HOUSTON – Anthony Richardson completed 10 of 32 passes in the Colts' 23-20 Week 8 loss to the Houston Texans on Sunday, giving him a completion percentage of 32.3 percent on the afternoon.
Among quarterbacks with at least 30 attempts in a game since 2000, Richardson's completion percentage is the third-lowest, about a percentage point higher than what the Texans held Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen to (30 percent) three weeks ago at NRG Stadium.
Also on that list is Richardson's backup, Joe Flacco, who completed 10 of 31 attempts (32.3 percent) in 2011 while with the Baltimore Ravens.
"I don't necessarily look at numbers," Richardson said. "They said oh, (Michael) Vick didn't have a great completion percentage his first couple of years, you know, and he's probably one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever do it. So I don't necessarily look at numbers, I just look at each play for itself."
Richardson on Sunday completed two of 15 passes in the first half – a 12-yard screen to running back Jonathan Taylor and a 69-yard touchdown to a wide-open Josh Downs – but six of those passes traveled at least 20 yards beyond the line of scrimmage. Those are, of course, low-percentage throws – about 38 percent of them have been completed league-wide this year, per Pro Football Focus – but the Texans made them available to Richardson by playing plenty of man-to-man coverage.
"We knew that they were going to try to take away some of the deep shots, but they played us in man," Richardson said. "So we like our matchups, we like our receivers to get open. We just got to execute at the end of the day. But we felt like they gave us opportunities to take advantage of certain things. We tried it, but (it was) just the execution not coming down at the end of the day."
Not all of those early misfires were on Richardson – the Texans forced incompletions on three of them, and the Colts' pass-catchers had a few opportunities to come down with those throws, too.
"We hit the big one early to go up 10-3, and so it was going good," head coach Shane Steichen said. "I think, too, we had a few drops there early. But yeah, we got to keep working through it."
Richardson will enter Week 9 with a completion percentage of 44.4 percent – right around Vick's 44.2 percent mark in 2001, for the record – but inside the Colts' locker room, there's not a focus on their starting quarterback's numbers. Instead, what those guys see is Richardson possessing the right work ethic and mentality – plus the talent and athleticism – to develop into the player they believe he can be this year.
"He's got guys in this locker room that got his back, and we're gonna continue to have his back," defensive tackle DeForest Buckner said. "The kid is a good talent, and he's working his tail off to be the best he can be for this team."
"Just letting him know, listen, we have your back," running back Jonathan Taylor said of his message to Richardson. "We already know. This is not just a one-play, a one-game thing. We're in it for the long haul. We have a goal that we want to achieve, and it's going to take all of us."
Richardson himself hasn't lost confidence, either. As his teammates filed into the locker room at halftime, Richardson greeted each one to let them know: I'm still locked in mentally, let's flush the first half and go try to win this game over the final 30 minutes.
"I'm just letting my squad know I'm still in it, regardless of what happened in the first half," Richardson said. "We didn't really do our best right there, but so what? It was the first half. I told the guys at halftime, don't even worry about the first half, just go out and execute in the second half and be better."
Richardson and the Colts' offense had two opportunities to tie or win the game late in the fourth quarter but were unable to deliver. Defensively, while the Colts were able to get plenty of pressure on Texans quarterback C.J. Stroud, guys on that side of the ball felt like there were plays they left on the field.
And so the overarching message from this team was belief in Richardson, while looking inward to see what they individually could do to better support their 22-year-old quarterback.
"We keep working through the process," Steichen said. "It's a process. We keep grinding through it. We do it together. It's a team game, we grind through those things and we'll get it figured out."
