Mason Goes Down on the Sideline. One More Thing for Indianapolis to Sort Out.

Brian Mason tore multiple knee ligaments on Thursday night — a sideline collision on the final play of the preseason game — and now the Colts are heading into the regular season without their special teams coordinator. The timing is about as bad as it sounds.

The practical question is who runs the unit in the interim and how quickly the staff can absorb the disruption. Special teams coordinators don't just call coverage schemes; they own the week-to-week preparation, the personnel groupings, the situational decisions that show up in one-score games. The Colts went 3–6 in those last year. They cannot afford slippage in the margins.

This is the third significant personnel-side complication I've filed on in as many days, after Taylor-Britt's suspension and Pierce's continued absence. None of them are the same kind of problem, but they're piling up at the same moment — the final stretch before the opener — and each one requires a contingency the organization wasn't planning to make. Mason's injury is the most unexpected of the three.

The Colts haven't announced a replacement or interim arrangement yet. That's the next thing to watch.