INDIANAPOLIS — The Indianapolis Colts today officially began on-field preparations for Sunday's Week 3 contest against the New York Jets. What were some of the top takeaways on the day?
Injury report
Here is today's injury report, the first of the week for the Colts:
Adams to miss some time
We learned earlier in the week that safety Malik Hooker was done for the season with an Achilles injury, while wide receiver Parris Campbell is, at the very least, expected to miss a significant amount of time with a knee injury after both players exited last Sunday's victory over the Minnesota Vikings.
Both Hooker and Campbell have since been placed on injured reserve.
Also injured that game was linebacker Matthew Adams, who suffered an ankle injury on a Nyheim Hines punt return play in the second quarter and did not return.
Head coach Frank Reich confirmed today that Adams is "probably going to miss a couple weeks" of action.
The third-year Houston product is a key piece of depth at linebacker for the Colts, as well as a major special teams contributor. Others at the linebacker position who could see added opportunities are Zaire Franklin, Jordan Glasgow and E.J. Speed.
In other Colts injury-related news, both tight end Jack Doyle and cornerback Rock Ya-Sin did not practice on Wednesday.
Doyle (knee) initially appeared on the team's injury report a week ago, and did not participate in all three days of practice before being ruled out prior to last Sunday's game against the Vikings.
Reich had said last Friday the initial belief was that Doyle was going to miss multiple weeks, but that because he was "making good progress" at the time it was too early to give a more exact timetable for his potential return.
Ya-Sin, meanwhile, was a last-minute addition to the Colts' inactives list Sunday just before kickoff against the Vikings after he was taken to a local hospital to be evaluated for what was initially described as a stomach illness. Reich said Monday that, "After being evaluated at the hospital yesterday, Rock was diagnosed with a non-football-related illness. Not going to go into the details of that right now, but it's too early to tell what his status will be for this week."
With Ya-Sin out against the Vikings, the Colts utilized Xavier Rhodes, T.J. Carrie and Isaiah Rodgers at cornerback opposite starter Kenny Moore II throughout the ballgame. The team on Tuesday also elevated cornerback Tremon Smith to the active roster from the practice squad.
Familiarity on both sides
There will be a ton of familiarity on both sides of the coin in Sunday's matchup, as the Jets feature a 53-man roster with several former Colts players, including: defensive end Henry Anderson, center/guard Josh Andrews, edge rusher Tarell Basham, cornerback Pierre Desir, safety Matthias Farley, running back Frank Gore, cornerback Nate Hairston, long snapper Thomas Hennessy and cornerback Quincy Wilson.
The Jets also have former Colts wide receiver Donte Moncrief and tight end Ross Travis on their practice squad.
So what does this mean, exactly?
While he doesn't feel as if it'll make a huge difference when it actually comes down to what they're expecting out of the Jets — or what they think the Jets will expect out of them — Reich can still acknowledge the abnormal nature of so many former players, many of whom were on the Colts within the last year or two, being on the other sideline.
"I can honestly say I've never had this experience," Reich said. "(Colts Communications') Matt (Conti) just gave me the combined list, and, I mean, it's amazing — and a lot of good players, a lot of good guys.
"I don't know every one of those guys, but I know most of them and they were good players for us and they're good players for the Jets," Reich continued. "We knew when some of these guys departed they'd still be playing and being productive and playing good football."
As for altering the gameplan?
"I should put it this way: we'll do just enough to complement things that they may know or personnel things that they may think or know to keep them off balance," Reich said. "We'll try our best to do that."
Situational improvements
The Colts have prided themselves under Reich as being one of the better situational teams in the league.
Over the 2018 and 2019 seasons combined, the Colts converted 45.1 percent of their opportunities on third down, which ranked third in the NFL over that span; only the Kansas City Chiefs (47.4 percent) and Baltimore Ravens (45.9 percent) were better.
The Colts also ranked fifth (67.14 percent) and seventh (64.29 percent), respectively, in 2018 and 2019 when it came to red zone touchdown scoring percentage.
But those areas have certainly not been strengths for the Colts through their first two games this season; they currently rank 31st in the league in third down conversion percentage (30.43) and 28th in red zone touchdown scoring percentage (44.44).
While two games is certainly not enough of a sample size to make any drastic changes, Reich said today that he's been discussing each opportunity with offensive coordinator Nick Sirianni and figuring out how to make those percentages increase moving forward.
"We're still so early in the year that you don't have a lot of attempts," Reich said. "So every missed attempt, as far as the percentage (is concerned), is going to hurt you more.
"We talk about it all the time, about staying in phase all the time, but especially in the red zone," Reich continued. "We put a big emphasis in the red zone. Like, we don't mind being 2nd and 8 — let's just get positive plays. The one thing we don't want to end up is 3rd and long in the red zone. That's tough sledding. So we've gotta do a better job there. We have talked about it a lot, but it's definitely an area of improvement."
