The Sam Ehlinger conspiracy theory: Colts offense is about to blow out

Disclaimer: This is a mostly satirical article, not to be taken entirely seriously.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, get ready, because this is now the Sam Ehlinger show. Long gone are the stale days of the Matt Ryan led offense, where if a play resulted in over 10 yards you would gasp in amazement, and going backwards seemed more normal than going forward, because there is a new kid in town, and this kid actually has some legs, and will make us Colts’ fans really happy.

With the move, and the way the start of the season unfolded for the Colts, I started to develop a crazy (perhaps not so crazy) conspiracy theory in my head... what if the offense sucked so bad the past 4 weeks because Reich was orchestrating a new special offense around Sam Ehlinger? And Matt Ryan was just the placeholder until the head-coach was ready to unleash it? The injury to Matt is the perfect excuse to now surprise the league with everything the former Longhorn’s quarterback has to offer.

Of course this is just a theory, but it was certainly surprising watching what was supposed to be an “offensive mastermind” at the helm getting no sort of rythm at all in his offense. There was no creativity, no explosive plays, no new concepts, it was just flat out boring. Think back to all the Frank Reich led offenses before, heck, even Jacoby Brissett instilled more excitement in me than Matty Ice. The Colts offense ranks near the bottom of the league in explosive plays, in total yards, in scoring... and near the top in giveaways, usually not a good combo. Frank Reich clearly has plenty of flaws, but he certainly is a proper offensive playcaller, so that level of sucking has to raise some suspicion...

What I actually think might have happened is that the Colts realized that they had something good in Sam Ehlinger after watching him practice the last two years and seeing him ball out in preseason football. That was probably also a big reason why they decided to go with 3 quarterbacks on the 53-man roster, something that is not common in Frank Reich. Seeing the talent and possibilities to open up the playbook with a mobile athletic quarterback like Sam, other than the statue that is Matt Ryan, Reich was probably salivating at the opportunity to base his offense on RPOs once again, and it has been evident this season that the traditional pocket passer is quickly going out of fashion, as evidenced by the demise of Brady, Cousins, Ryan, and perhaps even Stafford and Wilson.

My thinking is that over the past ³⁄₄ weeks, after realizing that the offense was going nowhere with Ryan at the helm, Reich started devoting most of his time developing the most overpowered, triple-option, RPO based offense, and running it along with Sam, and it was just a matter of time before it was time to unleash it. The Colts have the playmakers at the receiver position, they have the running backs, and the offensive line will not have to stress out so much in pass protection, it is the perfect scheme all around. With the way the defense has been dominating opposing offenses, the Colts dont need to score over 35 points every single game to win, they just need their offense to be serviceable, but I have a hunch it is going to be much better than that. All aboard the Sam Ehlinger Train, it is leaving the station next Sunday, and once it leaves, you will not get another chance to get on board.