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As the No. 7 seed in the AFC playoff race, not many are putting their faith in the Indianapolis Colts pulling off an upset against the No. 2 Buffalo Bills on Saturday. But that doesn’t both Frank Reich one bit.
The Colts opened the week as seven-point underdogs—the third-biggest spread of the week—against the Bills, who have truly been on fire to end the season. But the Colts are fine embracing the underdog role even in the playoffs.
It takes the pressure off of them to perform, and Reich believes it will allow them to play loose and aggressive.
“I’d rather be the one seed, but I do feel good about our team more than anything. The pressure is not on us,” Reich said. “We should be in there, we should be loose, we should be aggressive, we should be freed up to just play our best game of the year against a really good football team because essentially like you said, in reality no one is going to give us a chance.”
In terms of Vegas, the Colts haven’t been viewed as underdogs much this season. It has happened a few times when injuries or COVID-19 struck and took out a key player for a week.
But for the most part, the Colts have been favorites against some pretty good teams. That said, Indy hasn’t faced many teams like the 13-3 Bills, who finished the season winning nine of their last 10 games.
“It’s that us-against-the-world mentality and that’s all you need,” Reich said. “When you’re with this team the way I am day in and day out, you would know where I get the confidence to feel like we have the team to beat anybody in this tournament.”
It should be a fun game between two teams who match up well against each other and even though Indy might not be favored, they are content playing the role of the underdog to begin the playoffs.
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