As disappointing as the last month and a half has been for the Colts, with a six-game losing streak crashing them out of the playoffs, Sunday's season finale against the Houston Texans at NRG Stadium will be our final chance to watch this team play football again until their preseason opener next summer.
By that point, we'll all have been so starved of football we'll take any morsel we can get. Usually, at some point during the summer, you'd bite your arm off for a quote-un-quote meaningless Week 18 regular season game.
With that in mind, there's still plenty to watch on Sunday afternoon, as we get our last chance to watch Colts football until seven-plus months from now. We'll look at five players to keep an eye on against a Texans team still playing for the AFC South:
RB Jonathan Taylor: There are a couple of statistical milestones at stake here for Taylor. Entering Week 18, Taylor is 47 yards behind Buffalo Bills running back James Cook for this year's rushing title; Cook, who will play alongside Buffalo's offensive starters against the woebegone New York Jets, has 1,606 rushing yards to Taylor's 1,559. Taylor has a solid lead for the most rushing touchdowns in the NFL with 18, ahead of the Baltimore Ravens' Derrick Henry (16).
And, notably, Taylor needs one more touchdown to set a new Colts franchise record for total touchdowns in a season. Currently, Taylor has 20, tying him with Hall of Famer Lenny Moore (who had 20 in 1964) and his own total in 2021. If Taylor were to score three touchdowns and finish with 23 on the season, it'd vault him into a tie for the eighth-most touchdowns in a single season in NFL history.
It'll be quite a challenge for Taylor to find yards – and the end zone – against an extraordinarily stingy Texans defense; Taylor, over his last six games, has totaled only three touchdowns and hasn't had more than 87 rushing yards in those contests.
WR Alec Pierce: If Pierce finishes the 2025 season with an average of at least 20 yards per reception (he's at 20.3 now), he'll become the first player since DeSean Jackson to have multiple seasons with 35+ catches and a yards per reception average of 20+ yards. Jackson hit those marks twice, in 2010 and 2014; Pierce would be the first player with consecutive 35+ catch and 20+ yards per reception seasons since the Los Angeles Rams' Flipper Anderson (1989, 1990).
Only 29 players in NFL history have averaged over 20 yards per reception on at least 35 catches in multiple seasons, though of those 29 players, all but Pierce and Jackson hit those marks after 1995. Since 1995, only nine players have averaged 20+ yards per reception on 35+ catches: Pierce (2024, 2025), A.J. Brown (2019), Mike Williams (2019), Jackson (2014, 2010), Mike Wallace (2010), Bernard Berrian (2008), Ashley Lelie (2004), Eric Moulds (1998) and Chris Sanders (1995).
RT Jalen Travis: Among a dozen rookie tackles with at least 100 snaps this season, Travis' Pro Football Focus overall grade (73.2) is second-highest; he's the only one in that group to not allow a sack, per PFF. It's a small sample size, though, as Travis played some garbage time minutes early in the season before tagging in for an injured Braden Smith at right tackle in Week 14. He started at right tackle in Week 15, flipped to left tackle in Week 16 with Bernhard Raimann out, then went back to right tackle for Week 17.
The 2025 fourth-round pick will face his toughest test to close out his rookie season, though, in Texans defensive end Will Anderson Jr. Anderson, who primarily lines up over an opposing team's right tackle, is tied for the NFL lead in total pressures (92) and is eighth in sacks (12). Per PFF, Anderson has "won" against his primary blocker on a league-leading 26.7 percent of his pass rushes – a rate higher than the Cleveland Browns' Myles Garrett, who's likely to win AP Defensive Player of the Year.
DE Laiatu Latu: If Latu were to register a sack and a half on Sunday, he'd become the first Colts player since defensive Justin Houston in 2019 to finish a season with double-digit sacks. Latu has 59 pressures, tied for 14th-most in the NFL, and if he registers two pressures, he'd finish the year with the most quarterback pressures a Colts player has had in a season since Jabaal Sheard had 64 in 2018.
Latu has had a sack in each of his last three games; the last Colts player to have at least one sack in four consecutive games was Houston, who had a six-game sack streak in 2019.
P Rigoberto Sanchez & PK Blake Grupe: We'll tag-team two-thirds of the Colts' special teams battery to close out here. Sanchez enters Week 18 with a net punt average of 44.8 yards, which would set a new franchise record and is second in the NFL behind only the Baltimore Ravens' Jordan Stout. The combination of Sanchez's punts and outstanding coverage – highlighted by the work put in by gunner Ashton Dulin – has held opponents to just 6.3 yards per return, second-lowest in the NFL. And 52.4 percent of Sanchez's punts have been downed inside the 20-yard line, the fourth-highest rate in the NFL and a new career high for the longtime Colts punter.
At kicker, Grupe enters Week 18 having made all eight of his field goals – three of which have been from 50-plus yards, including that dramatic 60-yarder against the Seattle Seahawks – and all seven of his PATs. We'll see where the Colts go at kicker in 2026 – Spencer Shrader was having an outstanding season before sustaining ACL and MCL injuries on a PAT against the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 5 – but Grupe's success could get him into that mix next season.
