INDIANAPOLIS – "I'm just trying to not screw it up. That's all."
Well Matt Hasselbeck, I guess you are doing a pretty good job of that.
Hasselbeck's post-game comments on Sunday in trying to asses his play this season were accurate, but it doesn't even begin to tell the entire story of what he has meant to the Colts in 2015.
While backup quarterbacks around the league are struggling mightily, Hasselbeck is undefeated in four NFL starts, the latest coming in a 315-yard, two-touchdown outing in the Colts 25-12 victory on Sunday afternoon.
"It was an amazing experience to see him," Bucs quarterback Jameis Winston, some 19 years younger than his opposing signal caller, said on Sunday.
Winston wasn't done in talking about the man he just shook his hands with at midfield.
"A straight surgeon," Winston said in describing Hasselbeck. "He's been doing it for a long time, so that's expected coming from him. He played a great game."
On Sunday, Hasselbeck's precision led to the Colts seeing six of their 10 offensive drives end in points.
The day included some first-half struggles for Hasselbeck and the offense, stuff that was resolved at halftime.
A first half of playing "too safe", which Hasselbeck admitted after the game isn't the smartest statement when you don't turn the ball over, eventually opened things up for the offense following halftime.
With Hasselbeck distributing the ball to eight different pass catchers, the Colts playmakers flourished with the ball in their hands.
"For us the main thing, once you get us the ball, we are able to make plays and that's what he's doing," T.Y. Hilton, who finished Sunday with six receptions for 95 yards and two touchdowns, said of Hasselbeck after the victory.
In moving to 4-0 this season, Hasselbeck is now the first quarterback in NFL history to win his first four starts at the age of 40.
Sitting at 0-2, and then again at 3-5, the Colts desperately needed Hasselbeck.
As the game balls and victories keep coming Hasselbeck's way, here's a 40-year-old quarterback ascending at an age guys just don't produce like he's doing.
"I will say that being up here (in Indianapolis)," Hasselbeck said after the game trying to sum up his play in 2015, "this is my third year here now, practicing with Andrew Luck---he's a really good player and a very, very hard worker. They coach him hard, and he asks to be coached hard. I do believe that I've gotten better being coached hard and being around him.
"I came here kind of thinking, 'What else could you know, what else can you do to the man or zone or this kind of thing?' I've learned a lot of football here. I think I've gotten better just being around him and this coaching staff."
And the Colts have gotten better thanks to Hasselbeck.
