Some members of the NFL community previously wondered if the Indianapolis Colts would consider taking a flier on Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders via the 14th pick of the 2025 draft.
The club signed former New York Giants starter Daniel Jones to compete with 2023 first-round draft pick Anthony Richardson for the starting job this summer.
While speaking with reporters on Monday, Colts general manager Chris Ballard indicated he is open to grabbing a quarterback as early as the first round of the player-selection process on Thursday night.
“You don’t ever want to pass up a player you think has a chance to be really good,” Ballard explained, as shared by Myles Simmons of Pro Football Talk. “I think you say that for every position, but especially at quarterback.”
Ballard added he “absolutely” could take a quarterback at pick No. 14 “if there’s a player we deem is worthy of it.”
For an article published on April 16, NFL insider Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated revealed he believes Jones will be Indianapolis’ 2025 Week 1 starter, in part because “there’ll be a natural curiosity about what Jones can do with the team Chris Ballard and (head coach) Shane Steichen have assembled.” That said, Jones’ injury history coupled with how his Giants tenure ended this past fall suggests he won’t be a long-term answer for the Colts.
Meanwhile, injuries have limited Richardson to just 15 starts over a possible 32 career contests (minus a two-game benching this past November following the “tired” controversy). Breer noted that Richardson simply “hasn’t done nearly enough with the chances he’s been given” since the spring of 2023 to be considered the favorite to win the upcoming competition for the QB1 gig.
“The one thing you can see with the quarterback position now, you better get to know them in the draft process because you never know when it’s going to come back to you,” Ballard said on Monday. “That’s the one thing, I always kind of giggle when a quarterback turns us down, like, ‘No, we’re not going to visit with you.’ Three years from now, we’ll see how that plays out — because you just look at it. The changing of teams now, the lack of patience, guys are… And everybody’s developmental curve and journey is different. So you never know when it’s going to come back around to you.”
The previously mentioned Sanders is currently expected to fall to at least the New Orleans Saints at the ninth pick of the draft. ESPN’s Jordan Reid believes New Orleans will take Sanders, while Adam Schefter of ESPN reported on Monday that “there is a belief around the league that the Saints are more interested in using a high pick on an offensive or defensive lineman.”
In the event that the Saints pass on Sanders, it’s likely he’d be available for the Colts at pick No. 14 unless a team leapfrogs Indianapolis in the draft order for the polarizing prospect.
“We got two guys that have had some really strong flashes and they’ve had some bad moments too,” Ballard said about Jones and Richardson on Monday, per Josh Alper of Pro Football Talk. “That’s OK. I think both of them will be better because of this, and I think the team will be better because of it. …If I’m a betting man, at some point both of them will help us.”
Perhaps the 2025 Colts will also get help from a third quarterback selected by the club on Thursday.
