Most essential Colts, No. 1: Matt Ryan brings Super Bowl aspirations to a talented team
In a salary-cap league like the NFL, finding building blocks is essential. As teams churn and burn the roster through the draft and bargain signings in free agency, it helps to find the players who are either a cut above the rest or can perform a task few others can. They bring security and relieve the pressure on everyone.
Over the next two weeks, we'll be ranking the 10 most essential players to the Colts' success in 2022. It's a subjective process, weighing factors such as ability, positional value within a scheme, age, leadership and durability.
To make it simpler, we're asking the following two questions about these players:
1. How difficult would he be to replace for more than a month?
2. What does the Colts' 2022 ceiling become if this player hits his?
Today, we finish up the list with No. 1, Matt Ryan.
Here's the final top 10:
Just missed: Nyheim Hines, Julian Blackmon, Ryan Kelly, Kwity Paye
10. Braden Smith, right tackle
7. Stephon Gilmore, cornerback
5. Yannick Ngakoue, defensive end
4. DeForest Buckner, defensive tackle
3. Michael Pittman Jr., wide receiver
2. Jonathan Taylor, running back
1. Matt Ryan, quarterback
Position: Quarterback
Age: 37
Experience: 15th NFL season, 1st with Colts
Accolades: 222 starts in 222 games, 59,735 yards, 367 TDs, 170 INTs, 65.5% completions, 4 Pro Bowls, 1 MVP
2021 stats: 17 games, 3,968 yards, 20 TDs, 12 INTs, 67% completions
Why he's here: The top spot on this list should come as no surprise. In a quarterback league, the man behind center will be the most important on almost every team. That's certainly true for the Colts, a team on its fifth passer in five years, desperate for someone to stop the wheel from spinning.
That's the hope with Matt Ryan. The Colts feel over the moon to have landed him, which only happened once the Falcons created a situation with their pursuit of Deshaun Watson. Ryan was intrigued by the other players on this list and what they could potentially do together.
He knows he holds the keys to this ship. And his teammates know it, too.
"Quarterback play is everything," Nyheim Hines said. "We’re going to have great quarterback play this year."
Ryan is 37 now. He's not in his prime, like most of the players on this list, but he's not that much from it either. His arm still looks lively and accurate. He's playing the way aging quarterbacks do, with his mind in order to spare his legs. He's still potentially a top-10 quarterback, and for as long as that's the case, he'll be No. 1 on this list.
As an aging quarterback, he needs a good team around him, and that's what's been missing from his life the past three seasons. The Falcons started a rebuild before they'd found a new quarterback, and they finished in the bottom two in rushing offense and defensive DVOA last season. That's why you didn't hear a lot about Ryan.
But his team still won seven games, and it was thanks largely to the man behind center. He was throwing to a running back, a rookie tight end and a wide receiver named Justin Gage, and he still managed to complete 67% of his passes, a tick above his absurd 65.5% career rate.
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Ryan has been to the places the Colts want to go, having started a Super Bowl as well as nine other postseason games. No other player on their offense has been to the Super Bowl, and the receiver room tops out at 25 years old. The whole system is built around Ryan lifting young players toward their personal ceilings with steadiness, accuracy, intelligence and vibrato.
If he's able to find something like that in himself, he will give the Colts the balance they desperately needed in the second half last season, when teams were gunning to stop Taylor. They'll see a career year out of Michael Pittman Jr., who models his game after Julio Jones. They'll capitalize on a defense that has such a penchant for forcing turnovers.
With Ryan at the helm, the Colts should have the best quarterback in the AFC South. Winning the division would mean hosting a playoff game, where Ryan can transfer the confidence he has in the playoffs to his teammates with a home victory.
If he isn't that guy any more, if age takes its toll, or if he were to get hurt, the Colts would be back in the spin cycle. They'd cease being a contender, regardless of what the other players on this list do.
The path is here for the Colts to chase the biggest stage out there, and that's why players are living their best lives this spring. They know what's changed.
Contact Colts insider Nate Atkins at natkins@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter @NateAtkins_.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Colts: Why Matt Ryan is No. 1 among most essential players
