The Indianapolis Colts are retaining general manager Chris Ballard for the 2025 NFL season, so I’m sure the question on the mind of just about everyone is, why?
By now, we are all quite familiar with Ballard’s track record at the helm of this team, so I will bypass that information and dive into what my best guess is as to why Ballard is returning.
And that’s something to be mindful of here–this is just a guess on my part and not the only possible factor at play. In Jim Irsay’s letter to Colts fans, he mentioned things evolving quickly in the NFL from week to week and season to season as a reason that he remains optimistic. But obviously, there is more that went into this decision.
I think the timeline here is important, and by timeline, I mean having the GM, head coach, and quarterback–the pillars of every franchise–on the same track.
Had the Colts moved on from Ballard but kept Shane Steichen and Anthony Richardson for 2025–which seemed to be the case–the incoming GM would have inherited both the coach and quarterback.
In that scenario, if things go poorly in 2025, now that new GM is bringing in his own head coach and quarterback for the 2026 season. We saw something similar happen when Ballard was hired as the GM and he kept Chuck Pagano for one year before ultimately letting him go.
On the flip side, by retaining Ballard, Steichen, and Richardson, if the team struggles this upcoming season, the Colts will have the opportunity to start fresh in 2026 with a new trio at those positions.
In addition to that, a full reboot of the entire roster at that point becomes much more in play from a salary cap perspective, with the Colts able to move on from a number of the veteran contracts they have on the roster during the 2026 offseason with relatively little salary cap ramifications.
Again, from a timeline perspective, it would give the potentially new GM a brand new slate to work from in 2026. At that time, it could be a cleaning house type of situation for the Colts.
Whereas, if the Colts moved off Ballard this year, there isn’t a lot of roster flexibility that exists right now in terms of turnover possibilities because there are a number of still relatively fresh contracts and in regards to salary cap space, the Colts rank in the middle of the NFL pack this offseason–not good and not bad.
Now, this isn’t to say that the new GM would have to keep the status quo, but a lot of the 2025 Colts’ roster, particularly a number of key…
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