Last week against the Buffalo Bills — just one week ago! — the Indianapolis Colts finally settled on the perfect Jonathan Taylor game plan.
Against the Buccaneers in Week 12, they shredded it entirely, instead opting into exchanging blows with Tom Brady while hoping Carson Wentz and the offensive line could stand up to the scrutiny of the spotlight.
Unfortunately, Eric Fisher showed up — as did Leonard Fournette — and though Taylor eventually returned to even the score with three and a half minutes remaining, Brady grabbed the reins yet again and won another one-score game to add to his storied history.
The question on every Colts fan’s lips: Where was JT28, exactly?
When you have Jonathan Taylor on the goal line pic.twitter.com/uUvFQRhNWN
— #RingerNFL (@ringernfl) November 28, 2021
Though Taylor’s final totals are passable (16 rushes for 83 yards and a touchdown, four receptions for 14 additional yards), his 100-yard streak was emphatically broken in the Colts’ biggest game of the season against the defending World Champions, and it was broken by design.
And, spoiler alert for a later item on this list, but Taylor’s middle-of-the-road totals weren’t exactly impressively spread out, if you catch our drift.
In case you weren’t already angry enough in the moment, mourning the loss of a 10-point halftime lead on the most infuriating quarterback of all time, these three telling statistics about Taylor’s largely-absent performance on Sunday will have you begging Frank Reich for an explanation.
An explanation that goes beyond, “We rode the hot hand in Carson. What can I say?”
These 3 Jonathan Taylor stats are infuriating after Colts vs. Bucs.
3. Third Quarter Disappearing Act
You may remember the first half of this one as “The Half Where Indy Nearly Doubled Up TB12”. It was a wonderful time to be alive. The Colts struck quickly with Ashton Dulin downfield. They struck methodically, ending their next touchdown drive with a short pass to Jack Doyle. They struck back, fending off Brady’s first comeback attempt with a late TY Hilton TD.
They won in every method imaginable…except for one, which they abandoned entirely once they had a lead to sit on.
Instead of taking the air out of the ball, Indy relied entirely on Wentz throwing downfield and assessing RPOs. In the rare instances where Wentz didn’t float the ball, he ended up scrambling himself instead of handing off to the second-year back who just wedged his way into the MVP race.
Taylor’s total touches in the third quarter? Just one — and it came on a short pass for a loss of three yards.
Jonathan Taylor had one touch in the third quarter. When he was featured on #Colts only good drive in second half, they marched right down the field and scored a TD.
— Locked On Colts Podcast (@LockedOnColts) November 28, 2021
As if this game plan could’ve gotten any more mangled, just wait until you read exactly how many consecutive passes Wentz ended up tossing…as the lead evaporated, mind you.