The Atlanta Falcons and Indianapolis Colts each hope an international trip can help fix recent setbacks as the teams meet in Berlin, Germany, on Sunday in the city’s first NFL game.
Indianapolis (7-2) will serve as the game’s ‘designated home team’ for the league’s fifth game played in Germany. The NFL has played a pair of games in both Munich and Frankfurt, including a Colts win over the Patriots two seasons ago in Frankfurt.
The excitement level for going overseas for Indianapolis — which had its four-game winning streak snapped Sunday with a 27-20 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers — might pale in comparison to the energy created by acquiring a new star in the secondary on Tuesday.
The Colts sent a pair of first-round picks and wide receiver Adonai “AD” Mitchell to the New York Jets for two-time first-team All-Pro cornerback Sauce Gardner. The 25-year-old played the first seven games this season before missing the Jets’ Week 8 win at Cincinnati in concussion protocol. New York had a bye last weekend. Indianapolis announced Thursday that Gardner cleared concussion protocol and is expected to play against Atlanta.
“I think everyone’s fired up,” Colts head coach Shane Steichen said of the addition. “Any time you can add an elite player to your football team, I think the energy level and juice adds excitement to the building.”
The move looks to complement the league’s highest-scoring offense (32.2 points per game), led by the NFL’s surprise leader in passing yards Daniel Jones (2,404) and the league’s leader in rushing yards Jonathan Taylor (895).
Favored over the freefalling Falcons, Steichen doesn’t want the outside noise to result in overlooking Atlanta.
“We’re not worried about the future. We’re worried about getting better today and getting ready to go play the Falcons,” Steichen said. “The future will take care of itself, but if we worry about the future, that’s going to hurt us in the long run.”
Since an Oct. 13 win over the Buffalo Bills, Atlanta (3-5) has seen itself quickly fall to the bottom half of the NFC standings. A year that had postseason expectations has been derailed by three straight losses to the San Francisco 49ers, Miami Dolphins and New England Patriots.
The Falcons found a new way to lose at New England, as kicker John Parker Romo missed a would-be game-tying extra point with less than five minutes left en route to a 24-23 loss. Atlanta released Romo and signed veteran Zane Gonzalez as the team’s third kicker through 10 weeks.
A glaring issue across the Falcons’ losing stretch has been the inability to run the ball. Since Bijan Robinson ran for 170 yards in the Buffalo victory, the third-year running back has averaged just 37 yards per game in three outings since.
“Our run game is what it is right now,” Atlanta head coach Raheem Morris said. “We’ve got to find ways to get it broken out again. … We’ve played with the right physicality and right intention, we just didn’t get the exact results you want. We liked the process and we look forward to going out there and displaying it this week.”
Quarterback Michael Penix and rising star wide receiver Drake London hooked up for three touchdowns in the latest loss, career highs for both players.
The duo found success in spite of an injury-plagued offensive line. Both guards Matthew Bergeron (ankle) and Chris Lindstrom (foot) exited and didn’t return vs. New England.
Looking ahead, it appears Bergeron’s injury is the more significant of the two.
“Feel really good about Chris,” said Morris, who deemed the three-time Pro Bowler as day-to-day. “Matthew is more week-to-week. We’ll see how that goes. Obviously it doesn’t look good for this week, but you never know.”
Kyle Hinton is expected to start Sunday, as Bergeron was ruled out on Thursday and will not travel to Berlin. Atlanta defensive end Leonard Floyd (hamstring) and offensive tackle Storm Norton (foot) also were ruled out on Thursday, while Lindstrom was upgraded from a non-participant on Wednesday to limited.
For the Colts, defensive tackle DeForest Buckner (neck), cornerback Kenny Moore II (Achilles) and wide receiver Michael Pittman (glute) were among the seven players who did not practice Wednesday. Buckner also missed practice Thursday and was ruled out for the game in Berlin, while Moore and Pittman were upgraded to full participants. Wide receiver Anthony Gould (knee) and defensive ends Samson Ebukam (knee) and Tyquan Lewis (groin) did not practice.
–Field Level Media
