With the unfortunate season-ending injury to Colts’ defensive end Samson Ebukam, it is not only Laiatu Latu who will be relied upon more heavily this season, but Tyquan Lewis will be as well.
“That was a big blow for us,” said Lewis after Tuesday’s practice. “Samson’s a great guy. We all contribute in different ways and he’s also a leader of the group and a big contributor. We wish him the best as far as recovery goes.
“But as far as the group go, we’ve still got a lot of great leaders in that room. We know that we have a void to fill. I mean, he was our sack leader last year, but we’re going to come in waves. We all stick together as one.”
After dealing with injuries during the 2021 and 2022 seasons, Lewis was fully healthy in 2023 and put together a productive and efficient season, appearing in all 17 games.
Lewis played 437 snaps, totaling 44 pressures–the third-most on the team–and ranked 17th among all edge rushers in PFF’s pass-rush win rate metric. Lewis also ranked 43rd out of 122 edge rushers in run-stop rate as well.
“Each and every day I wake up, and soon as soon as my feet hit the ground, I just say I’m grateful for everything and entitled to nothing,” said Lewis. “I’m just grateful, man. In my career, it’s not necessarily what I’m chasing, I just want to wake up and just be the best every single day. Like every day I aspire to be the best I could be.”
In addition to Lewis’ production, his versatility is a key element to what he brings to the Colts’ defensive front, able to line up both as a traditional defensive end as well as playing snaps along the interior.
Without Ebukam, Lewis is going to see more playing time, but how or where is still to be determined.
There’s the potential that without Ebukam, the Colts could need more defensive end snaps from Lewis, which means playing inside less. He also could tasked with handling the obvious running downs, while Latu handles the pass rush situations.
But regardless of how the Colts decide to utilize Lewis this season, he doesn’t care all that much. He’ll be ready for whatever role needs to be filled.
“I mean, whatever they need,” Lewis said. “It don’t matter to me, man. I’m comfortable wherever you put me. You can put me anywhere. You can put me in the middle of the ocean. I can’t swim but I’ll try.”
The Colts are coming off a season in which they produced 51 sacks, the fifth-most in football. That ability to get pressure on the quarterback is a cornerstone for defensive success because doing so has a positive trickle-down effect to the entire unit.
Admittedly, replicating this production, and generating pressure more consistently overall, becomes a greater challenge without Ebukam, but Lewis believes this defensive front still has the ability to produce at that level.
“No question,” said Lewis when asked about still being as productive as last season. “That’s the main thing, that we have to win games. It starts up front with us. As far as production goes, we all contribute as one. One person goes down, next man up, just having that mentality.”
