If you attended the Indianapolis Colts‘ mini-camp practice that was open to the public Wednesday evening, you would notice that hanging from the rafters of Lucas Oil Stadium read a brand new, crisp banner that read “2014 AFC FINALIST,” per SNF on NBC’s twitter account.
The @Colts raise an “AFC Finalist” banner: http://t.co/jcLVZgYnmw pic.twitter.com/9QW883FE6x
— Sunday Night Football on NBC (@SNFonNBC) June 11, 2015
The big deal regarding the hanging of the banner is due to the fact that the Colts were embarrassed by the New England Patriots 45-7 in the 2014 AFC Championship game last January, and many look at it as sort-of a “participation trophy” you could say.
Alright, it’s understandable as to why many would find this move as questionable…laughable. After all, the Colts were demolished in every aspect of the game on that particular Sunday night in January – much to the dismay of Colts fans. It’s simple though: if the Colts hadn’t lost that game as badly as they did, no one would be budging an eye.
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I will admit, when I had first looked up into the rafters and saw the new banner Wednesday while attending the team’s mini-camp session, it did make me scratch my head a tad. My thoughts of the banner were the same of everyone who had seen it spread across social media: “What sense of accomplishment is there to be had by this?” It left me thinking for a minute but the more I thought, the more and more I realized that it wasn’t that much of a deal after all.
Despite what all of the social media warriors out there want to believe, the Colts aren’t the only team that has ever raised a banner for an achievement that ultimately had been deemed useless by the end of the season. One example would be the the banner hanging in Gillette Stadium representative of the Patriot’s perfect season in 2007, Per Collin McCollough of Bleacher Report
CSNE mocks Colts for hanging AFC Finalist banner (http://t.co/cSpC1C1hjB). Meanwhile, in Foxboro... pic.twitter.com/FgkkcSp1vX
— Collin McCollough (@cmccollo) June 11, 2015
For what it’s worth, the New England media and fan-base has enjoyed mocking the Colts for this move but seems to not want to mention this banner that hangs high and proud inside Gillette Stadium.
At the end of the day however, it is just a banner with no implications on the following season. But after all, you can usually find these nonsense stories in the midst of a long NFL off-season. But many should also know that reaching the “Final Four” of the NFL is very difficult to do regardless of if the team wins or loses.
Nobody seems to bat an eye at the “1995 AFC FINALIST banner,” going to show that the Colts should put all of the talk aside and keep the banner high going forward.