The Colts' best- and worst-case outcomes for the 2024 season

Hope springs eternal to start every NFL season. But many teams are also just a few wrong moves away from a season headed off the rails.

Every squad has a range of outcomes for how this season can go. It can be a low range for teams consistently on the high end like the Chiefs, Ravens or Eagles; or for those in obvious tear-down rebuilding situations like the Patriots. Most other teams could have a successful or disappointing season based on just a few key factors.

The Colts should be considered one of those teams. In Shane Steichen 's second season, and in what could be the first full season for Anthony Richardson , there's a couple of extreme versions of how this season could go.

Here, we're going to take a look at the high- and low-end outcomes, with some models to help make it more than guesses in the dark:

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Best-case scenario: A trip to the AFC Divisional Round

Two years ago, Steichen had a young dual-threat quarterback on a team that went 9-8 who needed to prove himself as an NFL passer.

That Year 2 starting leap for Jalen Hurts and the Eagles, from a young quarterback and the fast-paced offense around him, is mostly the model the Colts need to pray for this season.

Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts exploded from 26 total touchdowns in 2021 to 35 in 2022. He saw his completion percentage, yards per attempt and yards per game skyrocket in Year 2 of Steichen's system. It came together so well to open up so many avenues for Steichen and the Eagles to kill defenses whether they were in nickel or base personnel and whether they converged on Hurts or Miles Sanders in the backfield that Hurts was able to finish as the MVP runner-up only to Patrick Mahomes.

With that dual-threat skill set that became impossible to game plan for, plus explosive weapons and a defense that was loaded in the window of a rookie quarterback contract, the Eagles were able to jump from that 9-8 finish in 2022 to a 14-3 season that earned the No. 1 seed, two playoff victories and a trip to the Super Bowl.

The model is a good one for Anthony Richardson, Steichen and the Colts after their 9-8 season together, though the high-end upside isn't quite the same.

The Colts didn't take the Eagles' aggressive approach to chasing established stars to fill roster holes like trading for wide receiver A.J. Brown or signing edge rusher Haason Reddick and cornerback James Bradberry. The Eagles manifested a jump in their passing game with a true No. 1 wide receiver in a way the Colts don't quite have, and Philadelphia plugged the weaknesses on defense enough to build the kind of fully rounded team that could secure home-field advantage.

The Colts took the opposite approach by running everything back and adding zero veteran starters, leaving them a weakness in the secondary that a best-case scenario would have as an average unit if everything breaks right in the health of JuJu Brents, Kenny Moore II and Julian Blackmon, plus the ability of Jaylon Jones and Nick Cross to take steps up to become solidified starters.

The other clear difference is that the AFC field is different than when the Eagles beat Daniel Jones and an injured Brock Purdy to reach the Super Bowl. The only quarterbacks to reach the AFC Championship Game since the pandemic started are Mahomes, Joe Burrow, Josh Allen and Lamar Jackson, and it's a step far to think Richardson is quite ready to rise to that level when he's made 17 starts above high school.

But the Richardson-Jonathan Taylor backfield could be one of the most explosive the NFL has ever seen. The Colts are going to run the duo enough to think that 17 games from both isn't realistic even in a perfect scenario. But if they can each play 15 and then be ready for the playoffs, these two athletes who measure at least 225 pounds and run a sub-4.4-second 40-yard dash could combine for one of the most efficient, explosive and best scoring seasons for a backfield ever.

They could give the Colts an identity that teams can't stop and that can also allow Steichen to dictate the pace, tempo and time of possession.

Add in the steady volume of Michael Pittman Jr. and Josh Downs, plus some explosive plays from Adonai Mitchell and Alec Pierce now that they have strong-armed quarterbacks, and this offense could take the league by storm similar to what the Ravens and Lamar Jackson did in his MVP season in 2019, just with more of the star power shifted to Taylor than the quarterback.

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On defense, a pass rush of DeForest Buckner, Laiatu Latu, Kwity Paye, Tyquan Lewis and Dayo Odeyingbo can break the Indianapolis record the Colts set last year for sacks, wrecking some games and creating explosive plays to make up for the ups and downs of the secondary. If Blackmon stays healthy and plays like the Pro Bowler he looked like in training camp, the defense as a whole could finish as a top-half unit.

That can be enough to earn a home playoff game, where this offense with the home crowd and a dome setting in January could torch a traveling opponent. It'd hit a wall on the road against the AFC's monster quarterbacks, but this season could give Richardson and other young players two much-needed playoff games of experience to surge into next season.

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Worse-case scenario: Last place in the AFC South

Have the Colts ever gone 9-8, missed the playoffs by one game, changed out the quarterback and run back the rest of the offense and seen it all go South?

The model for this Colts' season to hit a low floor is from their own 2022 campaign.

The offensive weapons are clearly better now, and the quarterback has more in his toolbox, but this year's version also didn't invest in Stephon Gilmore, Yannick Ngakoue and Rodney McLeod on defense. In fact, the only veteran outside acquisition to that side of the ball was backup nose tackle Raekwon Davis.

The similarity between 2024 and 2022 is in how general manager Chris Ballard is placing a bet on a critical position group without any additions and expecting internal growth to be the solution. He did it in 2022 with the offensive line, moving a right guard in Matt Pryor to left tackle and a center in Danny Pinter to right guard, only for those moves to drag the collective all season.

This year, Ballard's placing a similar bet on his secondary, which got exposed late last season for its youth, and he's expecting a little less youth to be the solution. He again has three stalwarts he trusts in Kenny Moore II, Blackmon and JuJu Brents, much like he did with the 2022 offensive line with Quenton Nelson, Ryan Kelly and Braden Smith.

But, like in 2022, Nick Cross mixing and matching positions could spring a similar leak that overextends Moore, Blackmon and Brents, who also combine for 38 career missed games.

The depth in the secondary is so concerning, given that they have five total cornerbacks and one of whom is coming off an Achilles tear in Dallis Flowers, that it's possible another injury or two places this group in a scrambling spot early in the year like it was with that 2022 offensive line. On a schedule that begins with C.J. Stroud, Jordan Love and Caleb Williams and later sees Aaron Rodgers, Josh Allen, Tua Tagovailoa, Stroud again and Trevor Lawrence twice...

It could get rough enough that the explosive plays allowed overwhelm solid performances in other areas, especially if these opposing quarterbacks get on the same game plan to throwing so quick that they negate the talents of the Colts pass rush.

Steichen proved last season that he's highly adaptable to losing great players on offense, and he'll likely find a way to be productive with Joe Flacco and a rotating cast of running backs if the worst strikes and Richardson and Taylor combine to miss more than half the season together. But he'll lose the upside of those explosive athletes, which could be necessary to answer the scores a leaky secondary allows. And when Richardson is out there, a young quarterback trying to develop healthy habits could fall into bad ones if he's forced to be the hero for a defense that can't hold up.

A couple of injuries would create some more concern on offense: If Pittman were to go down for his first lengthy absence since his 2020 rookie season, the Colts don't have an established player on the outside, where Downs isn't an option. And if Smith struggles with injuries again this season, the Colts don't have another tackle option to feel good about.

The Colts play in a division with three teams that made aggressive moves to improve this offseason, from the Texans adding Stefon Diggs, Joe Mixon and Danielle Hunter to the Jaguars acquiring Arik Armstead to the Titans bringing in Calvin Ridley, L'Jarius Sneed and Quandre Diggs. They could all be better, especially in the passing game, which could combine with an emergency in the Colts' secondary to sink Indianapolis to last place in the division like in 2022.

It seems unlikely that owner Jim Irsay would go on a firing spree to the same level. The worst-case here is a more normal bad season, which produces more than four wins but can still finish in last place if the Texans, Jaguars and Titans all take a step as the Colts go neutral.

Contact Nate Atkins at natkins@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter @NateAtkins_.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: The Colts' best- and worst-case outcomes for the 2024 season