Colts clinch playoffs after record-setting Jonathan Taylor explosion

The Indianapolis Colts clinched their playoff spot, thanks to Jonathan Taylor’s mastery.

After a week of intrigue, mental math, and nailbiting, the Indianapolis Colts are officially in the 2020 NFL Playoffs, overcoming the Jacksonville Jaguars one last time in a loaded AFC to get to the big dance.

Regrettably, they’ll be a seven seed thanks to Tennessee’s, um, heroics, but it’s an honor just to be nominated.

Especially when that nomination is the result of a breakout game unlike any other for Jonathan Taylor, the rookie ‘back out of Wisconsin who asserted his authority in this one — and passed Edgerrin James in the process for the most single-game rushing yards in franchise history.

By a whole lot.

Taylor ended with a ho-hum 253 yards, good for the ninth-most in NFL history in a single game, and also good for an exclamation point on a rookie season that proved to live up to the hype, even after the nitpickers stopped noticing.

As the year went on, Taylor developed into a fully-formed top back without the Marlon Mack insurance policy he expected to have if the struggles arrived; the veteran was lost for the year in Week 1, though he never stopped advising Taylor as the campaign dragged on.

All told, Taylor’s rookie year ends with 1,169 rushing yards, 11 touchdowns, and a stranglehold on the job entering Mack’s contract expiration.

It also doesn’t end quite yet.

Indy will advance to the playoffs and travel to a confident Buffalo team, though even their arrival in the playoffs looked dicey last week. Week 17 creates strange bedfellows, which is why Reggie Wayne and other Colts legends were rooting like hell for…Deshaun Watson, who nearly upended the Titans and gave the Colts the AFC South.

https://twitter.com/ReggieWayne_17/status/1345888356648022016?s=20

It was not to be, however, and the Colts will be facing quite a challenge next week in the frigid cold in front of a select few members of Bills Mafia.

Hmm…Buffalo in January…little ground and pound sound appealing? We know just the record-setter for the job.

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