An item from last Sunday explained the efforts of Colts tackle Braden Smith, who endured serious OCD in 2024, to expand access to player mental-health resources, and to streamline and modernize the league’s handling of players confronting such challenges.
With the Colts on a bye this week, Smith visited PFT Live for a lengthy discussion regarding his own journey, and his commitment to helping other players who may end up needing help for any type of non-physical ailment.
The relevant portion of the interview is attached. The full conversation is here.
As it relates to the league, Smith wants mental-health issues to be handled like any other condition acquired while playing the inherently physical, stressful, and demanding sport of professional football. Currently, a player who has developed anxiety, depression, OCD, or any other mental-health condition lands on the non-football illness list, if/when it prevents him from practicing and playing. Smith has been advocating directly with the league to make such players eligible for injured reserve. This will, among other things, remove the possibility that the player’s team will decide not to pay his salary while he’s on the NFI list.
Hopefully, the league won’t view it as a matter of collective bargaining, but as the right thing to do for the men who play the game.
Regarding the NFL Players Association, Smith wants to expand the existing network of contacts for workers’ compensation attorneys in each city to include mental-health professionals who will serve as an immediate contact point for any player who needs help. That person would then refer the player to the appropriate professional, if it is determined that specific assistance, diagnosis, or treatment is needed.
In some cases, the player may just need to talk to someone. And the player — as Smith explained — may not feel comfortable using the mental-health clinicians made available by the teams. Correct or incorrect, real or imagined, some players fear that activating the team-provided mental-health resources will get back to those who shape the roster. The legitimate concern is that the player’s mental-health issues will become a factor when deciding who stays and who goes. Who gets playing time and who doesn’t. Who gets a new contract and who doesn’t.
The goal is to remove all obstacles to players seeking help when help is needed. It’s hard enough, for many, to open up at all. If they believe that opening up could cause more problems than it solves, they won’t do it.
Football constantly changes and evolves. The NFL, we believe, is always trying to improve. In the past 16 years, the league has made player health and safety a priority. Mental health should be a priority, too.
The recent death of Cowboys defensive end Marshawn Kneeland should be the catalyst. Both the league and the union should embrace any and all possible strategies for providing a system that will remove any and all barriers to a player who is silently dealing with problems that have become too big for him to deal with alone.
Smith should be applauded for using his own challenges as the spark to help other players. Any players who read this should send it to their teammates. The agents who read this should send it to their clients. Braden Smith’s commitment should spark a groundswell for the kind of positive change that will result in players struggling with the question of whether to get help to believe that safe, easy, and effective paths are immediately available.
Colts running back Jonathan Taylor has been tough to stop in the United States this season and he showed last Sunday that he’s just as difficult to defend in Germany.
Taylor ran 32 times for 244 yards and three touchdowns in Indy’s 31-25 overtime win against the Falcons. Taylor’s third touchdown was the game winner in the extra period and he had three catches for 42 yards as well.
It was the fifth three-touchdown game of the year for Taylor and he leads the league with 17 touchdowns on the season.
That production has made him a favorite for AFC offensive player of the year and his Week 10 work made him the AFC’s offensive player of the week for the third time this season.
Most would prefer to keep politics out of sports. That’s hard to do when sports is caught up in politics. (And when sports shows platform politicians.)
In the case of NIL payments for college athletes, the stewards of college sports have run to politics for relief from the mess the industry made for itself via decades of maintaining a rigged system that violated the antitrust laws and exploited the players.
One politician is fully on board with the idea that the only way to avert a supposed disaster is to artificially limit the amount of money college athletes can make.
Appearing Tuesday with Pat McAfee, President Trump pushed the idea that a free market for college football players will eventually spell doom.
“Well, it is a very serious problem because even football where they give quarterbacks $12 million, $13-14 million . . . all of a sudden you’re going to be out of control,” he said, via Mark Giannotto of USA Today. “And even rich colleges are going to go bust because you’re not going to be able to do this. And you know they had the old way, they gave scholarships, they did lots of good things, but there could be some form of payment. But when they start bidding up the costs, look the NFL and all teams, they have caps. You don’t really have that in college sports, and when the guard comes along that weighs 350 pounds and he’s phenomenal and they say that’s gonna make the difference between having a great team and a lousy team, and they give him $10 million, that’s going to start happening pretty soon. All of a sudden you’re going to have like NFL-type payrolls. . . .
"[C]ollege football is very big, but as big as it is, if they don’t do some very powerful caps, these colleges are all going to go out of business no matter how rich they are.”
But that’s how free markets operate, sir. That’s how it works for college coaches, who get millions to show up — and millions to leave.
Change one word in the first sentence uttered on the issue. Replace “quarterbacks” with “coaches.”
We’ll do it for you: “Well, it is a very serious problem because even football where they give coaches $12 million, $13-14 million . . . all of a sudden you’re going to be out of control.”
But they’re already paying coaches that much, and no one is saying it’s out of control or that it’s going to force colleges out of business.
It’s only an existential threat when the rabbit has the gun. It’s only a problem when the players have a chance to do what people like President Trump have done their whole lives, and continue to do every day. Capitalize on every available opportunity to make as much money as they can. (That’s what “capitalism” means, folks.)
Here’s a possible response to the President’s rant, within the confines of a true dialogue/debate on the topic. “Sir, has anyone ever tried to limit the amount of money you make? . . . Sir, is it not for all businesses to operate within their means? . . . Sir, don’t businesses that fail to operate within their means go bankrupt all the time?”
Why should player compensation be capped? The only apparent reason is that Trump and others (like his buddy Nick Saban and, given his silence on the issue, McAfee) want the “old way” where the players only receive scholarships, not full and fair compensation as determined by the same free-market capitalist system that Trump, Saban, McAfee, and millions of others have capitalized on.
The “old way” was exposed to be one big, not-so-beautiful antitrust violation, with businesses coming together in violation of federal law to prevent competition, and true compensation, for the services of young men with significant marketable athletic skills. The “old way” funneled the money that the players generated to others who had little to do with attracting that revenue via ticket sales and TV deals.
The new way is the way it always should have been. As the business of college sports grew, the players should have been allowed to share in it. They weren’t, because the universities banded together under the umbrella of the NCAA and blatantly violated the federal antitrust laws.
They made this mess. They should be required to clean it up. If they want NFL-style caps, embrace an NFL-style union. But they don’t want that. They want to have it both ways. To get the limitations that can be secured through collective bargaining without making the concessions needed to get there.
Fortunately, the effort to restrict player pay has yet to get any real traction. Hopefully, it never will. If every other business in America must operate within a free and fair market, the colleges and universities (all of which are businesses) should be expected to play by the same rules.
The Colts didn’t trade for a pass rusher before last week’s deadline. However, they’ve been kicking the tires from time to time on available veterans with established NFL pedigrees.
On Tuesday, the Colts gave a tryout to 2016 first-rounder Shaq Lawson.
Lawson, 31, was drafted by the Bills. After four years in Buffalo, Lawson has played for the Dolphins, Jets, Bills (again), and Panthers. He last played in 2024.
The Colts also worked out on Tuesday defensive end Myles Cole, defensive end Viliami Fehoko, defensive tackle Christopher Hinton, defensive tackle Maurice Hurst, and defensive end Chris Wormley.
Late last month, the Colts gave veteran pass rusher Shaq Barrett a tryout.
Lawson has 110 regular-season appearances with 38 starts. He has 26.0 career sacks.
Josh Allen? Nope. Patrick Mahomes? Nope. Lamar Jackson? Nope. Aaron Rodgers? Please.
Since 2018, one of those four quarterbacks has won the NFL MVP award. Currently, none is the favorite to win it in 2025.
Right now, at +275, it’s Patriots quarterback Drake Maye. Hot on his heels is Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford, at +300.
Both had impressive road wins in Week 10, with New England toppling the Bucs, 28-23, and the Rams evening the regular-season series with the 49ers, 42-26. And Stafford is the first player to have three straight games with four or more touchdown passes and no interceptions.
Mahomes lands next, at 5-1, followed by Colts running back Jonathan Taylor at 6-1, Allen at 7-1, and Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold at 10-1.
Jackson is currently 25-1. Rodgers has plummeted to 150-1.
There’s still plenty of football to be played. And it fluctuates every week. Still, the Patriots are 8-2. They face the Jets, Bengals, and Giants before their bye. They should be 11-2 at that point.
Then come games against the Bills and the resurgent Ravens, followed by the Jets and Dolphins to end the season.
The No. 1 seed is within reach for New England. Which puts the MVP award squarely within Maye’s grasp.
Of course, the Rams could also end up with the No. 1 seed in the NFC. Which could boost Stafford. Who has never won it, and who could benefit from the perception that it’s his last chance to do so — with Maye having many more opportunities.
