INDIANAPOLIS — This Colts opener is going to feel more weighty than any opener the team has played in years.
Facing a pivotal season for the future of the franchise, the Colts open Sunday under a different kind of weight, the emotional toll of losing late owner Jim Irsay in the offseason.
Irsay’s memory has been ever-present for everybody in the building since he died in May, but the Colts are placing Irsay in the team’s Ring of Honor on Sunday, placing the team’s collective loss front and center as Indianapolis embarks on a critical season.
The emotions are going to be impossible to ignore.
Irsay’s legacy looms large over the roster.
“A bunch of us, we’ve been talking about it, how we really do have to win for Jim and start fast and put something out there that he’ll be proud of,” defensive tackle DeForest Buckner said. “We definitely take that to heart.”
The opener always mattered deeply to Irsay.
His team hasn’t won a season opener since 2013, an inexplicable streak of futility in season openers that clearly rankled Irsay the longer it stretched. The streak has covered two general managers, three head coaches, seven starting quarterbacks and at least five games where the Colts were favored.
There have been seasons where Indianapolis overcame its season-opening loss to go on a run; more recently, the season-opening losses have crushed preseason hopes that the Colts might break out of their doldrums and become a player in the AFC South once again.
Irsay always used to talk about the importance of the opener.
With so much at stake, with Irsay’s legacy fresh in their minds and plastered across the stadium, the Colts will be able to feel a palpable difference.
“You want to win every game, you want to win every first game,” running back Jonathan Taylor said. “But you know he’s watching, and we want to put a good product on the field to ensure that what he left behind is headed in the right direction.”
In a lot of ways, Irsay’s Ring of Honor ceremony is the first opportunity for the Colts fan base to remember Irsay en masse, paying tribute to a man who was intimately involved with the franchise from the moment it moved to Indianapolis in 1984.
Irsay cast an enormous shadow in the city, both as a businessman and a philanthropist.
Reminders of his impact will be everywhere on Sunday.
“Honoring Mr. Irsay, I think there’s a lot more to it,” coach Shane Steichen said. “What he’s done for so many people in this city, in this organization. … what he’s meant to so many people, not only in this city but out of the city, it’s a big Week 1 for us as a team.”
Reminders of a more successful past will also be there.
Irsay will be the 20th member inducted into the Ring of Honor, and most of the names already inducted will be on hand for Irsay’s ceremony. Irsay himself inducted everybody else; they will come back to induct him, along with countless other players from the past.
A lot of those players will be reminders of better days for the franchise, days the fan base longs to get back.
“It should motivate everybody,” Colts cornerback Charvarius Ward said. “All the legends, all the Hall of Famers, everybody in the Ring of Honor, they’re coming out for Mr. Irsay, so we’ve got to come out and put on a show for everybody. Pretty sure it’s going to be emotional at the start, but we’ve got to come out there, turn up and not let them down.”
When a franchise remembers one of its most influential members, there is always added pressure for the team on the field. Emotions in sports are inextricably tied to the result on the field; everybody in the Colts organization wants to induct Irsay into the Ring of Honor with a win.
Not only in the opener, but throughout the season.
Wide receiver Michael Pittman Jr. put it best:
“Our whole season is ‘Win for Jim.’”
Joel A. Erickson covers the Colts all season. Get more coverage on IndyStarTV and with the Colts Insider newsletter.