Joe Flacco made his first Colts start on Sunday, and his performance carried over from his surprising run with the Browns last season. The 39-year-old passer’s Cleveland success did not lead to a strong free agent market, however. 
After the Colts’ 37-34 loss, Flacco informed CBS Sports’ Aditi Kinkhabwala the Colts were the only team which made an offer during the spring. A report from March indicated the Eagles had made an offer for the former Super Bowl MVP to return to Philadelphia. Flacco served as the Eagles’ backup for a brief stretch in 2021, but he did not see any game action.
Since then, he spent time with the Jets and Browns, taking over as Cleveland’s top option not long after he was merely added as veteran insurance under center. Deshaun Watson‘s season-ending shoulder injury eventually resulted in Flacco making five starts at the end of the campaign. He averaged 323 passing yards per game during that stretch, throwing 13 touchdowns. The longtime Ravens starter wanted to remain in Cleveland for the current season as part of his goal of playing for the next two years. As was recently confirmed, though, the Browns did not make an offer to Flacco.
Cleveland has Watson on the books through 2026, and despite his struggles he will remain atop the depth chart. Jameis Winston was added to fill the role of veteran backup, a decision which left Flacco free to move on. The latter took a one-year, $4.5MM pact to head to Indianapolis on the open market. The Colts were interested in retaining Gardner Minshew after he served as the team’s starter for much of last season, but he received a more lucrative deal from the Raiders than Indianapolis was prepared to offer.
When taking into account Flacco’s relief performance in Week 4 following Anthony Richardson‘s hip injury, he has amassed five touchdowns without an interceptions along with a 70% completion percentage. Flacco has averaged nearly nine yards per attempt and posted a 115.6 passer rating during that brief stretch. Continuing that impressive output would not be expected over an extended period, and Richardson could be back to full health in time for Week 6.
Last year’s No. 4 pick has struggled to date, but he will retain starting duties once healthy. If Flacco is called upon again, though, he could continue to guide the team’s offense effectively and help his 2025 market value in the process.
Flacco earned another backup job last year, but let’s not overreact to him putting up numbers against the Jaguars. Every quarterback Jacksonville has faced this year has lit them up except for Watson, and even he was playing with two backup tackles.
I hear what you’re saying and this feel good story probably won’t last all season but it’s just refreshing to see a veteran QB play hard for $4.5MM and exhibit humility.
$177 million in career earnings will take the sting out of only making $4.5 million. But yeah, still a cool story to see a guy come off the couch five years after looking washed and go from an overpaid starter to a strong backup, even if he can’t always look like he did against Jacksonville.
I don’t see why we need to downplay it. I don’t think that anyone expects a career resurgence as a starter, but the man is doing what’s asked of him at a high level for his role. Flacco wasn’t bad last year, and hasn’t been bad this year. No, we don’t expect gratuitously high passing yards, nor should we expect more than a few games of high performance, but as far as backups go, Flacco’s playing extremely well.
Given his age, we can expect the bottom to fall out after several games, but there’s little reason to downplay his success either here or in Baltimore. It’s worth noting that, for all of his replacement’s hype and for the praise that he does deserve, he still hasn’t reached Flacco’s accomplishments to this point.