Stephen Holder

stephen.holder@indystar.com

INDIANAPOLIS – The “surprise” onside kick the Indianapolis Colts recovered in Sunday’s win over the Tennessee Titans actually wasn’t much of a surprise at all.

Punter and kickoff specialist Pat McAfee said the Titans were fully prepared to field an onside kick, knowing full well the Colts have a reputation for using the tactic.

“Most surprise onside kicks – especially because we’ve had so many in our past – most teams will have eight guys within 20 yards of the 35,” said McAfee, who is 4-for-10 on onside kicks in his career. “Usually, it’s only six. This team had 10 guys. So, they had all their guys up there ready for it.”

So what in the world were the Colts thinking attempting the kick anyway?

McAfee was intentionally vague to protect the Colts’ strategic plans, but he said special-teams coordinator Tom McMahon saw something in the Titans’ kick-return alignment earlier in the game that suggested the Colts had a chance to pull off a successful onside kick. As it turned out, the Colts were wrong.

Chiefs at Colts, 1 p.m. Sunday, CBS

“We thought we had something,” McAfee said. “On the film, they hadn’t shown it. But then Tom thought he saw something and we thought we could make it work. But it ended up working out. We didn’t plan for this. It was literally something that was drawn up on the sideline but ended up working out.”

It worked because the Titans couldn’t handle the awkward-bouncing kick, even though they did not ultimately show whatever unnamed susceptibility the Colts thought they had displayed.

On that point, there are two things to know here: One, onside kicks often come down to the receiving team’s ability to handle the kick, whether players know it’s coming or not. Second, the Colts are one of the best at pursuing onside kicks — thanks to McMahon, one of the finest special teams coaches in the NFL — and that’s why they pull the trigger so often.

“On every surprise onside, you hit the ball and you’re putting a guy in a bad position to make a play,” McAfee said. “There’s a lot of heat on one particular person. And that’s a tough ball to catch. So, basically you’re banking on a guy either not having practiced that play or you’re banking on our guy making a better play. That’s why the surprise onside takes a lot of (guts) to call.

Regarding the Colts recovering onside kicks, McAfee said, “We practice it every single week. I think we focus on it a lot more than a lot of other teams do. We put a lot of emphasis on recovery and what it means to our team if we can get it. I also think we have a lot of confidence because of the success rate we’ve had. We feel like we should get the ball. That’s how we look at it.”

Follow IndyStar reporter Stephen Holder on Twitter: @HolderStephen.