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Doyel: Without injured QB Anthony Richardson, Colts can win AFC South with Gardner Minshew
Gregg Doyel
Indianapolis Star

INDIANAPOLIS – The 2023 Indianapolis Colts’ roster says Gardner Minshew II is 6-1, 225 pounds. The roster doesn’t seem to be telling the truth. If Minshew measures 6-1, it’s only when he’s wearing cleats and standing on top of Shane Steichen’s playbook. As for the weight – 225 pounds? Zero chance.

Minshew is surrounded Wednesday by reporters, which makes this a normal Wednesday around here. Chuck Pagano, Frank Reich, Jeff Whatshisname, Steichen, doesn’t matter who’s coaching here – the Colts' starting quarterback speaks with local reporters each Wednesday, and for the foreseeable future that quarterback is Minshew.

So we’ve got him surrounded, but he looks comfortable answering questions. That’s why the Colts got him this offseason, you know. No, not for the news conferences. But because he’s comfortable in this role, starting for an NFL team, or any role really. He signed with the Colts on March 16 with the understanding that they planned to use the No. 4 overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft – six weeks later – on a quarterback they hoped could start as a rookie.


Minshew knew, and Minshew was fine. The only thing he’s been guaranteed since graduating from Brandon (Miss.) High in 2014 is disrespect. He was a two-star recruit, signed by Troy but not given a chance there so he left for a Mississippi junior college. Then to East Carolina, then Washington State. Those were the schools that would take a chance on him, because his measurables weren’t much. He wasn’t 6-1, he wasn’t 225 pounds, and he wasn’t fast either. At the 2019 Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, he ran the 40-yard dash in 4.97 slow, slow seconds.

But Minshew has this leadership you have to see to believe. Ever read "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" by James Thurber? Has that book been banned yet? Mitty is this everyman, unremarkable in most ways. Gardner Mitty, I mean Minshew, is like that but with a twist – a splash of Keanu Reeves circa Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure.


It works in the locker room, and everywhere else. Minshew was beloved from 2019-20 in Jacksonville, where he will lead the Colts on Sunday with first place on the line in the AFC South. He’s an NFL success story because of hard work, intelligence, intangibles and leadership.

That combination will have to work here for at least the next four games, maybe the rest of the season. Not trying to be an alarmist about Colts rookie Anthony Richardson, who was placed on Injured Reserve, which means he’ll miss a minimum of four games. While reportedly his window is 4-8 weeks, Steichen wouldn’t expound much Wednesday.


“We’ll see,” Steichen said when asked about the prospect of surgery on the sprained AC joint in Richardson’s throwing shoulder.

“I don’t know that yet,” he said when asked if Richardson could miss the rest of the season.

Here’s what we know: Gardner Minshew II is the Colts’ QB1 for the next four games, maybe the next 12 games, and whatever could come after that. Because the Colts, whose offseason wasn’t much to look at, find themselves with a 3-2 record, tied with the Jaguars for first in the AFC South.

It’s impossible the Colts are in this spot, with or without Anthony Richardson.

It’s also impossible Gardner Minshew is 6-1, 225 pounds.

Can looks be that deceiving?

Colts nailed QB spot in offseason...

Remember how much we hated the Colts’ offseason? Well, maybe not, because to hate something, you have to be moved to a strong emotion. The Colts’ offseason was boring, weird, with one exception:

They nailed the quarterback position.

After treading water for four years with veteran quarterbacks backed by mid-round rookie draft picks, the Colts finally put on their big-boy swimming trunks and dived into the deep end this offseason by drafting Richardson in the first round and signing the best available backup (Minshew) as his mentor and their Plan B.

The signing of Minshew was so exciting – and such a clear signal that Richardson would be their draft pick – I was reduced that day to a mixture of ALL-CAP EXCITEMENT and nonsense gobbledygook. One line from that story, and I quote: gwababa wowow OMG and also: YOWZERS!


Don’t look at me like that.

If only the rest of the Colts’ offseason had been as exciting. They needed cornerbacks, unless they really planned to go with Dallis Flowers and Isaiah Rodgers as their top two outside corners, but the Colts signed none in free agency. They drafted three, though. Maybe Warren Central’s JuJu Brents of Kansas State would pan out in a year or two.

The Colts needed a pass rush, but they doubled down on 2021 draft picks Kwity Paye and Dayo Odeyingbo, and signed someone named Samson Ebukam – Ebukam Samson? – in free agency. Whoever he was, he’d played six NFL seasons, usually as a starter, with a season-high of five sacks. Terrific.

As for the offensive line, the Colts were essentially running it back from last season, when last season’s offensive line was terrible.

Add that up, check out their modest additions at receiver – third-round pick Josh Downs and veteran Isaiah McKenzie, the Samson Ebukam of receivers with six years in the NFL and a season-high of 42 catches – and what were the Colts doing? Not much. Biding their time for the 2024 NFL Draft, it looked like.

I’m asking again: Can looks be that deceiving?

... and did well elsewhere too

The Colts can win the AFC South, and that’s without Anthony Richardson playing another snap this season. Here’s to hoping he returns after four games and wins NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year – cheers! – but the Colts need Richardson back for his own development more than they need him to win in 2023.

Each quarterback has played four games this season, with Minshew starting one and finishing three others, and the Colts are 3-1 in those games. The Colts are 2-2 in Richardson’s four games, and lost the only game he started and finished.

No, Minshew is not better than Richardson, but the drop-off isn’t big enough to worry about as it relates to a spot in the 2023 NFL playoffs. Right now the Colts have a shot at the AFC South. Someone has to win the division. Why not the Colts? They’ve already beaten Tennessee and won at Houston, and can take the tiebreaker from Jacksonville’s hands by beating the unpredictable Jaguars on Sunday.

Then again, the Colts have been unpredictable too. Like, who saw 3-2 coming? Beating the Ravens in Baltimore? Snapping a five-game skid against the Titans, even as Richardson was injured in the first half?

This season is happening because the Colts’ offseason has yielded better results than expected, especially on defense where Samson, Paye and Odeyingbo have combined for 7½ sacks, 14 QB hits and nine tackles for loss, giving the Colts excellent play on the defensive exterior to complement stars DeForest Buckner and Grover Stewart inside. Linebacker Zaire Franklin is five games into a Pro Bowl invite. Emboldened by the front seven, the young cornerbacks – pressed into action by Rodgers’ suspension and Flowers’ injury – have done well enough.

The Colts offense has received a pleasant boost from running back Zack Moss in Jonathan Taylor’s absence, and Downs has been a solid complement (23 catches in five games) to leading receiver Michael Pittman Jr. (31). And the offensive line, with bulked up second-year pro Bernhard Raimann or 2023 fourth-round draft pick Blake Freeland at left tackle, has been just fine.

Then there’s Minshew. He won’t beat the Jags by himself Sunday – he’s not Anthony Richardson – but he won’t lose it, either. Minshew takes no chances, which doesn’t create a lot of gwababa wowow OMG moments but produces zero head-slappers, either. He’s completing 68.7% of his passes, going 57-for-83 for 553 yards, two touchdowns and no interceptions.

Ready for the most Gardner Minshew II stat ever? His career interception rate of 1.476% would be third all-time, if he had the minimum 1,500 career attempts (he has 1,016).

“Gardner does a great job of going in and operating at a high level,” Steichen said Wednesday, “finding completions and moving the ball well. I have a ton of confidence in his abilities.”

So do the Colts. This locker room loves the guy, and you can see why. He’s more than his mustache and mullet, more than his duuuuude persona. Maybe he’s more than 200 pounds, too, though I doubt it. After the media finished surrounding Minshew and he headed for an off-limits part of the locker room, I followed him because I had to know.

Are you really 225 pounds?

“Dude,” he said, and kept walking.

I’m saying you weigh a buck-90.

“Duuuuude,” he said at my guess of 190 pounds.

And then he was gone, without ever answering the question. Not that it matters. Gardner Minshew is a lot like these Colts – more formidable than he looks.