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LaRon Landry has missed the past four games due to a suspension handed down by the NFL for violating it's performance enhancing substances policy, and even though that suspension has now ended, the Colts have a week to determine what to do with their safety.
The Colts have a roster exemption for Landry where he can practice this week but they don't have to activate him to the 53-man roster yet. If he is going to play on Monday night against the Giants they need to activate him by 4 p.m. Monday afternoon (making a corresponding roster move too), and if not he either has to be released or on the active roster by Tuesday at 4 p.m.
"We basically have a week to get him back in the fold," head coach Chuck Pagano said on Monday, "giving us time to work through roster mechanics, if you will, and then getting him back in the building and seeing where he's at from a physical standpoint. Get his sea legs back underneath him, so to speak. It gives us roughly a week to see exactly where he's at."
What this gives the Colts is flexibility, which Pagano also noted. "If we want him to play, if he's ready to play on Monday, then we've got to do it by 4 p.m.," Pagano said. "If he's not and we don't feel like we want to throw him out there with him being gone for a month, which I hope everybody would understand, then we don't have to do that."
Our own Andrew Aziz looked at whether Landry should regain his starting spot as he returns, and he concluded that he shouldn't and that Sergio Brown should continue starting - a feeling shared by many others. Landry wasn't good at the beginning of the season when he was playing and for three of the four games without Landry the Colts defense played very well.
Landry was eligible to return to the facility on Monday. But whether he actually did? We're not sure. One thing we know: at the time Chuck Pagano held his press conference on Monday he still hadn't seen Landry. "I have not seen him yet," Pagano confirmed at his 4 p.m. press conference. Add that to what we heard a month ago from Reggie Wayne, and there might be some questions:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Reggie Wayne on Laron Landry: "He is kind of a guy that sits by himself. We're not gonna judge. I'll just keep a question mark on my face."</p>— Jake Query (@jakequery) <a href="https://twitter.com/jakequery/status/517062710165798915">September 30, 2014</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Ultimately, my guess is that the Colts will go back to starting Landry, whether it be on Monday night or the following game. But it's not certain, and the Colts have a week with a roster exemption to figure some things out.