Indianapolis Colts rookie quarterback Anthony Richardson was the most athletically gifted but also maybe the rawest quarterback prospect in the 2023 NFL Draft. Despite that, Richardson will be the team’s Week 1 starter, and as such, he played the entire first half of the final Colts’ preseason game. That performance, like most of Richardson’s career right now, was up and down, but first-time head coach Shane Steichen was generally happy with the QB’s game.

“Shoot, I thought he did a solid job,” Steichen told the media at his press conference. “We scored three out of the first four drives, which is good. The two-minute drive wasn’t what we wanted, but we’ll go back, look at the tape. I thought he did some really good things and some things we’ve got to clean up as well.”

Anthony Richardson was 6-of-17 for 78 yards and he ran five times for 38 yards, resulting in two touchdowns and a field goal on the team’s first there drives.

This stat line shows that Richardson is precisely where most NFL experts thought he would be entering the NFL. He’s been wildly inaccurate this preseason, going 13-of-29 (44.8%) in two games this Colts’ preseason.

Richardson has also been electric with his feet and times and moved the ball decently on offense in these games. So, as Shane Steichen said of his young signal-caller, the most accurate critique right now is that the rookie quarterback has done a “solid job.”

That could change soon, as the intensity, complexity, and talent level in games change a lot when the regular season starts. We’ll get our first chance to see Richardson under live fire on Sunday, September 10, when the Colts take on their AFC South rivals, the Jacksonville Jaguars.