FanHouse AustinCollie

This weekend's AFC South showdown appeared, at the beginning of the week, to be one of those strength vs. strength matchups. The Colts have the NFL's seventh-ranked pass defense and they have only allowed three passing touchdowns all season (making them the stingiest in the NFL). The Houston Texans are the NFL's third-best passing team and have thrown 16 touchdown passes in eight games.

Things this week, have, uh, changed a bit.

The Montana-Young 49ers, the '70s Steelers, the '70s Dolphins, the '90s Cowboys, the Belichick-and-Brady Patriots: what do they all have in common? They are all-time great NFL teams that racked up many wins in a handful of seasons. You know what else they have in common? None of them have ever put together as impressive a regular season resume as the current Peyton Manning-era Colts.

That's right, after beginning this season 5-0, the Manning-era Colts are now 80-21 since the beginning of 2003. The '70s Steelers went 87-27-1 from 1972-1979. From 1981-1998, the 49ers were always pretty stout, but they never put together a six-plus season run where they played close to .800 ball like the current Colts (they came closest from 1987-1992 when they went 75-20). The '90s Cowboys went 70-20 in their best stretch. From 2001-2007, the Patriots went 86-26. Shula's '70s Dolphins, at 67-16-1, check in as the best competition.

So, these Colts should go down as one of the best teams of all-time, right? Uh, no. Not yet, at least.

Austin Collie was a little-known receiver coming out of BYU in this year's NFL draft, but on Sunday night he had a big game on a big stage, with the best performance of his young NFL career in the Sunday night Colts vs. Titans game. And as we open up the Monday morning NFL Twitter mailbag, we start with Collie.

We also get to Randy Moss's interception, Mike Singletary's coaching, Dre Bly's Leon Lett moment, and Derek Anderson's pathetic completion percentage. Your questions and my answers for the NFL Twitter mailbag are below.

Sunday Evening Wrap checks out players who increased or decreased their value during the Sunday afternoon games.

Faller of the Week: Everyone on the Oakland Raiders. The Houston Texans entered the game as one of the league's worst defenses. They were the worst in the NFL against the run. Sunday, the Raiders gained just 165 yards and only a single first down on the ground against those same Texans. I'm done with Darren McFadden. Michael Bush and Justin Fargas shouldn't be considered viable fantasy contributors in any format, and I'd even give up on Zach Miller (which isn't his fault, but he's not going to put up stats for this embarrassingly inept offense). This team is dead to me, and they should be to you, too.

On a televised report, ESPN's Adam Shefter reported the Colts are likely going to ink wide receiver Hank Baskett to a contract. Baskett is most famous for stealing Kendra Wilkinson from Hugh Hefner, but he does play a little football on the side.

The four-year veteran has caught 72 passes for 1,052 yards and six touchdowns in his career. Most notably, he has a penchant for long touchdowns -- he's caught TDs of 90, 89 and 87 yards in his career. Baskett was recently released by the Eagles.

Early in the season opener Sunday against the Jacksonville Jaguars, Colts' No. 2 wideout Anthony Gonzalez left the game with a non-contact, apparent knee injury. After some evaluation in the locker room, reports say the preliminary diagnosis was that he'll miss anywhere from two to six weeks with a strained ligament in his right knee. There will be more testing Monday and the team will keep an eye on any swelling, but, for now, it appears he's on the shelf for a while.

The third-year receiver suffered the injury while running a route. It seemed a freakish-type injury, considering he wasn't making a hard cut with the ball nor was he hit.

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Training camps have wrapped up, the NFL season is right around the corner, and it's still hot as sin outside. But instead of cooling you off with a warm island song, FanHouse break out ye old heat check for our 2009 NFL Season Previews. " We'll rate each club in 5 categories on a scale of 1 to 10, high score wins.

For most franchises, 12 wins is a banner year; one they can hang their proverbial hats upon. For the Colts, 12 wins is a certainly. They have won at least 12 games in each of the last six seasons. They have also had Tony Dungy as their head coach for the past seven years, but now he's gone. In 2009, the Colts will look for some continuity. Can it be provided by the Jim Caldwell administration?

One of my favorite moves on fantasy football draft day is taking a late-round gamble and letting everyone else laugh at me. You can have the first round, just let me pick late. To illustrate, here's an actual message board post last season after one of my drafts: "Commish Snyder purposefully did not draft a kicker so he could take a flier on yet another long shot (Steve Slaton of the Texans). I'm sure he'll say it will pay off in the long run."

My response? "I'll end up dropping Patrick Crayton (my fifth WR) for a kicker before week 1 when Slaton wins the Houston gig -- unless someone suffers a season-ending injury, in which case I'll drop that person."

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With Fantasy Football season ready to kick in high gear, FanHouse is here to preview each and every team -- one per day until we've done them all.

Meet the ...
Team under Peyton's leadership for the first time without Tom Moore*. That's right. Peyton's only offensive coordinator for his entire 11-year career has been the venerable Moore. Moore's first year at the helm was Manning's rookie season, so the two grew together. It's going to be interesting to see how Manning fares without his mentor calling the shots.

Of course, Manning's obviously cerebral enough to deal quite well with the transition, and the Colts have enough weapons in their arsenal to remain the high-octane offense we're used to seeing every fall.

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