The Indianapolis Colts have a well-documented offensive position battle headed into the 2025 NFL season. Maybe it doesn’t get the attention it deserves since it doesn’t (shouldn’t) affect anyone’s fantasy football team. But, there is a major decision the Colts are going to have to make between Anthony Richardson and Daniel Jones.
And Pro Football Focus agrees, listing the quarterback competition as one of their “10 preseason position battles to watch” this year.”
“Inconsistency and injuries have left Anthony Richardson trailing in the Colts’ quarterback competition heading into training camp, and a recent setback with his shoulder could further hinder his chances,” Mason Cameron of PFF writes. “With Richardson sidelined, Daniel Jones is reportedly emerging as the early favorite to win the starting job.”
He’s right and it probably isn’t the explanation Colts fans want to hear. Of course they want Richardson to win because he’s the young, highly touted guy they drafted to be a superstar. So far, he’s been anything but. Jones is the safer bet, but his ceiling is pretty apparent at this point and it’s far from drool-inducing.
“While Jones faced his share of criticism during his time in New York, he demonstrated competence when operating within structure,” Cameron continues. “Before being benched and ultimately released last season, he earned an 83.2 PFF passing grade when kept clean — a sign that he can succeed in the right system.”
New York Giants fans would disagree with that, although outside of Saquon Barkley, he really had nothing to work with during his time there.
So what is Jones’ ceiling?
After being drafted No. 6 overall in 2019 as the quarterback of the future, Jones showed relatively quickly that he was never going to be “the guy.” Sure, he threw for 3,027 yards, 24 touchdowns and 12 interceptions in 12 starts in his rookie year, but the lowly Giants still were just 3-9 under his command.
But, in 2022, Jones led the G-Men to a 9-6-1 record and a playoff win, so maybe there was some hope. He completed 67.2% of his passes for 3,205 yards and 15 picks that season, which is solid. So far, that’s been the high-water mark of his career and unless something changes for him in Indianapolis, that might end up being the lone bright spot for his career when all is said and done.
That’s not to say he can’t flourish in head coach Shane Steichen’s offense. It’s a change of scenery (the few games last year with the Minnesota Vikings don’t count because he didn’t play a down) and there is no telling that he can’t pull a Sam Darnold, because Sam Darnold even pulled a Sam Darnold last year and Jones witnessed it firsthand in Minnesota.
He’ll have a running game, but detractors would say he had six years of Barkley and still didn’t produce, so there’s that. But, he absolutely has an upgrade in receivers with the Colts as the Giants avoided wide receiver talent like the plague for years until drafting Malik Nabers last year.
It’s okay to be the quarterback that needs an incubator (see: Kerry Collins, Giants fans) and maybe the Colts will provide one. But sadly, this 2020 video from a game against the Philadelphia Eagles kind of sums up his career. If Colts fans haven’t seen it, then let me introduce you to Daniel Jones:
The Giants were bent over a barrel on Jones
Following the 2021 season, the Giants declined Jones’ fifth-year option which was available to them as a former first-round pick. It was the right move, but it ended up biting them in the backside a bit.
After the Giants won a playoff game and Jones looked like he might be turning a corner, it was contract time. The fifth-year option would have been perfect, but they already declined it the year before. So, they could have franchised him, but they didn’t. Instead, they opted for a long-term deal of four years, $160 million.
It was a bad idea at the time and it turned out as badly as it sounds. Jones was never worth that kind of money, but that doesn’t affect the Colts. Maybe they can take solace in the fact that he was once thought of (briefly) as a $40 million quarterback and they now have him on a one-year, $14 million prove-it deal.
It’s pretty well accepted that Richardson is the upside guy in the position battle, but perhaps it’s actually Jones. At least he’s shown that he can have some success in the NFL and Richardson absolutely has not.
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