Two days after being informed the Colts were naming Sam Ehlinger as their starting quarterback, Matt Ryan stood in front of his locker at the Indiana Farm Bureau Football Center and expressed his individual and personal disappointing with losing his QB1 status – but also what his mindset would be moving forward.
“I’ve always preached that you’ve got to accept and embrace the role that they decide for you and try to be the best in that role that you be,” Ryan said. “And that’s what I’ll do.”
Ryan spent the next few weeks rehabbing his right shoulder, which was injured in the Colts’ Week 7 loss to the Tennessee Titans, and doing what he could to help Ehlinger throughout the week and on gamedays. What he didn’t do was mentally check out or become a malcontent.
“It’s probably natural to do that in those situations,” Ryan said. “But from the people I trust and the advice I got from people outside of the building I talked to is, the one constant is you can’t assume anything in this league. You can’t make the assumption that you know how things are going to shake out. You just don’t. You just keep that mindset that you don’t know how the week’s going to shake out. You try to get yourself in a good space mentally and physically, and I think part of that, rehabbing during that time of trying to feel better and get myself to a good place kind of helped me through that.”
In part because he maintained a high level of professionalism and perspective, interim head coach Jeff Saturday felt comfortable about going back to Ryan as the Colts’ starting quarterback for Week 10. In the whirlwind of last week, Saturday had a conversation with Ryan to gauge the veteran quarterback’s physical and mental state, and came out of it confident Ryan was not only engaged, but ready to play if asked.
“15 years in the league and getting benched and all the other things that subsequently went with that, just wanted to make sure he was in the right frame of mind,” Saturday said. “And listen, he’s a…
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