Insider: What Colts fans should expect from Andrew Luck

Stephen Holder | IndyStar

Show Caption Hide Caption Chopping Wood: Getting you ready for Colts training camp IndyStar Colts Insiders Stephen Holder and Zak Keefer break down the burning questions facing Colts as they open training camp this week in Westfield.

WESTFIELD, Ind. – He runs out of the tunnel, takes his first snap and, before you know it, the Indianapolis Colts are bound for the end zone.

Playoffs, here we come! Comeback Player of the Year, MVP speculation – nothing is out of reach.

The Colts’ franchise quarterback is back, and all things suddenly are possible.

Well, maybe.

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This is how Andrew Luck’s return likely is playing out inside many fans' heads. After all, the Colts’ franchise quarterback finally has returned to the lineup, hoping to take the NFL by storm after a year and a half on the sideline dealing with assorted shoulder travails. When veterans report for training camp Wednesday, Luck will have “no restrictions” on him during practice, according to General Manager Chris Ballard.

So, why worry?

For starters, there’s this: Luck is attempting something few have actually done. How’s this for perspective? Luck hasn’t played in a game in 19 months. That’s 19 months of worrying, wondering and not knowing. Nineteen months of not throwing to T.Y. Hilton and Jack Doyle. Nineteen months of not asking his shoulder to bear the load it’s about to.

As much as your human nature wants to assume nothing will change, do you really know that?

It’s time for an Andrew Luck reality check. Yes, he’s back. Yes, he’s healthy. Yes, his outlook is as bright as it’s been since surgery.

But, no, that doesn’t guarantee this will be a seamless process.

“He’s missed a lot of time,” ESPN analyst and former NFL quarterback Tim Hasselbeck told IndyStar.

Then Hasselbeck offered this bit of history about a quarterback who also spent a big chunk of time on the sideline.

“Take Peyton (Manning) for example,” Hasselbeck said of the former Colts great. “Peyton plays, what, (13) years and then there’s the (neck) injury. He misses a year, then he comes back and he’s not as good because of the surgery and because he’s getting older, but he plays great. I can remember wondering, ‘I hope people realize how insanely difficult that is.’ He went an entire year not playing football.

“The benefit that Peyton had is that he had played so long that, mentally, he was prepared. Had that happened to Peyton between years five and seven of his career, it might have been very different. But by the time he went through it, he was so good in terms of the game preparation, understanding what he was going to see that week, and he was so good at the line of scrimmage before the ball was even snapped, those things were a real advantage to him and really helped him deal with the fact that he wasn’t exactly the same. We don’t really know if Andrew, physically, is going to be the same.”

IndyStar looked at the top 25 quarterbacks from the last 20 years who missed at least four games or were injured in the offseason, then analyzed their performance prior to the injury and in their first four games back. The result? The quarterbacks were roughly 20 percent worse statistically in completion percentage, quarterback rating, touchdown-to-interception ratio and (hold your breath Colts fans) sack percentage. They returned to their previous level of performance by Game 5 or 6 on average.

The bad news is that Luck missed more time than most of the quarterbacks in the study and could suffer a greater (or longer) dip in play.

The good news here is that Luck’s most recent comeback attempt has been mapped out with scientific precision with the help of the best experts in the world (and we do mean the world, including The Netherlands).

Pre-injury Stat Post-injury Decrease 62.8 Comp % 61 17.0% 90.4 QB rating 85 18.6% 2 TD-INT ratio 1.5 16.7% 5 Sack% 6.2 23.0%

We saw him throw publicly, finally, during the team’s minicamp in early June. Then Luck jetted off to California to ramp up his throwing regimen during the past six weeks. He’s described as ready to resume full-on practicing when players take the field on Thursday.

But if you think we’re through with the questions, you might want to take off your blue-colored glasses for a moment.

“I still think we’ll get questions until he lines up and plays again, and plays high-level football again,” Ballard said. “I can just see the panic the first time he throws an interception. It’s just part of what we do. He understands it. He gets it.”

The questions run the gamut.

First, there’s the physical.

“Here you have this guy who could make very single throw, easily” before his injury, Hasselbeck said. “Is that different now? It might be. What is his fastball like now? We don’t know that yet. I think there should be a lot of – I don’t know if apprehension is the right word – but I don’t know if you can expect it’s going to be the same right away.”

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And then there is the mental.

“You referenced him having played injured for all that time, so, now, how do you deal with this?” Hasselbeck added. “‘Am I sore or is this a setback?’ There’s even that kind of thing in a player’s mind coming off of surgery. It’s like, ‘Would I be sore anyway? Or is this because of what I’ve been through?’ I think there’s a lot at play there.”

Then there is an issue that is a combination of both – physical and mental. At some point, Luck will have to take a hit. His shoulder is structurally sound from all accounts. But that doesn’t mean there won’t be concern on his part when he inevitably gets taken to the turf for the first time.

“The thing I think (Luck) has done a tremendous job of is having courage in the pocket,” Hasselbeck said. “It can separate OK quarterbacks from really good ones. And because he was tough and wasn’t afraid to hold onto the ball, he would make throws and really expose himself as he’s standing in the pocket. If you go to any quarterback around the league, they’ll admire that about somebody’s game. I think that’s something where (you have to ask) does that change?”

This is among the most interesting and important aspects of this story. If Luck isn’t aggressive, he isn’t himself. It’s part of what has made him great and helped him win so many games.

“Obviously, we play a violent sport where you fall and stuff,” Luck said last month. “My goal is to be in as good a shape and playing a style of football that suits me that’s also what’s best for the team.”

Coach Frank Reich had this to say on the topic recently: “He doesn’t always know what he’s going to do and that’s exciting. Good quarterbacks are obviously all very exciting to watch, but he’s got that extra flair like Brett Favre and a couple of the guys that make some (quarterbacks) even more exciting than most because when everything breaks down, you just don’t know what he’s going to do. We’ve kind of tried to say, ‘Sometimes, Andrew, just shut down the play.’ It’s easier said than done because when you have greatness like that you think about shutting this play down (but) there’s still a chance.”

Will any of that be lost after this long layoff Luck has endured? No one knows.

And that’s the point. Everything looks and feels good right now. The MRI looks good. Luck’s physique looks good. His shoulder feels good.

Those are the things we know. But there are still some things we don’t know and won’t know until the moments of truth arrive.

“The challenge for fans here is, ‘Hey, here’s Andrew Luck. They told us he was the best prospect since John Elway and now he’s back. He came to the Colts and they immediately were good. So, hey, we should be right back in it,’ Hasselbeck said.

“But it’s trickier than that.”

Follow Colts Insider Stephen Holder on Twitter: @HolderStephen.