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Colts GM claims he is ‘100 percent’ on same page with Chuck Pagano

The Indianapolis Colts remain in flux. At 2-3 on the season, the powers to be may have staved off termination with an ugly win over the Chicago Bears last week.

In no way does this mean that general manager Ryan Grigson and head coach Chuck Pagano are guaranteed to keep their jobs beyond this season. Both have been downright failures. And both seem to be tied at the hip.

So. At the very least, it appears that the team’s general manager is remaining supportive of his head coach.

“It’s not a time for panic,” Grigson said Tuesday on CBS Radio, via the Indy Star. “The season is young. You can’t let that stuff start creeping in your psyche because you’ll be dead before you even get started.”

This was in direct response to comments made by former Colts receiver Reggie Wayne that put Grigson’s ability to perform at a high level as GM into question.

“I honestly think Andrew Luck’s playing pretty good, despite some of the O-line woes that they’re having,” Wayne said earlier in October. “A lot of people are wanting to criticize Andrew Luck instead of really, in my opinion, going after what the big problem is. I think that big problem is a lot of the front office decisions. Whether it’s draft picks or it is free-agent picks, they’ve missed on a lot of guys.”

To be fair here, Wayne isn’t wrong. Grigson has struggled a great deal in the personnel aspect of his role. He’s continually flopped on draft picks, traded a first rounder for Trent Richardson and has found immeasurable ways to drop the ball in free agency.

Grigson’s initial response seemed to be more about him saving face. He also took on Wayne’s assumption in speaking to Jim Rome.

“(Wayne) is going to have his position. At the end of the day, it only comes down to the belief that those guys in the locker room have. That’s just noise outside the building. We’ve got to focus on what we can control.”

If it were just Wayne speaking out against his former team because he was bitter about the way the marriage ended, that would be one thing.

Unfortunately, there’s a ton of noise coming from Indianapolis and the entire football world. The Colts boast a 10-11 record since the start of last season and are currently closer to last place than they are to first.

That’s not necessarily an indicator that either Grigson or Pagano are doing bang-up jobs at their current positions.

Adding more fuel to the fire here, the general manager just recently seemed to throw his quarterback under the bus (more on that here).

This comes mere months after a Grigson-led front office negotiated Andrew Luck’s contract extension. A deal that made him the highest-paid player in the NFL.

It also comes after Grigson and Pagano took part in a three-way meeting with Colts owner Jim Irsay. A meeting that likely saved the jobs of both the general manager and the head coach.

Despite all this, Grigson wants us all to know that they’re on the same page.

“We’re 100 percent (on the same page),” Grigson said. “This whole thing is about meeting in the middle. I don’t think a lot of people understand either job in its totality. We often tend to wear emotion on our sleeves and we know how to eat crow. We’re both good like that.”

Where that page might lead to is anyone’s guess. It could be a chapter in this now depressing book that presents both Grigson and Pagano with pink slips as bookmarks.

As it is, Indianapolis has a couple weeks to save its season. Further struggles moving forward, and someone will have to pay the piper. It won’t be Luck or Irsay, so you can do the math from there.

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