Colts Run Outta Luck, Lose to Texans in Shootout

Indianopolis Colts head coach Frank Reich is definitely a product of his circumstances.

Take his name, for instance.

Dude's named after his dad. He's Frank Reich Jr. Apparently, only one generation of arranging a first name to be the German word for France just wasn't enough.

Maybe this is a clue as to why he'd do a James Franklin and take home the honors for making the weekend's dumbest call, NFL version.

 

Worse, that decision caused the Colts to fall short of their comeback attempt against the Houston Texans, who until now had avoided winning at all costs.

No more. Houston took this one, 37-34, in the wanning seconds of overtime.

Indy fans were bewildered. After all, isn't Reich famous for knowing comebacks? He's the dude who came off the bench to lead Buffalo to the greatest turnaround in NFL history.

 

Fast forward to the present.

Despite being down, 28-10, late in the third quarter, Andrew Luck's 464-yards-and-four-touchdowns performance ignited the Colts' resurgence and send the game into overtime.

However, late in the fifth quarter, Reich chose to let Luck go for a fourth-down conservation on their own 43-yard line, which coulda possibly preserved what woulda been the NFL's third tie this season.

 

It was kinda like Reich was going for a second generation of comeback history.

We're going for that 10 times out of 10. That [play] has just got to work.

No word whether or not Gen Robert E Lee said the same thing to Maj Gen George Pickett. Some things are just academic at this point.

 

A low pass to Chester Rogers would doom the Colts ...

 

... and two plays later, Texans kicker Ka'imi Fairbairn would celebrate his game-winning 37-yard field goal.

Maybe Reich has read about the Pulaski Academy high school team. They never punt and have a Harvard professor's math to back them up. They're actually quite successful.

 

Who knows? It took baseball years to look at Bill James as a genius instead of a mad stat dude.

But the hard stat here is Reich's decision didn't work for the Colts. Maybe failing at the plate 7-times-outta-10 makes ballplayers millionaires, but in the NFL, it makes you odds-on to get next spring's first overall draft choice.

 

Until that play, the shootout between these AFC South rivals featured great performances from both sides. Luck's numbers have been noted. Among the Texans' heroes:

• Deshaun Watson finished with his best game of the season, scoring three TDs and throwing for 375 yards; and
• JJ Watt recorded two more sacks and a forced fumble as he continues to enjoy a resurrection in his career after two injury-plagued seasons.

Their names don't translate into German. They're fine with that.