{"id":99509,"date":"2026-08-12T03:23:20","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T03:23:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/colts-hc-shane-steichen-names-starter-for-preseason-opener\/"},"modified":"2026-08-12T03:23:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T03:23:20","slug":"colts-hc-shane-steichen-names-starter-for-preseason-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/colts-hc-shane-steichen-names-starter-for-preseason-opener\/","title":{"rendered":"Colts HC Shane Steichen names starter for preseason opener"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\tIndianapolis Colts\u2019 quarterback Anthony Richardson (#5) waves to the fans during Colts Camp at Grand Park Sports Campus, Tuesday, July 29, 2025 in Westfield. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Co\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Indianapolis Colts<\/a><\/strong>head coach Shane Steichen<\/strong><\/a>indicated on Tuesday in Foxborough that backup quarterback Anthony Richardson Sr. <\/strong><\/a>will receive the start on the road for Thursday night\u2019s preseason opener against the New England Patriots, playing in the first half, while fellow quarterback Riley Leonard<\/a><\/strong>will take over in the second half.<\/p>\n

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#Colts<\/a> head coach Shane Steichen shared Anthony Richardson will start at QB against the Patriots, with Riley Leonard playing the second half.<\/p>\n

He also said Daniel Jones will not be playing in any preseason game. pic.twitter.com\/eDEM6RyUG3<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 WISH-TV News (@WISHNews8) August 11, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

The plan is then for Leonard to start a week later when the Colts host the Atlanta Falcons in preseason, with Richardson then coming in relief of him in the 2nd half of action.<\/p>\n

Of course, as noted above, Colts starting quarterback Daniel Jones, who\u2019s so far looked very sharp in training camp and has shown no lingering effects of last season\u2019s Achilles tear, will not play in any preseason games. <\/p>\n

Regarding the Colts QB2 competition behind Jones with Richardson and Leonard as the challengers, neither backup quarterback has clearly separated himself from the other throughout training camp so far. <\/p>\n

Preseason could be an ideal opportunity for either backup quarterback to make their case for the QB2 job. <\/p>\n

Regarding Richardson, he\u2019s still made the occasional \u2018highlight reel\u2019 throw in Colts camp, but it\u2019s just a matter of achieving greater consistency. Of critical importance for Richardson will be showing that some of the fumbled snap issues he\u2019s had in training camp are just an aberration and not a lingering issue of potential vision loss. Colts head coach Shane Steichen can\u2019t accept unnecessary turnovers\u2014and rightfully so, no coach could. <\/p>\n

For what it\u2019s worth, Leonard, who\u2019s also had an up-and-down camp so far, reportedly had a strong showing running with the 2\u2019s during Tuesday morning\u2019s joint training camp practice with the Patriots just ahead of the two teams\u2019 Week 1 preseason game. <\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Indianapolis Colts\u2019 quarterback Anthony Richardson (#5) waves to the fans during Colts Camp at Grand Park Sports Campus, Tuesday, July 29, 2025 in Westfield. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Co Indianapolis Coltshead coach Shane Steichenindicated on Tuesday in Foxborough that backup quarterback Anthony Richardson Sr. will receive the start on the road for Thursday […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":99510,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9388,2356,9512,7730,6786,12281,30203],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99509"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99509"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99509\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fallsurfing.net\/firstnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}