A Rundown of Today's Happenings at Colts
Practice
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THE NEXT STEP
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Jacob Tamme knows he can do better.
Which is why the second-year tight end is not content with his solid performance from Thursday night's preseason game against the Philadelphia Eagles.
The main focus after the game was how well the first-unit offense played. But another storyline, which drew some much-deserved attention, was Tamme, who helped get the star-studded offense rolling.
The tight end began the game lined up as a receiver in the slot, and took the first play from scrimmage 12 yards after catching a short screen pass from quarterback Peyton Manning. From there, the Colts drove the ball all the way to Philadelphia's 18-yard line.
On first down, Manning looked for Tamme once again. This time, the tight end was in the end zone. Tamme jumped into the air to snare Manning's pass and got two hands on the ball – only to have an Eagles defender strip the ball out of his grasp.
It was the only blemish on an almost-perfect game for Tamme – he pulled in a team-high five receptions to go along with 60 reception yards – but it showed the tight end there is always room for improvement.
"I got a chance to make some plays and I did some good things. (But) I also had some mistakes that we have to get corrected," Tamme said.
Like the offense as a whole, Tamme played well Thursday.
"But there's a lot of little things that we can improve on, myself included," he said.
Head Coach Jim Caldwell said fans got a glimpse Thursday night "of what (Tamme) is capable of doing."
"When he was in college, he was a guy that certainly got the ball quite a bit and ran well with it afterwards," Caldwell said.
In college, Tamme recorded 133 receptions, the most in Kentucky school history for a tight end and the second-most in Southeastern Conference history.
Tamme showed that type of ability against the Eagles, taking several short passes over the middle for extra yards, including a 23-yard pass from quarterback Curtis Painter in the second quarter.
"He's a guy that's a threat down the field and also very, very good at intermediate pass cuts as well."
And thanks to his size – 6'3" and 236 pounds – Caldwell said defenders do not always catch on how to how fast Tamme actually is.
"If he gets the right matchups, he can obviously give you some problems."
NOT RULING HIM OUT, NOT RULING HIM IN
Colts quarterback Jim Sorgi would love nothing more than to get back on the field. And if it just so happened it came in the form of a homecoming – well, that would be even better.
The Colts backup quarterback steadily has been working his way back into playing shape after suffering a hamstring injury in the middle of training camp.
After returning to practice with the Colts Saturday, Sorgi said he is "not totally back," but is starting to make his way back into the swing of things.
"He's been slowly doing a few things," Caldwell said. "He's been throwing the ball a little bit, but hasn't gotten to the point yet where he's doing a lot of running. I would expect that (the training staff) will ramp up his activity this week."
Caldwell and Sorgi both said they are taking a wait-and-see approach in terms of whether Sorgi will play in the team's third preseason game on the road against the Detroit Lions next Saturday.
"I'm not ruling it out, I'm not ruling it in," Sorgi said. "I'm just going day-by-day and seeing how it feels tomorrow after what I did today, and try and go out there Tuesday and go through a full practice and see how it feels after that."
"But if things keep progressing the way they have, I think there is a good chance."
As an added bonus, Sorgi hails from Fraser, Mich., just 20 miles outside of Detroit. He said he has a lot of family and friends who will be in attendance Saturday, which is giving him a little extra motivation to come back against the Lions. But even if he is forced to sit out for the third time this preseason, Sorgi plans on making the trip to Michigan.
"Even if I'm not playing, I'm going," Sorgi said. "That's one thing quarterbacks around here do. I've got work to do even if I'm not playing. So, either way, I'm going to be there."
PERSONNEL MOVES
On Saturday, the Colts re-signed RB-Walter Mendenhall, who was with the team during training camp, and DB-Marcus Paschal. To make room for the roster additions, the Colts waived QB-Chris Crane and LB-Adam Seward.
