The Colts won 12 games last year, including 9 in a row.
Tom Moore leaving wouldn't change a whole lot. Peyton calls the plays and they have been running the same offense for years. Very few wrinkles have been added in the last 5 years.
It's cumulative workhorse. Dungy wasn't handpicked by Polian because he was the flavor of the month in HC'ing. He was this unique individual who had a pretty firm mastery of a defense that didn't require some of the most expensive pieces in the game, he was a teacher, he was a facilitator and mentor, he had both cache and the kind of disposition and demeanor needed to keep a top heavy offensive team like the colts from fracturing, even absent his own coaching staff, and he had the capacity to get a talent like Manning to take a step back and reign in his own instincts in favor of allowing a team to form an identity around him and not just through him.
Losing him along with Harrrison, Mudd, possibly Moore while replacing him with a home grown rookie HC who seems oddly focused on tweeking the Dungy defense is a lot. I think that is why Polian took the RB in the first. Less new faces in Manning portion of the offense, hope the existing players can replicate what they've already been taught, focus on running the ball better just in case, pray Tennessee takes a step back and neither Jaxonville or Houston finally click. Dungy never had much to do with that offense beyond morally supporting it and suggesting it try to be more and balanced. Somebody has to run the practices and coach up youngsters and critique the veteran players and make decisions on the roster, and broker coaching compromises and deal with the media fallout...and that isn't Peyton's place, and if it defacto became it in the absence of Dungy, Mudd and Moore, the backlash could potentially be nasty.
Polian also already has a lot on his plate what with the overall economy, problems with the stadium, an impending uncapped year, potential labor unrest and Peyton's contract running out in 2010 (or 2012 if he doesn't opt to void which would be unusual for a Condon client). Coming off the kind of gift wrapped 12 win season you guys managed to pull off last year, this could be finally be the long anticipated beginning of the end of the Manning era Colts.
We got some issues looming too, as most teams do, but Bill has dealt with those frequently over the last decade here. Won his first Superbowl after losing his #1 drafted franchise QB in week 2, won 2 more and got to a third with his 6th round replacement, and even managed to win 11 games after losing Brady for an entire season in the first quarter of last season. He has a stronger base or overall foundation (part of which is rooted in the system) to work with than Polian has had in Indy. You guys have always pointed to that when it suits you, as well as acknowledging that Manning is the franchise in Indy. Only Manning has always required a cumbersome support system. Polian has always had a vision of what will win, but he's also not capable of successfully implementing it himself as a GM, he's needed a HC and coaching staff to do that, and he has more stringent financial limits to work with in assembling all of the above due to market size and an ownership not nearly as financially strong and savvy as the Krafts.
It may not be a disastrous season in Indy, but don't make it sound like it doesn't have that potential written all over it...
