Head coach Shane Steichen's Indianapolis Colts are in the midst of an NFL-long nine-game losing streak.
The Indianapolis Colts have now lost nine consecutive games dating back to last season after falling 33-30 to the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday. That makes it a whopping 316 days since the Colts’ last victory. Of those nine losses, six of them were one-score games.
This team's mantra coming into the year was to “find a way.” Owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon made the decision to run back the braintrust from last season with that simple message. Find a way to fight through adversity and grind out some of these wins that they failed to do last season. Through two games in 2026, the only thing the Colts have found a way to do is lose.
This loss to the Chiefs is indicative of head coach Shane Steichen’s career with the Colts. An incredible offensive performance against one of the better defensive minds in the league that fell short due to poor defensive play (throughout the game) and game management late in the game. While Steichen still deserves praise for his ability to generate points without wide receiver Alec Pierce, the late-game management fell apart yet again.
The baffling part of how Steichen manages these close games is that he’s watching the same games that everyone else is. He knows the strength of this team, since he was hired, has always been with the offense, and the glaring weakness has been the defense. Even with that knowledge, he consistently relies on his defense to make plays that they simply have never been able to make in his tenure.
Take the Seattle Seahawks game last season. The Colts are grinding out a tough one against the eventual Super Bowl champions on the road with Philip Rivers at quarterback. The Colts were playing with house money at that point, and the game came down to a 4th-and-3 situation at the Seahawks’ 42-yard line with 52 seconds left.
Steichen had two options at that moment: attempt a franchise-record field goal attempt with Blake Grupe in the rain in Seattle or go for it on fourth down and put the game in your offense’s hands. Steichen elected for the conservative approach with the field goal attempt, which actually worked, until the Seahawks went right down the field in 50 seconds to kick the game-winning field goal moments later.
It’s easy to say in hindsight that Steichen was right to rely on his defense in a low-scoring affair, but leaving the game up to chance when your defense was starting Johnathan Edwards and Mekhi Blackmon at cornerback is the root of the issue. He had full faith in Grupe making a kick that has never been made in franchise history. He had faith in the defense (somehow) stopping the Seahawks at that moment. But he didn’t have faith in his offense to get three yards to completely ice the game?
Flashes of that Seahawks game came to mind twice last night. With 40 seconds left in the game, in a night where the defense couldn’t stop a nosebleed, the Colts faced a 4th-and-4 decision from midfield. The Chiefs still had three timeouts left, but a conversion here would have put the team in the driver's seat to kick a game-winning field goal.
Instead of having faith in his offense, a unit that scored 30 points without Pierce, Steichen elected to punt it back to one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history, and they were lucky that Chiefs head coach Andy Reid didn’t opt for an aggressive approach after the punt. This led to the game going to overtime and the Colts facing another key situation late.
The Colts hit an explosive pass to Laquon Treadwell in overtime to set them up with a 1st-and-10 inside the red zone. The Colts just needed a touchdown to win the game, so the clock simply didn’t matter in this situation. After two inexplicable runs to start the series and a Jones scramble on third down, the Colts faced a 4th-and-8 with the game on the line.
In almost any other situation, the right call is to kick it and go for the tie. It’s rare to convert a 4th-and-8 in the NFL, especially with Pierce out of the lineup. But last night, a kick essentially meant conceding the game. The Colts' defense wouldn’t have stopped Pat O’Neal Riley at quarterback in that situation, let alone Pat Mahomes.
The game went exactly as expected after that field goal. Mahomes and running back Kenneth Walker III effortlessly drove down the field and set up the game-winning field goal with time expiring. Going for it on 4th-and-8 would have been a gutsy call, no doubt about it, but it would have been the better option than conceding defeat like the Colts did last night.
Steichen is an excellent offensive coach who has been able to maximize the talent he’s been given, so why does he never trust his offense to go out and win the game? He’ll trust the defense to do something they are completely incapable of doing. He’ll even trust his kickers to make record-breaking kicks in clutch moments. But his offense can’t get three yards to ice the game? Couldn't they get four yards near the end of regulation last night?
Steichen’s days are numbered with the Colts for a multitude of reasons, but his lack of faith in his offense (and his overwhelming faith in the lesser units on this team) will be one of his biggest downfalls in retrospect.
