Why the Colts fired Chuck Pagano as head coach after 6 seasons

Chuck Pagano rode quarterback Andrew Luck all the way to the AFC Championship Game in 2014. After two years of mediocrity and one bottoming-out season, his tenure with the Colts is over.

Indianapolis fired Pagano on Sunday after six years with the franchise. The team announced the move Sunday afternoon.

Colts owner Jim Irsay thanked Pagano in the team’s official statement:

“Chuck Pagano provided Colts fans with many exciting wins and memories as head coach of the Colts,” said Colts Owner & CEO Jim Irsay. “Throughout his tenure in Indianapolis, he impacted the lives of the players he coached, those who he worked with in the organization and Colts fans across the globe. Chuck’s first season was one of the more inspirational stories in NFL history as he courageously battled and overcame leukemia. As a result, his CHUCKSTRONG Foundation has raised millions for cancer research. We are thankful for Chuck’s contributions to our franchise and community and we wish him, Tina and the entire Pagano family nothing but the best moving forward.”

While 2017 marked just his first losing season in Indianapolis, the Colts’ sloppy play and inability to compete in the AFC South without their star quarterback ultimately spelled his doom as the team’s head coach.

Pagano has been coaching in some aspect since 1984 when he broke into the ranks as a graduate assistant at the University of Southern California. The defensive-minded assistant had taken jobs at prestigious programs like Miami (Fla.) and North Carolina while as the secondary coach with the Browns, Raiders, and Ravens in the NFL. His big break came with Baltimore in 2011 when he served as defensive coordinator for the league’s No. 3 ranked defense.

That success led him to Indianapolis, where he missed 12 games in his first season due to cancer treatments. Bruce Arians stepped in as interim coach while Pagano battled leukemia. Together, the pair led the Colts to an 11-5 record and a spot in the Wild Card round.

With Pagano’s cancer in remission, Arians left for a full-time head coaching position with the Cardinals — but Indianapolis didn’t suffer from his departure. With Luck behind center, the Colts posted two more 11-win seasons in 2013 and 2014, advancing one round further in the playoffs each season.

However, 2014’s trip to the AFC title game would be Pagano’s apex. The Colts fell to 8-8 in 2015, a season in which Luck missed nine games and went just 2-5 in the games he started. The Pro Bowl quarterback would return for the bulk of the 2016 season, but it resulted in another 8-8 campaign. Even worse, it flared up the shoulder injury that forced Luck to miss the entire 2017 campaign.

That set the stage for 2017, a season fraught with problems and mistakes. While preseason addition Jacoby Brissett performed well enough as the team’s fill-in quarterback, the Colts proved they could only handle the league’s bottom dwellers en route to a 4-12 record. Those four wins came against the Browns, 49ers, and Texans — three teams concentrated at the bottom of the standings all season.

Pagano’s management came under fire as well — first when Brissett was inserted back into a Week 10 game after suffering a possible concussion, then later when the team cut Pro Bowl cornerback Vontae Davis after the veteran opted for surgery to fix an ailing groin.

Pagano was on the hot seat this time last year, but it was former general manager Ryan Grigson who was fired. The club’s worst season since the bottoming out that allowed Indianapolis to draft Luck meant he couldn’t escape another round of restructuring.

Whoever takes over as head coach in 2018 will likely have Luck back at his disposal. The 2012 No. 1 overall pick told reporters he feels like his injured shoulder will be good to go after sitting out 2017. He’s spent the last few months undergoing treatment in the Netherlands.

While Pagano’s overall record reflects a solid coach, his inability to topple a rebuilding Titans team or a quarterback-less Texans team and win an AFC South crown the past three seasons is a damning stain on his resume.

That, combined with the personnel drama that has created all the wrong headlines, led to his eventual departure from Indianapolis.