Colts week twelve snap counts vs. Steelers: Notes and thoughts from the Colts' loss

The Indianapolis Colts hosted the Pittsburgh Steelers on Thanksgiving night and lost 28-7.  Because of holiday and family stuff I've been in and out for the rest of the weekend, but with a long time between games we'll still take time to look back and analyze the most recent game.

That involves our weekly snap count feature, looking at who played and how long they played and making some notes from that.

Offense:

Notes:

• Thursday's game was the first time that Scott Tolzien saw action in a regular season game with the Colts, as though he was active in the first ten games he never played.  With Andrew Luck out with a concussion for the game, however, it was Tolzien's time to start and he played every snap.  He did an admirable job filling in for Luck, completing 22 of 36 passes for 205 yards and a touchdown with two picks.
• The production of Jordan Todman should definitely be noted, as he played in just three offensive snaps all game (on the final drive), yet he rushed for 37 yards on three carries to finish as the team's leading rusher from the game.  That topped the 28 yards on 15 carries by Frank Gore (on 35 snaps) and the 20 yards on two carries by Robert Turbin (on 26 snaps).  It's important not to make too much of some garbage time yards, but Jordan Todman impressed with the few snaps he got.
• Credit should also go to Dwayne Allen, who stepped up and was a favorite target of Scott Tolzien.  He finished second on the team in receptions (with five) and second in yards (with 49), finishing with a top-ten game in his career in both categories.  Allen has had an up and down season so far for the Colts, but he stepped up on Thursday.

Defense:

Notes:

• Vontae Davis played with an ankle injury in the game and then left early with a groin injury, meaning that he only played 41% of the snaps.  That also resulted in Patrick Robinson and Rashaan Melvin playing the majority of the cornerback reps, followed by Darius Butler.
• The two starting inside linebackers, D'Qwell Jackson and Edwin Jackson, tied for the team lead with seven tackles on Sunday.
• The Colts' pass rush was absolutely non-existent on Thursday.  In fact, they recorded exactly one quarterback hit and zero sacks in 54 snaps.  One.  It came on a blitz by safety T.J. Green, and other than that the Colts weren't able to get home to quarterback Ben Roethlisberger whatsoever.  It has been a big problem all year, but perhaps never more so than on Thursday night.

Special Teams:

(Note: Only those playing more than 50% of the special teams snaps appear here, so this is not the entire list):

• Like normal, Matthias Farley and Josh McNary played the most special teams snaps for the Colts.  Farley played 20 and McNary played 19.