in the way of cap space by getting rid of him.

At 31, Jackson is much less likely to bounce back into the player he was in Cleveland as well. Players of similar career length and quality on Pro-Football-Reference.com tended to be done as NFL linebackers in their early 30s. None of them made it past 31, and the only still-active player on the list, Jaguars linebacker Paul Posluszny, faces a climb to make it back and play at 31. 

Player	Years	Career AV	Age at Final Snap
Paul Posluszny	2007-Present	54	??
Frank LeMaster	1974-1982	70	30
Mike Douglass	1978-1986	59	31
Bruce Scholtz	1982-1989	52	31
Dennis Gaubatz	1963-1969	55	29
Richard Wood	1975-1984	53	31
Cecil Johnson	1977-1985	52	30
Brad Dusek	1974-1981	59	31
Buddy Curry	1980-1987	51	29
Doug Cline	1960-1966	54	28

A little foresight would have made the Colts question their decision to hand a big deal to Jackson. He had all the hallmarks of a bad buy: released by his former team, older and at a position where you can often develop instant help rather than forcing a fit. 

Jackson's signing was a folly for Grigson before the arrest. But now, after it happened, we can see how truly foolish the contract was in the first place. When a team can save only negligible cap dollars to get rid of a player who contributes to bad PR and plays poorly on the field, it's got a contract that probably shouldn't have been signed in the first place.

All DYAR and DVOA numbers cited are courtesy of Football Outsiders. Learn more about DVOA here.

Rivers McCown is the AFC South lead writer for Bleacher Report and the co-host of the Three-Cone Drill podcast. His work has also appeared on Football Outsiders and ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter at @riversmccown.