With the Colts staggering to an 0-2 start to begin the season and pressure mounting on their long-suffering defense and star quarterback Andrew Luck, some have wondered if there could be changes in store.
Coach Chuck Pagano has been even more hands-on with the defense, his specialty, coming into the season, sources said. And much has been made of the chronic turnovers, the inability to stick with the run game and the perpetual issues with pass protection on the other side of the ball.
Should problems persist, however, any shuffling of the coaching staff would have to come from above Pagano. Sources said Pagano does not have the autonomy to hire or fire staff if he sees fit -- not that he would consider any such drastic actions so early in the season.
When Bruce Arians left the Colts to become Arizona’s head coach after the 2012 season, Pagano was pushing for Rob Chudzinski, who would become the Browns head coach, to be offensive coordinator at the time with the Panthers staff in flux and head coach Ron Rivera's job in the balance after GM Marty Hurney was fired and a new regime came in place. Chudzinski ended up getting the Browns head coaching job.
Pagano was overruled, with Pep Hamilton getting the job. Hamilton, who worked with Luck at Stanford, was championed by GM Ryan Grigson, with Pagano not having autonomy of his staff.
Chudzinski was brought in as associate coach a year later when fired by Cleveland and Pagano's preference for him to be running the offense has been widely known within that building for quite some time.
Indianapolis will be under considerable scrutiny as it seeks its first win against a rebuilding Titans team with a rookie quarterback. If the Colts can't eliminate some of the quarterback pressure and become a more balanced offense, then it only stands to reason that more questions will be asked of the coaches and players in the weeks to come.
