INDIANAPOLIS – The Colts will be donning their white jerseys in Saturday night's preseason home opener against the Ravens.
At Thursday's final practice of the week, we saw Butler basketball coach Chris Holtmann in attendance with some members of his coaching staff.
Looking ahead to Saturday night, Chuck Pagano has laid out some specific injury updates on the defensive side of the ball.
INJURY NEWS
The following players did not appear to be practicing on Thursday: DE-Henry Anderson (knee), CB-Jalil Brown (foot), CB-Darius Butler (hamstring), DE-Kendall Langford (knee), WR-Marcus Leak (quad), ILB-Sio Moore (hamstring) and OLB-Robert Mathis (rest). WR-Chester Rogers (undisclosed) was wearing a red practice jersey.
Also on Thursday, Pagano announced the following players will not play in Saturday's preseason home opener: Anderson, Brown, Butler, Geathers, Langford, Leak and Moore.Chuck Pagano on the progress of Henry Anderson and getting him off the PUP list:
"He's doing really good, so I think we are close. We just have to make a decision what we want to do.
"Basically the doctors have said, 'When you guys feel good about it, we can get him off PUP.'"
Bowen's Analysis:* *Watching Henry Anderson at Training Camp (in Anderson), you could see this on the horizon. Anderson was moving like a guy ready for contact. It looks like some form of that could be coming at him, in practice, very soon.
The Colts' regular season opener is three weeks from Sunday. Getting Anderson back to practice next week would leave the Colts plenty of time to increase his reps, get an extended look at him, and then ultimately make a decision on---is the promising defensive end ready for Week One? The good news on the Anderson rehab schedule continues.
Chuck Pagano on the progress of Clayton Geathers:
"He's doing well. He just saw the docs, did a re-check, and everything looks good.
"They are going to ramp up his rehab and he will start doing a little bit more from a field activity type stuff."
Bowen's Analysis: Seen on Wednesday, Geathers was still wearing a walking boot on his injured foot. Pagano's words indicate that boot is coming off in the near future.
Now for those trying to compare the chances for Anderson and Geathers to be ready for Week One, let's not go down that road. These are two totally different injuries, completely different rehab schedules and obviously different players. When Geathers is fully healthy, we will have to see where T.J. Green's introduction to an NFL starting safety is going. Would the Colts want to utilize each of them in specific roles this season? That seems to be likely.
Chuck Pagano on how much the starters will play this weekend:
"I'd like to get at least a quarter, maybe a quarter and a half."
Bowen's Analysis: Look for the bulk of the starting units to play right around a quarter on Saturday night. Guys like Ryan Kelly, T.J. Green, etc. might see a little more playing time. That rep number will obviously fluctuate as the game progresses.
Andrew Luck is clearly the name to watch on Saturday night. Don't forget about a little time for Frank Gore and Robert Mathis. Could we also see Arthur Jones, D'Joun Smith and Tevin Mitchel make their 2016 debuts?
