The Indianapolis Colts have made several great draft selections in their history. Here’s a look at the top 15 draft picks for Indianapolis.
The 2022 NFL Draft is over and the Indianapolis Colts have added eight new players. The most recent selections will try to create their own legacies for a franchise with a history of talented players.
The Colts have been lucky to draft some of the best players in NFL history. Indy has several Hall of Famers and even more legendary players.
The franchise itself dates back to 1953 when the team was founded in Baltimore. After 30 years in Baltimore, the Colts relocated to Indianapolis in 1984.
For this list, only players drafted by the Indianapolis Colts will be ranked, 1984 to the present day. That means franchise legends like Lenny Moore, Raymond Berry, and many more will not be listed.
With that understood, here are the 15 best draft picks in Indianapolis Colts history.
The 15 best draft picks in Indianapolis Colts history
Selected at No. 22 overall in the 2011 Draft, Anthony Castonzo comes in at No. 15 on this list. The left tackle was selected by Indy out of Boston College.
Castonzo’s career got off to a delayed start as he was a part of the rookie class that entered the league during the 2011 lockout. He also dealt with injury in his first year.
However, Castonzo still started 12 games and quickly proved that he would be Indy’s franchise left tackle for many years. He ultimately played 10 seasons with Indy, playing and starting 144 games.
He was a consistent force at left tackle and was a pillar of an offensive line that struggled at times in the last decade. Castonzo, however, made a name for himself with the franchise.
Antoine Bethea played 14 seasons in the NFL, with four different teams. However, his most impactful run was with the Indianapolis Colts.
Bethea was the 207th-overall pick of the 2006 Draft out of Howard University. He immediately contributed to Indianapolis in a big way during his rookie season.
He won the starting job at strong safety and started all 14 games that he played in. That season, Indy dominated on both sides of the ball and ultimately won Super Bowl 41.
That was just the start for Bethea. A season later, Bethea would make his first Pro Bowl. He ultimately made three in his career and two of them were with Indy.
In total, he played eight seasons with Indianapolis, 123 games, and recorded 14 interceptions and 805 tackles.
Following his time in Indy, Bethea played three seasons with the 49ers, two with the Cardinals, and one with the New York Giants. However, his only Super Bowl victory came with Indy.
Marshall Faulk is a Hall of Fame running back and one of the best running backs to ever play in the NFL. However, he is only 13th on this list because of his short stint with Indianapolis.
After an impressive career at San Diego State, Faulk was drafted second-overall by Indianapolis in the 1994 Draft. He transitioned to the NFL and became an immediate impact player.
In his first season, Faulk ran for 1,282 yards and 11 touchdowns and had 522 receiving yards and one additional touchdown. He also made the Pro Bowl as a rookie.
Faulk returned to the Pro Bowl in his second season after having over 1,500 all-purpose yards for the second year in a row.
He’d make the Pro Bowl again in 1998, his fifth and final year in Indianapolis. Following that season, instead of paying Faulk a new contract, Indy traded him to the Rams.
Faulk took his career to new heights with the Greatest Show on Turf and the Colts drafted another great running back as they built around their young quarterback.
Bob Sanders was another great player for Indianapolis whose legacy was impacted by the limited amount of games that he played in Indy.
When available, Bob Sanders was one of the best defenders in the league and played with great instincts as a defensive back. Availability was his only challenge.
Sanders was selected by Indy in the second round of the 2004 Draft. He only played in six games as a rookie as he dealt with multiple lower-body injuries.
In his second season, Sanders played in 14 games and showed the football world what he’s capable of. He had one interception, one forced fumble, and 92 tackles.
He was voted to the Pro Bowl that season and was First-Team All-Pro.
In 2006, Sanders missed 12 games with a knee injury but he was able to make it back and contribute his play-making ability as the Colts went on to win the Super Bowl.
The season following the Super Bowl win was Sanders’ best year as a professional. He played in 15 games, had two interceptions and 97 tackles, and was named Defensive Player of the Year, in addition to making the Pro Bowl and All-Pro team.
In total, he played 48 games with the Colts over the span of seven seasons. He was able to win a Defensive Player of the Year award and a Super Bowl ring. His career was limited by injury but he made his presence felt whenever he was available.
Talking about immensely talented players whose time with Indianapolis was shorter than many hoped, it was only a matter of time before Andrew Luck’s name appeared.
Luck was the first-overall pick of the 2012 Draft and he entered the league with a lot of hype. Coming out of Stanford, many thought he was the best quarterback coming into the league since Peyton Manning. Some even thought he was better.
With so many expectations placed upon him, Luck entered the league and immediately delivered. As a rookie, he led the Colts to an 11-5 record while passing for 4,374 yards and 23 touchdowns.
In his second and third seasons, the Colts also finished 11-5 and Luck had made the Pro Bowl in each of his first three seasons. Each year, Indy had also advanced further in the postseason, making it to the AFC Championship in Luck’s third season.
Unfortunately, that would be the peak of Luck’s short career. The following season, Luck would only play in seven total games, missing the rest with injury.
He would end up sitting the entire 2017 season with a shoulder injury before returning in 2018 to win Comeback Player of the Year and making another Pro Bowl.
What everyone thought was the start of a new chapter ended up being the closing section of his NFL career. That was ultimately Luck’s last season as he surprisingly retired in August of 2019.
Ultimately, Luck spent seven seasons with Indianapolis, playing in 86 games.
One of the linemen that helped protect Peyton Manning was Ryan Diem. He was selected in the fourth round of the 2001 Draft and played his entire career with Indianapolis.
Diem was a lineman, his career wasn’t glamorous. He never made a Pro Bowl nor was he selected to any All-Pro teams. However, he was a critical part of Indy’s success in the first decade of the 2000s.
Diem played with Indianapolis from 2001 to 2011. In those 11 seasons, he played in 157 games and started in a total of 150 games.
His starts came all across the offensive line, primarily at right tackle and at right guard.
Although Diem didn’t receive much personal glory, he was one of the pieces that makes a run for Super Bowl 41 possible. He did a tremendous job protecting Manning’s right side and ultimately was a great selection for Indianapolis.
Someone else who helped out Peyton Manning a lot was tight end, Dallas Clark. Clark was a first-round selection for Indianapolis in the 2003 Draft.
In an offense that already had Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne as pass catchers, Clark settled in as the perfect tight end to attack the middle of the field.
In his rookie season, he started 10 games and had 29 receptions for 340 yards and one touchdown. He would only improve every year after that one.
For year two, Clark averaged 16.9 yards a catch and had five receiving touchdowns, making a bigger role for himself in Indy’s offense.
From 2007 to 2009, Clark had the best three-year stretch of his career, playing in 46 games and catching 235 passes for 2,570 yards and 27 touchdowns.
The 2009 season was Clark’s peak. It was the year he caught 100 passes for 1,106 yards and 10 touchdowns. That was the only time in his career that he had triple-digit receptions and over 1000 yards in a season.
It was also the only season that Clark was selected to a Pro Bowl and First-Team All-Pro.
Ryan Diem was the man responsible for protecting Peyton Manning’s right side and Tarik Glenn was the man who protected his left side.
Glenn was selected 19th overall in the 1997 Draft and was an immediate starter for Indianapolis. He started his career as a right guard but eventually settled in as a left tackle.
He was everything you could ask for in a left tackle. Big, physical, and overall great at his job. However, his most impressive attribute may have been his durability.
In Glenn’s 10 seasons, he started 16-of-16 games in nine of them. The six games he missed in 2003 with a knee injury were the only time he was unavailable.
Glenn was always present and prepared to go. He finished his career with three-straight Pro Bowl selections and walked away from the game after winning Super Bowl 41.
TY Hilton was selected in the third round of the 2012 Draft and he developed into a pillar player for the franchise in the post-Manning era.
Selected in the third round, Hilton burst onto the scene with 50 receptions, 861 yards, and seven touchdowns as a rookie. That was only just the start.
Over the last decade, Hilton put together a career that made him one of the NFL’s best wide receivers of the last 10 years and also one of the best receivers in franchise history.
From 2014 to 2017, Hilton was selected to four straight Pro Bowls and had the best season of his career in 2016. That year, he caught 91 passes for a league-leading 1,448 yards.
He has played his first 10 seasons with the Colts and fans are hoping he never puts on another jersey. In those 10 years, Hilton has played in 143 games and caught 631 passes for 9,691 yards and 53 touchdowns.
When Indianapolis traded away Marshall Faulk, the team was fortunate enough to select another Hall of Fame running back at the top of the draft.
In 1999, Indy selected Edgerrin James out of the University of Miami and he proved to be a great selection when he first stepped on the field as a rookie.
James led the league in rushing with 1,553 yards as a rookie. He also added 13 touchdowns, 586 receiving yards, and four receiving touchdowns.
In his first year, James also was selected for his first Pro Bowl and All-Pro First-Team. In year two, James kept his foot on the gas with 1,709 rushing yards to lead the league for a second consecutive season.
He played a total of seven years with the Colts and he made the Pro Bowl two more times in his final two seasons in Indy.
Overall, in the seven seasons, James played in 96 games and ran for 9,226 yards and 64 touchdowns. He also added 2,839 receiving yards and 11 additional touchdowns during his time in Indy.
The one unfortunate part of James’ career in Indianapolis is that he left the offseason before the team finally won the Super Bowl. However, Jim Irsay made sure to give him a ring anyway.
Robert Mathis was selected in the fifth round of the 2003 Draft and he went on to become one of the best players in franchise history.
Drafted out of Alabama A&M, Mathis was paired with Dwight Freeney to create one of the most dominant pass rush duos the league has seen.
After a mediocre 3.5-sack rookie season, Robert Mathis recorded 10.5 sacks in his second year and never looked back. He ultimately played 14 seasons with the Colts and had more than nine sacks in over half of his seasons.
Mathis’ best season came in 2013 when he led the league with 19.5 sacks and 10 forced fumbles. He led the NFL in forced fumbles three times in his career.
Playing his entire career with Indianapolis, Mathis was selected to five Pro Bowls and was a big part of the Super Bowl 41 team. He finished with 123 career sacks.
Dwight Freeney was the other half of the pass-rushing duo with Robert Mathis. He was drafted by Indianapolis a year prior to Mathis in the first round of the 2002 Draft.
Freeney was an immediate impact player with the Colts, playing in all 16 games as a rookie. In those games, Freeney had 13 sacks and led the league in both forced fumbles with nine and tackles for a loss with 20.
By his third season, Freeney was leading the NFL in sacks, with 16 in 2004. He established himself as a dominant pass rusher early and remained one for over a decade.
Freeney played 17 years in the NFL and 11 of those seasons were with Indianapolis. Of those 11 seasons, Freeney had double-digit sacks in seven of them.
He was selected to seven Pro Bowls during his stint in Indianapolis and finished 107.5 sacks, 44 forced fumbles, and 113 tackles for a loss for Indy.
Freeney’s only Super Bowl victory came with the Colts when they won Super Bowl 41.
Before Reggie Wayne was back with Indianapolis as a wide receivers coach, he was dominating on the field for Indy as a young wide receiver.
Wayne was drafted out of Miami in the 2001 Draft and was added to an already good passing offense to help take things to the next level. That’s exactly what Wayne did.
Wayne didn’t explode onto the scene as a rookie. He only had 345 receiving yards in year one and 716 in year two. He gradually improved each season and had 838 yards in his third year.
By year four, Wayne was officially a problem for the NFL. He had 1,210 yards and 12 touchdowns that season. That was his first 1000-yard season but it was the start of seven straight and eight in nine years.
The one season in that span that he missed 1,000 yards was 2011 when Wayne had 960.
Wayne’s best year came in 2007 when he led the league with 1,510 receiving yards. That was one of Wayne’s six Pro Bowl seasons in Indianapolis.
In Wayne’s 14 seasons with the Colts, he played in 211 games and caught 1,070 passes for 14,345 yards and 82 touchdowns. He finished his career as the second-best receiver in franchise history.
The best receiver in franchise history was drafted 19th overall in the 1996 Draft and his name is Marvin Harrison. He played 13 seasons in the league and they all were with Indianapolis.
Harrison was a pretty good receiver for his first three seasons, posting 836, 866, and 776 receiving yards respectively. However, he ascended to an elite level in his fourth season and never looked back.
In 1999, Harrison caught 115 passes for a league-leading 1,663 yards and 12 touchdowns. That earned Harrison his first trip to the Pro Bowl and he was named First-team All-Pro.
Harrison would go to seven straight Pro Bowls following that year, making it eight in a row. He also had more than 1,100 receiving yards in all of those seasons.
As the No. 1 receiver for Peyton Manning and the Colts, Harrison spent his entire career in Indianapolis dominating for over a decade.
He ultimately played 190 games in his career and caught 1,102 passes for 14,580 yards and 128 touchdowns. All No. 1 in franchise history.
Obviously, the best pick in Indianapolis history is Peyton Manning. The quarterback is the greatest player in franchise history and one of the greatest in the NFL.
Going back to the beginning, Manning dominated in college at Tennessee but there was a debate on if he should’ve been the No.1 overall pick.
The decision came down to Manning and Ryan Leaf and Indy ultimately chose Manning. Fortunately for the Colts, it worked out pretty well for them.
Manning went on to have a storied career, led Indianapolis to the Super Bowl, and is considered one of the best players to ever play in the NFL.
During his 14 seasons in Indy, 13 where he actually played, Manning led the league in passing yards twice and passing touchdowns three times.
He also was selected to 11 Pro Bowls during his time in Indianapolis and was a five-time First-Team All-Pro.
Before moving on to Denver to finish his career, Manning played in 208 games for Indianapolis and passed for 54,828 yards and 399 touchdowns. He finished his career as the best Colts player of all time.
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