Pittsburgh Steelers tight end Eric Ebron may have played his way out of Indianapolis last season.

The Colts felt like Ebron didn’t give them his best efforts when things got tough for Indianapolis late in the year, according to one Colts insider.

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After starting the season with a 5-2 record, it looked as if the Colts weren’t missing quarterback Andrew Luck one bit. However, over their last nine games, Indianapolis only managed to win two, and the Colts finished the year with a 7-9 record, missing the playoffs.

"The reason the Colts let him go is because they felt he quit on them this season," The Athletic's Bob Kravitz told 93.7 The Fan on Tuesday. "He had, I think it was an ankle, that the team wasn't even aware was an issue and then all of the sudden he said, 'That's it, I'm shutting it down.' I remember asking Chris Ballard, the GM, 'What are you going to do with Eric Ebron?' and he looked me straight in the eye and said, 'Yeah, we're done with him. We're moving on.' So, if you get him in the right frame of mind, he's a very productive guy. But he's a little bit mercurial I guess is the word I would use."

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Ebron, the No. 10 overall pick by the Detroit Lions in the 2014 NFL Draft, finally put everything together in 2018 when he had a career-high 13 touchdown receptions. But without Luck under center, he failed to get in sync with backup quarterback Jacoby Brissett. He only had 31 receptions with three scores last season and was placed on season-ending injured reserve in November.

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He will have a clean slate in 2020 after he signed a two-year, $12 million deal with the Steelers after the start of the league’s new year began. If Ebron bounces back and gains chemistry with a healthy Ben Roethlisberger, he is certainly capable of producing to the same standards he set two years ago.