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The 2014-15 NFL season is over, and all year long we've been taking a look at various power rankings to see where people rank the Colts. With the season officially done, and the focus shifting to the offseason, let's take a moment to look at where a few in the media ranked the Colts in their final power rankings of the season:
NFL.com's Elliot Harrison ranked the Colts sixth:
Sure, they looked bad in the AFC Championship Game. And I get that it was disconcerting for Colts fans to see their team fare so poorly. But at the end of the day, this club had so many injuries and challenges, particularly on defense. Also, the Ahmad Bradshaw injury was underrated in terms of importance this season. Huge loss. Chuck Pagano and Ryan Grigson seem to have a plan in place that works, and look no further than the team above them in these Power Rankings for an idea of how important continuity is.
CBS Sports's Pete Prisco has the Colts number nine:
They went to the title game, but that's because Andrew Luck covers up a lot of holes. They need to get better on defense.
Shutdown Corner's Frank Schwab ranked the Colts sixth:
It just feels like they're one monster draft from becoming a real championship contender. Andrew Luck is just going to keep getting better.
USA Today Sports has the Colts ranked fourth:
With the Trent Richardson gamble officially a failure, they'll need to identify someone to ease the offensive load on Andrew Luck.
I think the rankings are pretty fair, as the Colts did indeed make the AFC Championship game, but at the same time they didn't look very good at all in that game and are still just an average team overall with a great quarterback. They had some great successes in 2014 and have some progress to build on, but they still have work to do. The power rankings reflect that this is a team that is close but not quite there yet. The goal of this offseason is to get there.