Throughout the offseason, the Indianapolis Colts have been one of the teams linked to quarterbacks in both free agency and the 2020 NFL draft due to the fact that Jacoby Brissett hasn’t shown much as the long-term option under center.
While the media (us included) have been searching for which quarterbacks the Colts should pursue, linebacker Darius Leonard joined the “Rapsheet + Friends” podcast where he was asked if he has thought about veteran Philip Rivers joining the team.
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Instead, Leonard backed his teammate in Brissett, giving the latter his support. He starts talking at the 38:05 mark.
“No. Why would I do something like that? I believe in Jacoby,” Leonard said on the podcast. “Jacoby is a pretty good quarterback and he showed that early in the season when he had everyone healthy. You can look at any quarterback, when your WRs go down, of course your numbers go down. But when he had everybody he went 5-2.”
Leonard isn’t the type of player who will throw his teammates under the bus. Even if he didn’t mention Brissett when being asked about Rivers, there are likely some people that would have taken that as him not supporting Brissett.
But Leonard being the team-guy that he is, he gave his support for his current quarterback. The host of the podcast, Ian Rapoport of NFL Network, asked Leonard if Brissett was more the quarterback from the first half of the season rather than the second half.
“No question,” Leonard said. “I’ve spent two seasons in Indy and with Jacoby being a backup, I’ve faced him day in and day out so I know exactly what type of quarterback he is. I know exactly what type of leader he is.”
As for whether the Colts will pursue a quarterback in free agency, the odds would likely be no regardless. It doesn’t seem like Chris Ballard’s M.O. to go against everything he’s preached over the last three years just to add a stop-gap at quarterback.
Leonard is the ultimate team-guy, so he has no qualms about backing Brissett even if it’s likely they find his successor this offseason.
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