For more on the Colts and the Jim Caldwell firing, check out Stampede Blue.
Jan 18, 2012 - To say the first two and a half weeks of the Colts offseason has been very bizarre would be an understatement, and it was no different Tuesday when they announced that Head Coach Jim Caldwell would not be retained, after letting him twist in the wind since the Colts wrapped up an abysmal 2-14 season back on New Year's Day. While the conclusion is correct, the Colts did no favors for a guy Owner Jim Irsay couldn't have praised enough through the season, and even after the season.
It all started the Monday following their 19-13 loss to the Jaguars. Caldwell held weekly 12:45 pressers on Mondays, and speculation was running wild about the futures of him, Vice Chairman Bill Polian, and General Manager Chris Polian. Caldwell, like the good soldier that he is, still held that press conference, where he had to give vague answers to every local reporter trying to find out the direction of the team. Not two hours later comes the announcement that both Polians had been fired. It was completely unnecessary for the Colts to send Caldwell out there to not answer any questions, as Caldwell knew at that time that the Polians were gone. The Colts clearly wanted to keep the impression of the status quo, even if it meant Caldwell looked like the "yes man" everyone accused him of being in the first place.
The other piece of news that came out that day was that Caldwell, at least for the time being, was keeping his job as head coach, despite the 2-14 record and the Front Office going through a major overhaul, something that's rarely been done, if ever. The offseason moves very quickly for coaches, as teams look to hire replacements as quickly as possible to keep some level of continuity. With Irsay wanting his new General Manager to be included on the decision-making process for Caldwell, it meant he'd be behind the 8-ball, so to speak, to find other work if he was not retained.
Irsay hired Ryan Grigson last Wednesday from the Eagles to be his new GM, and they said publicly that they would have a decision on Caldwell by the middle of this week. On Monday, the Colts, including Caldwell, interviewed former Rams Head Coach Steve Spagnuolo for the vacant Defensive Coordinator job. Seemingly every major outlet here in Indianapolis had heard that Caldwell was going to be retained as Head Coach by Monday, and those reports make sense when you hear about Caldwell being in the interview for a new Defensive Coordinator.
But the Colts seemingly did a 180 overnight on Caldwell, and announced Tuesday afternoon that he would not be retained. Much like that January 2nd press conference, where they made Caldwell look bad, their insistence on keeping a facade of the status quo made the Front Office look haphazard and careless, while Caldwell, who had told his assistants that they could take vacation because he was in the Spagnuolo interview, certainly a reasonable conclusion to make. It's hard to believe the Colts hadn't made up their minds about Caldwell Monday, and if they hadn't, they clearly should have waited a day or two to interview Spagnuolo. It creates the picture that the Colts are flying by the seat of their pants, when their public perception is at the lowest it's been in over a decade. Not the picture they need to be painting.
Despite the careless way they led Caldwell on then pulled the rug out from under him, the decision was correct to not retain him as Head Coach of the Colts. If we are to believe Irsay when he talks about a "New Era of Colts Football", keeping the head coach that just led you to 2-14, hand picked by the former head coach, would not make any sense. Caldwell was well-liked and respected by the players, evidenced by the fact they never quit on him even when 0-13, but the players deserve a coach that can put them in the right situations to win games, something Caldwell struggled to do several times.
I said back in Week 2 that Caldwell should be evaluated not on the win/loss record, but on whether the Colts improved through the season, as they got used to playing without Peyton Manning. With the way the team was structured, the team was not going to look good early in the season without its centerpiece, and it didn't. But week after week we saw the Colts take the field with the same mentality as if #18 was under center, and they kept losing without any changes in philosophy. It was maddening to watch, and ultimately falls on Caldwell.
There were two obvious times during the season that changes could have been made, but nothing was done until it was too late. The first came after the 62-7 loss in New Orleans, one of the worst losses in NFL history. It was clear something was very wrong, yet they went into the next week against the Titans "doing what they do", and sure enough they continued to look bad. The second opportunity came at the bye week in Week 11, but once again there was no coaching staff change, and no drastic personnel changes. This is why Caldwell had to be released.
The handling of the quarterbacks also didn't help things, as once it became clear that Curtis Painter was exactly what we thought he was, a career backup, he needed to be replaced, not necessarily because Dan Orlovsky would assuredly do a better job, but just because it was clear Painter couldn't do it. The fact that he started 8 games this season, including the game after the bye, was dumbfounding. Then you add in that Orlovsky held his own against the three top seeds in the AFC Playoffs, including a win over the Texans, and it's easy to see that Caldwell didn't do his job.
There are more reasons that Caldwell seemed a bit over his head as a Head Coach, including kicking field goals while inside the 10 down by multiple touchdowns in the second half of games, having his star player publicly question your use of timeouts in playoff games, and being so risk-averse, at least in the conventional sense, that it put the Colts, who were at a clear disadvantage talent-wise throughout the season, even more at a disadvantage by not figuring out new and out-of-the-box ways to try and win games. While not the only example, the Colts did not try one surprise onside kick, fake punt, or fake field goal all season. Even if they didn't work, would they have been any worse off?
There's a laundry list of reasons why Jim Caldwell should not have been retained as Head Coach of the Colts, and Irsay and Grigson were correct to release him from his duties. But for a man that they speak so highly of, and there's no reason to believe Irsay and Grigson aren't being genuine when they say those things, they were very unprofessional towards Caldwell. Firing respected people is a tough job, but respected people also deserve a little better than what Jim Caldwell got from the Colts.
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