{"id":211570,"date":"2025-01-20T14:13:55","date_gmt":"2025-01-20T19:13:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/?p=211570"},"modified":"2025-01-20T14:13:55","modified_gmt":"2025-01-20T19:13:55","slug":"there-is-no-reason-to-give-up-on-colts-adonai-mitchell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/2025\/01\/20\/there-is-no-reason-to-give-up-on-colts-adonai-mitchell\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThere Is No Reason to Give Up\u201d on Young Colts Playmaker"},"content":{"rendered":"

Adonai Mitchell might turn out to be a bust. And that wouldn\u2019t be shocking, looking at his not-so-amazing rookie year. However, it\u2019s way too early to call the Indianapolis Colts wide receiver a bust. You can\u2019t earn that label after just one NFL season. Jon Spradley of Stampede Blue<\/a> wrote there\u2019s no reason to give up on Mitchell:<\/p>\n

\u201cReceivers tend to make the biggest leaps between years one to two. There is no reason to give up or believe A.D. Mitchell can\u2019t make it in this league. With that said, it was disappointing to not see more positives.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mitchell didn\u2019t impress anyone during his debut season in Indianapolis. Yet, he has the potential to emerge as a key contributor down the road.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere Is No Reason to Give Up\u201d on Colts Wide Receiver Adonai Mitchell<\/h2>\n

Adonai Mitchell\u2019s Career Thus Far<\/h3>\n

Adonai Mitchell played his first two years of college football with the Georgia Bulldogs. He won national championships in both seasons.<\/p>\n

Mitchell then transferred to the University of Texas. In his lone season with the Longhorns, he caught 55 passes for 845 yards and 11 touchdowns. He was named Big 12 Offensive Newcomer of the Year and was selected to the All-Big 12 Second-team.<\/p>\n

Indianapolis selected<\/a> Mitchell in the second round (52nd overall pick) of the 2024 NFL Draft. Many Colts fans wanted the team to trade up and land Marvin Harrison Jr.<\/a> That made sense, knowing he was the top receiver prospect in the draft and his dad, Marvin Harrison, is a Colts legend.<\/p>\n

However, a trade never happened and Harrison Jr. was drafted fourth overall by the Arizona Cardinals<\/a>. The former Ohio State star went on to have a great rookie year, catching 62 passes for 885 yards and eight touchdowns.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mitchell recorded just 23 receptions, 312 receiving yards, and zero touchdowns as a rookie this season. He had a few solid performances, like his 71-yard game against the Buffalo Bills<\/a>. He caught all six targets in that contest.<\/p>\n

He Needs to Take a Page out of Alec Pierce\u2019s \u201cHow to Ditch Being a Bust\u201d Book<\/h3>\n

Current Colts receiver Alec Pierce<\/a> knows all about being labeled a bust. During his first two seasons in the league, he only produced a total of 1,107 receiving yards and four touchdowns. Fans wanted him traded this time last year.<\/p>\n

Yet, Pierce broke out this season, contributing a career-high 824 yards and seven touchdowns. Now those fans calling him a bust have completely changed their minds.<\/p>\n

Mitchell can ditch the \u201cbust\u201d label like Pierce has managed to do. He, of course, will have to work on his game a lot to achieve that. As a rookie, he tended to shy away from contact. That won\u2019t cut it in the highly-physical NFL.<\/p>\n

Mitchell possesses the ability to create separation and get open. He\u2019s also very athletic and a good route runner, making him a tough matchup. If he puts the work in and develops better chemistry with quarterback Anthony Richardson<\/a>, the sky is the limit for this kid. Perhaps Mitchell and Richardson, who\u2019s also looking to have a breakout year<\/a>, can help get the Colts to the playoffs next season.<\/p>\n

Main Photo: Grace Hollars-USA TODAY Network via Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This young Indianapolis Colts wide receiver didn\u2019t have an impressive rookie year, but it’s too early to give up on him. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4890,"featured_media":211692,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[32427,9094,9564,7800],"class_list":["post-211570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colts","tag-adonai-mitchell","tag-alec-pierce","tag-anthony-richardson","tag-indianapolis-colts-news"],"modified_by":"Will Koshover, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4890"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=211570"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":211693,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/211570\/revisions\/211693"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/211692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=211570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=211570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=211570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}