Rivers Runs Through It: Is Philip Rivers a Good Fit For the Indianapolis Colts?

By Joanne Kong

Twitter: @KongFu4U

Philip Rivers spent his entire NFL career as a Charger. Drafted 4th overall by the New York Giants in the 2004 NFL Draft, Rivers was traded for Eli Manning, who was drafted 1st overall in the same class.  And so the story of Philip Rivers began.  Since Rivers has been the starting quarterback for the Chargers, he’s made it to the post season 5 times with 4 divisional round losses and an AFC Championship loss against the New England Patriots.  Inconsistent in AFC West divisional finishes throughout his tenure with the Chargers, it wasn’t terribly surprising when Rivers and the Chargers franchise finally parted ways after finishing the 2019 season 5-11.

How does Philip Rivers fit into the Indianapolis Colts system?

Rivers is no stranger to head coach Frank Reich, or offensive coordinator Nick Sirianni.  The three worked together for three years from 2013 to 2015 as part of the Chargers’ offensive coaching team, the last two seasons of which Reich was offensive coordinator and Sirianni was the quarterbacks coach. The history Rivers has with both coaches should help him in fit into the Colts scheme, which so far looks good.  In Rivers first drive, he led the Colts on a seven play, 63 yard scoring drive. He’d demonstrated a connection with his new teammates and finished the game with an impressive 78 percent completion rate.

Rivers managed to complete 36 of 46 passes for 363 yards, but also threw two interceptions and to only one touchdown, with a potential third interception called back due to penalty. In week 1, it was the interception late in the fourth quarter that was the most damaging. Trying to come back from behind, Rivers was picked off with four and a half minutes left in the game.  Interceptions are unfortunately something Rivers is all too familiar with. In 2019, Rivers had a whopping 20 interceptions, totaling 200 in his career. Under pressure, Rivers final drive consisted of 3 straight incompletions. So although the personal stats weren’t bad, the Colts ended up losing to a Jaguars team missing significant starters from last year’s already mediocre team.

What went wrong for the Indianapolis Colts in week 1?

The Colts passing game looked good early. Rivers looked fresh and accurate right out of the gate and it was clear there was a collective desire to start winning games. It’s not surprising that throughout the week 1 game head coach Reich decided to continue leaning on Rivers and the pass game.

“I felt like we were having success in the passing game, so the running game never really got into a rhythm,” Reich said. “I’ve said this a million times: There’s some games we’re going to throw it a little bit more. We felt like we had good matchups in the secondary.”

Reich wasn’t wrong. Rivers had 363 passing yards, most of which (227) was thrown in the first-half.  The problem is, although Rivers has a big arm, he becomes inconsistent the more he throws and therefore more likely to make mistakes. In fact, not only did passing yards from the first to the second half drop off, but so did completion percentage going from 85% to 68%. In 2019, Rivers turned the ball over 23 times (including fumbles), the third most in the NFL. Part of that was correlated with when Melvin Gordon was out for four games. Some of Rivers best games with the Chargers were when the run game worked, taking some pressure off of Rivers to move the ball down field in the air.

A non-existent ground game in week 1 certainly put more pressure on Rivers than necessary. Nyheim Hines is a third year veteran with the Indianapolis Colt, drafted in the fourth round. Hines has totaled just 513 rush yards and 4 touchdowns in the last two years with the Colts, running behind Marlon Mack, but did have 745 receiving yards and 2 receiving touchdowns over the same time. In week 1, Hines scored the first touchdown of the season for the Colts, and led the team with 8 receptions, but only totaled 28 rush yards.

Now that Mack is out for the season with a ruptured right Achilles tendon, Johnathan Taylor, drafted in the second round of the 2020 draft will be starting in the backfield.  But for Rivers to find success in week 2, he’ll need to trust Taylor and Hines as he did Melvin Gordon and Austin Ekeler when he was with the Chargers.

It’s safe to say that Philip Rivers fits into the Indianapolis system. But at 38 years old, Rivers is nearing the end of his football career. With just a one year contract with the Colts and potentially no second, the better question for Rivers is the long term answer in Indy, and if not, whether he’ll find success in the immediate future. He’s not solely to blame for the week 1 loss, but his turnovers are on him. Rivers is most clearly hoping for a Super Bowl, something he’s been unable to reach in his NFL career, and he has the weapons to succeed, if he can consistently avoid turnovers. Rivers is 19 interceptions away from beating his 2019 record and 20 interceptions away from beating his 2016 record. Clearly, those are two records Rivers will be looking to avoid.

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