The Indianapolis Colts Just Don't Learn From the Past

A wise person once said: “Those who don’t learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.”

I don’t know who that person was, but it certainly wasn’t Bill Polian.

After another season in which their eyes and hearts were set on perfection, the Colts and their fans did what they so often do late in the season—they watched the second-team offense hit the field and the starters hit the bench.

Then, they all hit the showers.

What else could they do? Their record had just taken its first hit of the season.

For how dejected the Colts all looked as they sat on the sidelines, watching their hard work toward perfection fall before their eyes, they’d better hope they win the Super Bowl now.

So often, we hear about a team needing to stay in rhythm as they hit the home stretch going into the playoffs.

But wait...

What the Colts did was strictly avoid injury to their players.

They may have ruined their chance at perfection, but their players will be fresh and healthy for what really matters—the postseason.

What if, by some ironic twist of fate, the Colts hadn’t benched their starters and someone (i.e. Reggie Wayne, Dallas Clark, or even Peyton Manning) got injured?

They’d look like fools.

If a wise person made the statement that opened this article, then an even wiser person said, “damned if you do, damned if you don’t”.

To make a long story short (and, well, this story has been 16 weeks long already), if you start the season 14-0, the only acceptable way to end the season is by lifting the Lombardi Trophy.

So why do I still think this was the wrong decision?

Look no further than the numerous teams who got hot at the right time and took their momentum all the way to the Super Bowl. Among those teams: the Giants, the Steelers, and even the Colts.

The Colts’ methodology has earned them zero Super Bowl rings this decade—the one year they won it, they played their starters through the season. They even played their starters when a playoff spot was guaranteed with their early win of the AFC South.

Not only has the mistake of sitting their starters cost them in the past, but the benefit of playing their starters has paid off for them as well.

Could the signs point any more clearly to the correct path to postseason success?

History has shown that the Colts’ idea of postseason “success” may suffer from faulty logic.

Polian’s theory on resting his starters seems to rely on the idea that he believes the Colts can turn it on like a light switch.

The problem with that logic is that the Colts haven’t been tested to do that. Their entire season’s worth of success has been a snowball of momentum, building and building all the way up to the third quarter of the game against the Jets.

When the Colts made that decision, they effectively heeded advice left behind by Bill Belichick: if you make a run at 19-0 and don’t get it done, it’s all for naught.

What Polian and the Colts have failed to learn is that the same stands for sitting your starters.