The NFL draft is just a few days away, and currently, the Indianapolis Colts have seven draft picks but none in the first round after trading it for Deforest Buckner.
During free agency, the Colts were able to fill a few holes in their roster picking up Buckner, Xavier Rhodes, and Philip Rivers, but they still have needs to fill.
Here are the three biggest need for the Colts heading into the NFL draft next week, in no particular order.
1. A long-term solution at QB
As of now, the Colts don’t have a quarterback under contract past 2020. Rivers signed a one-year deal this offseason and with him being 38, there’s no guarantee he will be back in 2021. Jacoby Brissett is also in the last year of his two-year extension he signed in 2019. With Brissett being 29 and having shown very little improvement throughout his career, it looks as if he isn’t the long-term answer at quarterback for Indianapolis.
Thankfully for the Colts, they have three picks inside the top 80. Indianapolis has a lot of options on how they can get whoever they like at quarterback if they like anyone in that range. If they want, they can trade back into the late-first round, take a quarterback in the second round with one of two of their second-round picks, or take a flier on a guy in the later rounds and fill other needs early.
Some quarterback prospects to watch throughout the draft would be guys like Jordan Love, Jacob Eason, Jalen Hurts, and Jake Fromm. Any of these guys could be there for the Colts at either 34, 44, or 75.
Other late-round prospects would be Anthony Gordon from Washington State, James Morgan from Flordia International or Nate Stanley from Iowa. If the Colts take a quarterback, they will be a project and will have to sit a year behind Rivers and Brissett and refine their game before taking over in 2021.
2. Play-making skill positions
It’s been a need for almost a decade now, a play-making wide receiver opposite T.Y. Hilton. The Colts have failed over and over to find that player, but this draft could be the year they could get one, maybe two, playmakers for the passing offense. According to draft expert for NFL Network, Daniel Jeremiah, he thinks this 2020 class is the deepest wide receiver class he’s ever scouted in the 20 years he has been doing scouting, and it shows.
With the Colts having those two early-second round picks, they’re in a good spot to land a prospect that in any other year would be a first-round prospect. A few wide receivers to look for are Michael Pittman Jr, Tee Higgins, Chase Claypool, Denzel Mims to name a few. There is a lot of variety in this draft too so if Indianapolis wants to get a big WR they have those options, as well as some speed.
The Colts also have a big need at TE. While they have Jack Doyle still on the roster, he is getting up there in age and in the Frank Reich scheme, he loves using tight ends as vertical threats, (ie Eric Ebron in 2018). With Ebron now gone, the Colts have a need there. There are a few intriguing options in the draft like Cole Kmet, Harrison Bryant, Hunter Bryant, and Brycen Hopkins, and outside of Kmet, the Colts might be able to get any of these players in the mid-rounds of the draft.
3. Offensive Line help
Last year was a rather lucky season for the Colts. They had all of their offensive linemen start every game for the first time since 2001, and every starting lineman played at least 91% of the teams’ offensive snaps. Don’t expect that fruit of health to shine again in 2020.
Indianapolis lost two key rotational depth offensive lineman in free agency with Joe Haeg signing with the Buccanneers and Josh Andrews signing with the Jets. With Anthony Castonzo re-signing a two-year deal after mulling retirement much of the offseason, finding OL depth isn’t as dire as it seemed a few months ago.
With Ballard’s perplexity to trading back and perplexity of drafting OL don’t be surprised if Ballard trades back in the middle of the draft to acquire another pick or two and take at least one or two offensive linemen in this year’s draft.
