Indianapolis Colts sign Eric Fisher - LT problem solved, knock wood! IU Football schedule released!

Intro good afternoon welcome to inside indiana sports now with ken sterling it's monday may 10 2021 we're brought to you by the great people of today's dentistry dr mike o'neill flat out the best dentist that there is he's been my dentist the last 27 years i trust him implicitly you will too all you have to do is give him a call hire the best when it comes to your health hiring the best is really really important all you have to do to make that happen give them a call 317-849-2933 punch subscribe hit like ring the bell Eric Fisher let's go let's talk about sports how about the colts today they got it done they signed eric fisher left tackle formerly with the kansas city chiefs formerly the number one overall pick in the draft in 2013 and a guy who in the afc championship game on january 24th against the bills tore his achilles tendon it's been surgically repaired he's on track with his rehab that is something that the colts wanted to find out last thursday when they did the medical evaluation of eric fisher as a result of that he has signed to a one-year 9.4 million dollar deal to be that final component of an offensive line where if he's healthy they're gonna be awesome you got fisher you got nelson the best guard in the game ryan kelly one of the best centers in the game mark lewinsky and braden smith who is a tackle was rated with exactly the same score by pro football focus as eric fisher last year how about that they both they were tied for 16th among all tackles in the nfl they are going to be opening opening gaping holes for jonathan taylor and for marlon mack knock wood and protecting the front side the back side all sides of carson wentz carson wentz has got to be protected otherwise what he does is try to extend plays and this is where he gets into trouble and he throws interceptions and he takes sacks instead of just mucking the play chucking the ball out of bounds and saying you know what second and ten ain't so bad we'll live to play another day he tries to make every play work as a positive play for his team when you think about carson wentz think about andrew locke very very similar in that regard remember andrew luck who would extend plays forever and then take a tough hit and all of a sudden he retires at 29 and people wonder why that's kind of the mo for carson wentz this offensive line has got to stand tall and play together and keep carson wins clean so that he doesn't need to extend plays all they have to do is run the ball and throw the ball as planned like last year with philip rivers maybe he can watch a tape and see what rivers did rivers either delivered or he chucked it you know delivered to a receiver or out of bounds and he mucked the play good for philip rivers wound up being an 11-5 quarterback as a starter for the indianapolis colts maybe wentz can have that kind of turnaround this year Eric Fisher timeline last year with the eagles not good 50 sacks in 12 games that's a lot of sacks this year if eric fisher is a starting tackle starting left tackle let's say by week five week six and and so we've done some research so this is what we do this is how we operate okay we don't just guess at stuff what i did was searched and found a a study authored by the american orthopedic foot and ankle society and brother let me tell you when these cats throw a party forget it throw out the record books it's gonna go all night long they throw ragers the orthopedic foot and ankle people it's what they do all right but what what they did in 2017 is they authored a study they studied the 78 nfl players who tore their achilles between 2010 and 2015 and looked how many guys wound up coming back to play 26 percent did not come back from a torn achilles but in a lot of cases those guys were old and they were cycling out of the league anyway of those who did come back it took about nine months to get to where they were on the field again and being productive and they lost approximately 22 percent of their power rating now i don't know what their power rating is but 22 percent you know what eric fisher minus 22 of whatever he had he's six seven he's like what three hundred and twenty three hundred and thirty pounds that twenty two percent i'll take eric fisher minus twenty two percent if he can be on the field in nine months and that was the average time to get back on the field nine months so he suffered that injury january 24th nine months from then is october 24th so right around the bye week week seven is the bye week of 17 games so he projects to play 11 12 maybe 13 games if he gets a little bit ahead of schedule if the procedures and the rehab protocols for a torn achilles the surgically repaired achilles have advanced a little bit he can get back on the field maybe a little bit earlier if he can play 12-13 games that'd be a hell of an upgrade for the colts over what they've currently got with davenport and with tevi and and it gets chris ballard off the hook for a draft where they had a gaping hole at left tackle but didn't solve that problem you know you had three tackles at the top of the draft with paneer sewell and rashaan slater and elijah vera tucker and then you had kind of a drop off and the colts weren't comfortable with any of the other guys or they would have traded back from 21 tried to go get somebody else another edge guy 26 27 28 package the bounty that they got for trading back with that 54th overall pick and you go get a guy like walker little right the stanford guy who's got all the physical attributes of his starting left Colts draft tackle but none of the experience he he's played one game since 2018. so what the colts decided to do they didn't like any of those scenarios they stuck at 21 they took quitting pay and then they stuck at 54 and they took hurricane dio and now they have solved at least temporarily their left tackle problem with eric fisher again one year 9.4 million dollars slots him about halfway back among left tackles now next year things get a little bit challenging because quentin nelson braden smith they're going to be paid more money some money comes off of ryan kelly's deal they structured it so this upcoming year in 2022 he doesn't count against the cap nearly as much as he does this coming year so maybe you can boogie foogie with things a little bit glowing is going to cycle out as a free agent or sign an extension we'll see what happens i think he cycles out and you plug and play another guy and maybe that's what they're doing with maybe they're waiting for danny pitter to take over right guard we're going to find out but chris ballard off the hook for uh not solving that you know rick venturi told me this uh about frank kush frank cush of course the first head coach of the indianapolis colts when they moved to indy frank cush was a head coach and and frank was kind of a crusty guy and kind of a nut but he said and and rick quotes him all the time and it's such a smart quote um you know what sometimes all you need to solve a crisis is a good night's sleep which means don't hustle into a solution the colts do not hustle into a solution they don't like the free agency bell rings and and they don't go hysterical they don't go crazy they are prudent they are in some respects plotting in the way they do this but they generally seem to find a result that works and and i think they've done that here now for a few weeks in all likelihood unless fischer really rehabs well and has no further complications and off we go with the opener you're going to have sam tevi or julian davenport as your starting left tackle that might be a problem and they're not if they've if they project fisher to be the left tackle they're not going to slide quentin out to left tackle from left guard and cause further mayhem with that offensive line they'll just wait for fisher but it's going to be fascinating to see how this plays out it has been fascinating i like to watch chris ballard work and even though we need we are always cognizant of what we see right not what we project but what we see chris ballard almost always gets it right in the end but getting there the way they make the sausage on west 56th street bothers us a little Colts off season bit because we don't know that there's a plan we didn't know that eric fisher was the plan we had no idea we thought hey you know what how about this walker little guy how about clearing or christian darasaw he seems like a nice fella a good competent left tackle a little bit mean-spirited isn't that nice let's get that guy they had a plan they executed the plan it looks like the plan at least on paper is gonna work quite nicely for the indianapolis colts so you look at the off season and what did the colts do they needed a quarterback they got carson wentz former number two overall draft pick what was that 2016. they needed a left tackle they went out and got the number one pick from 2013. they needed a wide receiver they resigned t y hilton they needed a cornerback or a few cornerbacks they resigned the guys like xavier rhodes and carrie who were here last year and they're going to be back another year they figured it out and they've got a defensive tackle coming in a guy from the dallas cowboys to visit antoine woods he's not a world beater but he might be a slight upgrade over one of the backups at defensive tackle for deforest buckner and grover stewart they just keep grinding over there and they keep figuring it out and they keep putting pen to paper and finding guys who are going to be able to help them win football games in 2021 it's really interesting to me it hadn't been easy for chris ballard chris ballard took that job thinking that he had his franchise quarterback for the next 10 years and all of a sudden poof bye bye andrew and he's gone now what do you do okay jacoby brissette you gave it a shot it didn't work phillip rivers was a great kind of a tourniquet for 2020 and now you've got carson wentz who at age 28 might have six eight good gears left in his arm and in his legs you go out and get a left tackle who's 30 right has the torn achilles but evidently it projects to be healing on time and on target so good interesting i i think 2021's got a chance to be a hell of a year for the indianapolis colts things keep happening good things keep happening not on our schedule but on chris ballard's schedule and that's the way it ought to be uh pacers tonight in cleveland the cavs flat out suck they're terrible they're a bad basketball team they've lost their last 10 and each of their last six by at least 16 points and the 16 point win over the sun or loss to the suns you know what all those points that entire difference was accounted for and over time when the cats were out scored 20 to four how about that that's a team that played pretty well for 48 minutes and then for five minutes absolutely atrocious that's what the cavs do pacers if they win tonight they all but lock up IU Football schedule a spot in the playing deal and and that's really i guess not a bad result you've got brogden still out and lamb's still out and you've had tj warren out for a significant portion of the season you've had miles turner out for a long time napier bjorkerin a brand new coach first time nba coach dealing with covid protocols and whatnot this has been a ridiculous season for the pacers uh man there is even if they make the pay they're no buzz about the pacers and it makes me sad a loss tonight would be horrifying just a quick mention of bob baffert whose horse tested dirty after winning the derby is he the worst person in sports i think he might be the worst person in sports the uh football schedule for indiana university has been released they begin the season at iowa then they've got home games against idaho and cincinnati on september 11th and september 18th they travel then to western kentucky and penn state before coming back home to play against michigan state and ohio state they go on the road to play maryland and michigan then they're at home for another two they play them in twos all twos uh they play rutgers in minnesota in mid-november and then the bucket game to finish a regular season and that is at west lafayette i i don't know like it used to be very easy to predict what indiana was going to do you could look at the schedule and say five and six or or later on when they added the 12th game five and seven you know six and six four and eight yet you knew that they were gonna start quick against non-conference teams and then maybe they're gonna win two big ten games you knew that now i don't know what to think i don't know what this program is anymore because they keep i mean two years in a row they played bulls in florida i don't know what to think about all this i don't know how to project what they're going to be and how they're going to do it i don't know what can michael penick stay healthy we don't know it's going to be a a mystery season where i go down for at least i'm gonna i'm gonna the over under on me going down for games two and two tailgates so uh four games total two i'll actually go in the stadium because indiana is better so it's not just tailgate city uh for me and my friends none of whom i'll mention by name or uh they'd get crusty with me tomorrow morning breakfast with kent we're all over eric fisher this tremendous news for the colts we'll talk about indiana football we'll talk about what god help us all pacers they you've got to have a win tonight we'll talk about that in the morning i can't wait to talk to you six o'clock on facebook live and then immediately thereafter on youtube