The Indianapolis Colts can't catch a break right now. They're blowing up the roster after a disappointing start to the season, but it looks like they can't even win the rebuilding game in the division.
The Colts got a 2027 third- and fourth-round pick and a 2028 fifth-round pick combined for Quenton Nelson and DeForest Buckner. In the meantime, the Tennessee Titans got two first-round picks and a fourth-rounder for Jeffery Simmons.
Granted, the circumstances are different, but it's still frustrating to see how not even two bona fide superstars like Nelson and Buckner could give this team a strong value in return. That's yet another indictment of the failed Chris Ballard era.
The Indianapolis Colts were short-sighted, and they're paying the price
The Colts cleared $17.7 million in cap space with these trades. Simmons is signed through the 2030 season, which is a huge difference from Buckner and Nelson, who were both on expiring contracts.
Then again, that shows just how shortsighted this regime was. They went all-in last season by trading for Sauce Gardner, and while injuries got in the way, they didn't seem to have a plan B in case things didn't work out this season.
They knew Nelson and Buckner would be free agents. They knew Gardner was coming off an injury-riddled season, and they knew Daniel Jones would also have to fight his way back from an injury. The odds weren't necessarily in their favor.
So, why not try to extend them? Why not work out a deal to at least give the team some wiggle room and leverage to trade them if things didn't go well this season? They knew they wouldn't have a first-round pick, so the incentive to tank was gone, especially without a player who could get them a first-rounder in a trade.
A general manager must plan for the future and play chess while everyone else plays checkers. They have to consider all possible scenarios and have exit strategies in place. Perhaps Ballard thought he'd never lose his job, which would explain the way he's operated since he arrived in town.
No one can say with a straight face that Quenton Nelson wasn't worth at least a first-round pick. The front office's inability to get the best player on the team to put pen to paper is just baffling, and it's the type of mistake that, like the failed Gardner trade, could come back to haunt this team for years to come.
The Colts are now stuck in the worst possible scenario. They don't have any sort of incentive to tank because they don't have their own first-rounder, but they won't be good enough to win many more games anyway.
This will essentially be a waste of a season, and they won't have many opportunities to find a franchise-changing player in one of the most stacked and promising draft classes in recent years, so they can't even fully reset their roster for another year.
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