Doyel: Matt Hasselbeck hasn't forgotten how to lead

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Matt Hasselbeck is standing at his locker, and this won't do.

"What are you doing here?" is how I start. "You're the starter now. Get out of here."

Hasselbeck looks at me like I'm nuts, which could be the case, but I'm making a point here: As the starting quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts – and not just their starting quarterback for the foreseeable future, but the most important player on the team's postseason push – Hasselbeck doesn't have to do what he normally does. Normally he's in the locker room every day, available and accommodating to the media. Only the stars limit themselves to one media scrum each week.

Hasselbeck is no longer a role player, is my point. He's a star. So act the part, I tell him, and stop being available. You already had your scrum this week. Big-time me. Tell me to scram.

Hasselbeck, bless his heart, can't do it.

"It's not about big-timing anybody," he says. "It's about having to focus on other things."

Then go focus, I tell him.

He smiles at me. We keep talking.

Which is how I caught him in one lie. Well, no. Sorry.

Two lies.

* * *

First things first, they were high-character lies, if there's such a thing. Second things second, I like Hasselbeck. Even liked him in the preseason when I was writing that he was finished, that if the Colts were going to need him this season as a Plan B, well, the Colts were in trouble. Because Hasselbeck was no longer a workable Plan B.

Oops?

Hasselbeck started two games in relief of injured Andrew Luck, won them both and threw three touchdowns with no interceptions. He's 2-0 with a 95.0 passer rating. Andrew Luck is 2-5 with a 74.9 passer rating.

Maybe the Colts don't have a workable Plan A?

Kidding.

Back to Hasselbeck's lies. And this is no joke.

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The first one, he was saving Chuck Pagano's bacon. Not sure if Pagano was lying, exaggerating or just mistaken, but when he announced Luck's latest injury during the Colts' bye week – the lacerated kidney – he said this was Hasselbeck's response to the surprise news:

"He canceled some plans," Pagano said. "Matt was around."

The media ran to Hasselbeck in the locker room, told them what Pagano had said, and asked if it was true that he canceled plans. And Hasselbeck, liar that he is, said it was.

"Maybe," he said. "Maybe. Yeah, I did."

Then he joked that teammate "Pat McAfee was tweeting photos with palm trees and stuff. I was driving my kids to school in the rain."

Oh, was it raining in Vero Beach?

That's where Hasselbeck spent most of his bye week down time – Vero Beach, Fla. He let that slip during our conversation at his locker, when he should have been shooing me away instead of telling me … wait, what? What did you just tell me?

"I took my tight end with me," he says.

Explain that, I said. And explain that football in your locker.

"This is the ball I threw during the bye week in Vero Beach," he says. "I threw it with Coby Fleener. We were on a driving range. Probably broke all kinds of rules, but that's what we did. Had to stay sharp."

So, Coby Fleener … you were planning to vacation with him?

"No," Hasselbeck told me. "That came up at the last minute. Our wives are friends, and I needed someone to throw with. It was win-win."

Now I'm the media member running, away from Hasselbeck – that liar – and toward Coby Fleener. Is this true, I ask Fleener. Is it true you vacationed with Hasselbeck?

"Um …" Fleener said.

He's not sure about this whole thing. Fleener, I mean. He's skeptical of the media, private about his personal life, just sort of complicated. Maybe because he's so smart. The guy is a Stanford grad, possibly better at programming computers than he is at catching passes – and he's on pace for his third consecutive 50-catch season. But he's weird. And so he's looking at me, not sure where to go.

"It's OK," I tell him. "Matt told me all about the vacation."

Coby stares.

I say: "It came together late, right?"

Right, he says.

"Since you were a late invite," I wonder, "did he pay for your vacation?"

Some of it, Coby says, but he won't say which part. Not sure it matters, but whatever.

"Why were you free, anyway?"

Other plans fell through, Coby tells me.

"What were those plans?"

Not telling you, he says.

Like I say, weird guy. But whatever. Let's get back to Hasselbeck, and his other lie. The one he's been telling for months, even though the truth would set him free.

It would have set me free, too.

* * *

Here's the thing: After the Colts' second preseason game, I wrote the following sentence: "In both games the worst player on the field may well have been Matt Hasselbeck."

Then I wrote some more stuff, stuff that looks stupid today – to repeat: Hasselbeck is 2-0 as a starter with a 95.0 passer rating – and concluded that fish wrap of an Aug. 23 column by deciding the Colts needed a new backup quarterback.

Oops.

In those preseason games Hasselbeck was 14-of-26 for 131 yards, an interception and no touchdowns. His throws weren't just inaccurate, but weak. The football looked like a loofah sponge coming out of his hand.

So the other day, as Hasselbeck was standing in front of his locker like the backup he used to be – not the star he is now – I brought up that column from August.

"It's OK," he says. "You were just doing your job."

I'm not apologizing for it, Matt. I already apologized to you last month. (This is true. I did.) But you weren't good in the preseason, I tell Hasselbeck. You've been great in the season. How was I so wrong?

"It happens," he says.

No it doesn't, I tell him. Not that badly. Was there some physical issue in the preseason?

"There was," he says.

Is there something physical now?

"Nope," he says.

Wait, what?! You were hurt in August, and you're healed now? That's why you looked so bad in the preseason?

Hasselbeck tries to backpedal a little bit, but he's 40. His backpedaling days are over.

"I will never make an excuse for poor play," he says. "Let's leave it at that."

No, let's leave it at this:

By insinuating that you stayed in town last week when you were really in Florida, you were fibbing to protect your coach. By insinuating for months that you were healthy this preseason when you couldn't throw the ball from here to there, you were fibbing to accept responsibility. By bringing Coby Fleener to your family vacation, you were preparing for an expanded role on this team.

Turns out, Matt Hasselbeck, you know exactly what it takes to be a starting quarterback and a leader for this franchise.

Stay at your locker all you want. Let's talk again, please.

Find Star columnist Gregg Doyel on Twitter at @GreggDoyelStar or at www.facebook.com/gregg.doyel.