INDIANAPOLIS – In the 40 years Jim Irsay stood at the top of the Colts’ franchise, the team’s late-owner witnessed six starts of 8-2 or better.
Only two of those teams made a trip to the Super Bowl.
One hoisted the Lombardi Trophy.
The lesson?
“He’d tell us to finish.”
It’s a sentiment that lives deep and is spread wide throughout the locker room of the 8-2 Colts, who visit the three-time defending AFC champion Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday at Arrowhead Stadium. The Chiefs are sitting outside the AFC’s playoff picture in ninth with just a 46% chance to make the postseason with seven games to go – and just a 26% chance, should they lose at home on Sunday.
“I think (Irsay would) be proud of us, and he’d tell us not to be content. The most important week is the next week. He’d know it’s a long season, and we know it too,” Quenton Nelson told IndyStar on Friday. “But I think he’d be happy with what we’ve done so far.
“Our mantra this year has been ‘Win for Jim.’ It just means more.”
What this 2025 Colts team, led by coach Shane Steichen and longtime general manager Chris Ballard – who entered this season on the hotseat following a 17-17 start in two seasons together – has done thus far is sprint out the gates paced by a high-powered offense reminiscent of the days of Peyton, Edge, Marvin and Reggie.
Just through Week 10, this group had won as many – if not more – games than six of the teams over the previous decade – during a span when the Colts haven’t won an AFC South title.
“I think Mr. Irsay would allude to going and winning the division first. The AFC South is what he really cared about. Being a player over the years and seeing and hearing how he spoke about the AFC South has been so important,” Kenny Moore II said this week. “We just wanna make him proud every day. We put in the work to make him proud.
“He’s got some great daughters here all the time, and we want to be able to play for him and his daughters and everything that the horseshoe represents.”
Those division titles are merely the jumping-off point. During the Manning era, they were the floor of what a potentially successful season began with. The Colts won the AFC South seven times over an eight-year span from 2003-2010, all but one where they won at least 12 games.
In five of those seasons, the Colts started at least 8-2, as they have this year – including 9-0 (2006), 13-0 (2005) and 14-0 (2009).
And yet, four times over that stretch, Indianapolis’ postseason run ended with a first-round playoff exit.
“If I knew Mr. Irsay, he’d tell us to finish. He knows they won a bunch of games here, and he’s been disappointed at the end, so I think the biggest thing would be about building and continuing to take advantage of every opportunity and never let our foot off the gas and continue to push ourselves to be the best version of ourselves,” veteran Colts linebacker Zaire Franklin said this week.
Said Steichen: “It’s been huge playing for him this year. It’s meant a lot to this team and this organization. He’s done so much for this organization and this city, and to play for something greater; I think it’s human nature, and it brings out the best in everybody, knowing what he’s done for so many people, this team, these players.”
Hours after the end of last season, Irsay released a statement on social media announcing that the franchise would retain Ballard and Steichen, despite a 4-6 limp to the finish that left them 8-9, featuring a Week 17 lowlight loss to the 3-14 New York Giants as the Colts’ playoff hopes held on by a thread. They closed the season two games out of the franchise’s first playoff berth in four years.
The Colts haven’t won a playoff game since 2018 – a resounding double-digit road win over the Texans in the Wild Card round – and the city of Indianapolis hasn’t witnessed one inside Lucas Oil Stadium since the Colts’ thumping of the Bengals in the Wild Card round in 2014.
Those streaks – and more – stand to be snapped in less than two months, but with perhaps the NFL’s toughest schedule remaining – including road trips to Kansas City and Seattle, a Monday Night Football showdown against Kyle Shanahan’s 49ers and four divisional games – nothing is certain. The Colts’ 93% chance to make the playoff by The New York Times’ playoff simulator is less than it was in 2021 when they embarrassingly dropped back-to-back games against the Raiders and Jaguars to miss the postseason.
This is the vision Irsay wrote of, longtime Colt wide receiver and now assistant coach Reggie Wayne said this week, when Irsay wrote this postseason statement to frustrated Colts fans in January: “There’s a high standard in this city for our team and anyone who steps on the field wearing the Horseshoe. The expectation is to win our division and compete for championships. Just being on the doorstep of the playoffs is not the standard I expect, nor what you deserve. We understand that and always accept that challenge.
“Believe me, I know you share my impatience and frustration. … More than anything, we want to reward you with division titles and playoff runs, and we’ve fallen short in the most painful ways possible.”
It’s a reminder of Irsay’s promise, as well as his dedication and fierce love of this franchise, and his deep yearning to see it rise to the top again, is seen daily by those at the team’s practice facility through the ‘JI’ patches frequently seen throughout the locker room. They mourn and honor Irsay’s impact, success and memory. They’re the physical reminder of the expectations he holds, even in death.
“This is the vision he always had in his telescope. He expected this team to be very competitive and successful and to be able to play together, to play for one another,” Wayne said this week. “I think he’d be proud – well, in his eyes, he’d think we should be undefeated.”
The Colts’ Ring of Honor member stopped and shared a hearty laugh with a scrum of media members.
“But it’s been awesome to see everyone come together playing for him, making this a great season. Hopefully we can finish the right way,” continued Wayne, who was then asked about the importance of the team’s in memoriam jersey patches.
“If it was up to me, those would be there forever.”
Joel A. Erickson and Nathan Brown cover the Colts all season. Get more coverage on IndyStarTV and with the Colts Insider newsletter.
