This seems like an easy cop-out to me.
Andrew Luck has without a doubt earned the title as leader of the Colts. Luck’s play was more than stellar during the duration of his rookie contract which led to him signing a huge long-term deal with the Colts this offseason. Luck signed a six-year $139.125 million deal which now is being used as the blame for the teams weak defense.
According to ProFootballTalk.com, Colts GM Ryan Grigson told Jay Mohr’s Radio show that the Colts can’t spend as much as they would like on defense.
“When you have to tighten up, once you pay Andrew Luck what we did, it’s going to take some time to build on the other side of the ball.”
I totally understand what Grigson is saying here, Luck’s deal took a big chunk out of the team’s salary cap but it just not an acceptable excuse to me. As the GM, his job is to balance the talent on the team and the amount of money available to pay them. To me he’s saying he’s okay with having a weak defense for the next couple of years because he keep Luck. Colts fans won’t be pleased with this. They like Luck but just 4 games into the season, it’s clear Luck can’t win it by himself.