"A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!"

With the Colts showing no signs of life on run defense, Jacksonville proved that, indeed, you can beat a dead horse. By 27 points.

The Colts can't be shocked at the outcome of yesterday's game. After giving up 375 yards to an opponent's running game, it's doubtful to expect to see a mark in the W column at the end of the day.

Peyton Manning reminds me a lot of my dad, but not so much in the areas of physical stature or pocket presence--though I must admit my dad is the king of fiscal responsibility. I'm talking more about the reaction to what he's helped build, and how quickly it was destroyed by negligence out of his control.

See, my dad once built an end table. It was a thing of beauty: a sturdy, sanded and stained craftsman's dream with a built-in lamp and a magazine rack for his Penn State literature. He spent an entire week creating it in his free time after work, and once it was complete he set it proudly by his TV chair, awaiting the moment where he could set a cold diet Coke on its shiny, varnished surface and catch Saturday's Big Ten game of the week.

It sat there in a state of Yankee Workshop perfection for approximately an hour and a half. It was at that time his eldest son wanted to tell him about that he was going to his friend Mindy's house. With his dad nowehere in sight (probably just finishing sweeping up the garage from the project), his son quickly scrawled the message on a piece of paper. With an ink pen. On the new end table. Which was built with pine. Soft, impressionable pine.

To this day, my dad can still tell me what that note said, as the message endlessly glares up at him from what was once his accomplishment--his pride and joy--and he continues to wonder how something that nice was destroyed so quickly, and without warning.

Now Peyton Manning, the person around whom the entire Colts offense was built, can only watch in horror as his accomplishments on the field are destroyed by a bunch of blundering idiots. At this point in the season, the Colts couldn't stop a run if they were the finish line at the Boston Marathon.

Remember last year? Peyton "the Franchise" Manning almost capped off a perfect season. Hell, remember this year? Peyton "Son of Archie" Manning made yet another run at a perfect season. For the most part, his numbers have been positive, and he captains his team with intensity and pride, willing his offense to score points to keep them in nearly every game.

He is not the problem.

How angry would you be if every concerted effort you made to produce brilliance was complemented with dumbfounded tomfoolery?

The Colts defense simply can not tackle. They may as well slather their arms with bacon grease before games. The problem was noted at the beginning of the year, but efforts to sharpen the run defense have been for naught.

For any football team to have continued success, there are three major goals that must be met:

1. Have an offense that doesn't make mistakes. The Colts offense is pretty solid because of mistake-free play. Ask anyone why Chicago may not make it to the Super Bowl this year and (after yelling about Rex for an hour) they will surmise that, though Rex's name was used, offensive mistakes are killing them.

2. Have solid special teams that can make big plays.
Vinatieri has been accountable this year, and the Colts special teams does what it has to do to stay in games.

3. Stop the run.* (crickets chirping)

With a defense that allows the equivalent of more than .2 miles on the ground, the Colts will not be on the dance floor come February. Peyton Manning will have to sit at home, in his TV chair, watching the Super Bowl. If he only kept the statistics of his team's run defense on his end table, along with a cold diet Coke by his side, he and my dad would really be interchangeable...save for the fact that my father would rather have his testicles eaten by a scavenging gaze of raccoons than root for the Tennessee Volunteers on New Year's Day.