General manager Chris Ballard and the Colts had no surprises up their sleeves on roster cut-down day. Indianapolis whittled its once 90-man roster down to 53 players by Tuesday’s 4 p.m. EST deadline, solidifying the initial group of players they will roll with to start the 2024 season.
Let’s look deeper into their selections and what they could mean for the upcoming campaign.
No surprise cuts
While cut day inevitably leads to difficult conversations with players, Indianapolis made no cuts that were very noteworthy. The most surprising came in the running back room, where second-year back Evan Hull missed out. Hull had played just eight snaps in his rookie season, registering a single yard, before being shut down with a knee injury.
While he was fully healthy for this year’s camp, it was clear early on that he and Tyler Goodson would be in a battle for the third position on the depth chart as the receiving back in head coach Shane Steichen’s offense.
Hull failed to impress enough in preseason while Goodson was a pleasant surprise, making it a seemingly easy decision for the Colts’ staff to go with Goodson. After all, he does have more experience in the offense than Hull.
Besides that, there were no other cuts worth noting. This is a good sign for Indianapolis heading into an important season, with pressure mounting to return to the playoffs.
With the tight end situation sorted, what’s next for Jelani Woods?
Going into training camp, the tight end position was quite clearly the most competitive battle to watch as there were five capable candidates vying for four spots. However, the unfortunate thing is that Ballard and Steichen’s decision was made much easier due to an injury.
Third-year tight end Jelani Woods, who recently underwent toe surgery and was expected to be out until around Christmas, was placed on season-ending injured reserve as a part of the roster moves Tuesday. There was some thought Indy could use one of its two newly introduced “IR to return” slots, but those went to DE Samson Ebukam and LB Cam McGrone instead.
It’s a crushing outcome for Woods, who will now miss his second consecutive season with an injury as he battled hamstring issues for the entirety of 2023. Instead, the Colts will go with Mo Alie-Cox, Kylen Granson, Drew Ogletree and Will Mallory at tight end in 2024.
With 2025 being a contract year for both Alie-Cox and Granson, Woods will be under tremendous pressure next season to outplay them both and earn more playing time, which will make for a tricky puzzle for Ballard to solve come contract time. But, for now, we have our answer to the most intriguing position battle anywhere on the depth chart.
Plenty of depth in the trenches
Ballard has preached since his introductory press conference in 2018 that the strength of a football team is built on the offensive and defensive lines. That ideology could not be clearer with his decision to keep 10 offensive and ten defensive linemen on the roster for 2024.
Ballard is no stranger to this type of decision, as he’s elected to keep 10 players on each side before, even once taking 11 defensive linemen in 2021. What was more interesting was who he did, and didn’t, elect to keep. On offense, he let go of Jake Witt, a 2023 seventh-round pick at offensive tackle, and to some surprise, kept second-year tackle Blake Freeland after he demonstrated consistent struggle throughout preseason, following up on a less than ideal rookie year. He did elect to keep one of his undrafted free agents, Dalton Tucker out of Marshall, which came as a bit of a surprise due to the overall group of undrafted signings generally underwhelming.
Defensively, Ballard made a few more cuts, letting go of rookie seventh-round defensive tackle Jonah Laulu and third-year tackle Eric Johnson II and kept Taven Bryan, who some thought would be a cut candidate. Clearly, Ballard values Bryan’s experience in defensive coordinator Gus Bradley’s scheme. Time will only tell if Bryan plays significant snaps on the interior this season, as the hope is for new signing Raekwon Davis and second-year tackle Adetomiwa Adebawore to be the main rotational pieces behind starters DeForest Buckner and Grover Stewart.
Gambling at cornerback?
The secondary has been the main talking point this offseason in Indianapolis due to the struggles last year’s group faced, albeit a group of young and inexperienced players. But, it doesn’t seem that Ballard has learned his lesson from the previous campaign, as he has again elected to take just five cornerbacks total, compared to the six he rostered last season.
Dallis Flowers is back from injury, JuJu Brents has continued to have his own battles with them, and Darrell Baker Jr. was one player who opposing offenses constantly picked on in 2023. Could we have seen this coming after the only two moves to address the position were day three draft picks, both of whom did not make the team? Possibly. But the bottom line is that nothing was done to significantly upgrade the position. The Colts are really rolling the dice on the group they selected, and it could end up coming back to bite them.
Quarterbacks as expected
After Jason Bean quickly became a fan favorite in the preseason, some were calling for him to end up on the roster. He did not, as Indianapolis kept the typical three quarterbacks instead of four. This was the expected decision, but it still does confirm that Sam Ehlinger has a strong rapport with Steichen. If he didn’t, the Colts would likely be OK ditching him a year before his contract expires and give Bean a developmental year.
With Bean currently on waivers, along with a large chunk of players left without a team Tuesday, a return to the practice squad is always possible. But it would’ve been more surprising to see him as one of the 53 instead of a scout teamer.
Although Tuesday was the deadline for teams to finalize their initial rosters, they are all just that: initial. With a waiver frenzy coming up soon, players cut Tuesday could end up back with their original teams as front offices do roster gymnastics to end up with the best group of 53 players (and 16 practice squad guys) that they can field going into the 2024 season.
