The 2005-2006 Indianapolis Colts are not the greatest team of all time.At this point, they may not even be one of the greatest.
Yes, they are 11-0.Yes, they could go undefeated. Yes, they have a future Hall of Fame quarterback and wide receiver in Peyton Manning and Marvin Harrison and another candidate in running back Edgerrin James.Yes, they have (arguably) the single best pass rusher in the game.
Now that those more popular facts are out of the way, we can look at a few other statistics. The Colts play in the AFC South, one of the worst divisions in football.They’ve got the luxury of beating up on the pop-warner level Texans and the rebuilding Titans.
Rounding out the division is the Jacksonville Jaguars, who the Colts have already beaten once and play again the 11th, this time without starting quarterback Byron Leftwich.
That’s practically four free wins for a team of Indianapolis’ quality.If the Atlanta Falcons or the Denver Broncos played cupcake teams in their own division, who knows what their record might be?
So where do the Colts go from here? Their remaining schedule appeared more intimidating two weeks ago than it does today. Following Monday’s 26-7 bruising of Pittsburgh, the Colts will play Tennessee, Jacksonville, San Diego, Seattle and Arizona. Three of these teams have losing records. In my (sometimes) humble opinion, the only game that might topple Indy’s hopes of going undefeated is the Christmas Eve game in Seattle against the Seahawks.
The only other road game in the stretch is at the Jaguars, who are likely to be less competitive without their quarterback.Barring any injury and assuming head coach Tony Dungy plays his starters in late-season situations, I believe the 2005-2006 Colts will go undefeated.
Are the 1972 Miami Dolphins worried? They should be. Every year a team threatens to put their undefeated season’s solidarity in jeopardy. They parade around all the sports outlets they can find talking about how good they were.This 2006 Colts team, through 11 games, has the number one ranked offense in the league.While this may be unsurprising, why is that they also have the number two ranked defense?
They’ve got the best offense, second best defense, best quarterback, best defensive lineman, one of the best wide receivers and running backs.And they’ve got the best record.
And they’re only five short weeks away from gridiron immortality.