The Colts on Friday signed the 39-year-old Flacco as a free agent.
by JJ Stankevitz
Joe Flacco has seen just about everything over the course of his 16-year NFL career.
About every blitz package and coverage scheme? Check. Playoff berths, good seasons, bad seasons? Check. A Super Bowl where the lights go out? Check. A young, explosive quarterback? Check. All those mid-2010s “elite” meters? Check. A Comeback Player of the Year Award won after coming off his couch and into the postseason? Check.
All those experiences, and all the banked knowledge and wisdom the 39-year-old Flacco possesses, are the starting point for how he can support the 21-year-old Anthony Richardson in 2024.
“I think the biggest thing as a quarterback being able to play fast and efficient,” Flacco said in an interview for “Overtime” on the Colts Audio Network and YouTube. “And I think when you simplify things down to the lowest level, that gives you the best chance of doing that. So a lot of the times we’re sitting in the meeting room and things come up and you hear a young guy talking – ‘well I saw this and then I saw that so that made me do this and then I did that,’ and it’s like, whoa, you don’t need to do all that. Do your job – take your drop, get your eyes there, make your decisions and move on.
“When you play a long time, you find a very natural way that you can relate to other players that maybe sometimes coaches, they’re not back there, they put in a little different terminology that maybe you don’t understand. So hopefully I can relay that message a little bit more clearly in certain cases.”
Flacco hadn’t yet joined the Cleveland Browns while Richardson started four games in 2023, but he saw head coach Shane Steichen continue to evolve as an offensive mind and playcaller. While with the Philadelphia Eagles for a stretch in 2021, Flacco began to see the nascent stages of Steichen – then the Eagles’ offensive coordinator – becoming, in his eyes, a well-rounded playcaller.
“I think most of Shane’s coaching career had probably been part of teams that drop back and throw the ball around a lot,” Flacco said. “And I think in Philadelphia, it was his first – not first, but he got a little bit more of a taste of a really physical offensive line, a team that can run the ball a little bit. So from my perspective, he would probably argue this a little bit, but it gave him a really good background in terms of already having that pass-heavy type of background to being with a team that really runs the ball well and has a lot of value because they run the ball well.
Originally posted on colts.com