Donte Moncrief: 'Love it here.' But will Colts want him back in '18?

• Colts at Titans, 8:30 p.m. Monday, ESPN

INDIANAPOLIS – In the first five games of this season are the first four years of Donte Moncrief’s NFL career, infrequent but dazzling flickers of "did you see that?" football underscored by an overwhelming majority of underwhelming snaps. Even now, 49 games in, it’s hard to get a sense of where he’s been and where he’s headed.

One play, Moncrief has future star written all over him. A week later, you wonder where it all went.

Such is the current quandary of the Indianapolis Colts’ 24-year-old promising but puzzling wide receiver and the general manager who a) did not draft him and b) must decide if he’s worth a sizable contract extension come March.

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Moncrief has 11 games to ensure his career continues in Indianapolis. What once seemed a surety no longer is.

“Whatever happens, happens,” Moncrief said this week in a quiet corner in the locker room, referring to his beckoning free agency. “God’s gonna make whatever he wants to happen happen.”

Unless the Colts lock him up early, come next spring Moncrief will hit the open market for the first time in his career. Once tapped and presumed the long-term sidekick to T.Y. Hilton, his close friend and mentor, Moncrief’s past year and a half have muddied his future. A sizzling start to summer workouts this year faded during training camp, when Moncrief was sidelined with a nagging shoulder injury. At least at one point, coach Chuck Pagano didn’t seem happy, seemingly calling into question Moncrief’s availability.

And new General Manager Chris Ballard hasn’t been timid when it comes to parting with members of the old guard, no matter where they were drafted, no matter what their past production was. Case in point: He traded his incumbent tight end, Dwayne Allen, for a fourth-round draft pick last spring. The message was clear: Under this regime you’re going to have to earn it.

When he inked free agent wideout Kamar Aiken last spring, Ballard said the signing wasn’t simply to spur production from Phillip Dorsett, whom Ballard shipped out of town a few months later anyway. It was designed to light a fire under Moncrief, as well.

Has it? Hard to tell. Through the season’s first five games, Moncrief has just 11 catches. He’s been demoted to the No. 3 receiver spot, behind Aiken. He’s yet to grab more than three catches in a game, and just once in his last 28 starts has he crested the 100-yard barrier. The production simply hasn’t been there.

That next step, which Moncrief has teased at taking for the past two seasons? He’s yet to take it.

But there are plays, wow plays, that hint at all that Moncrief brings to the table. He remains a lethal red zone threat and can win one-on-one matchups with the best of ‘em, like he did in Week 4 in Seattle, wrestling a 50-50 ball in tight coverage away from Seahawks corner Shaquill Griffin for an 18-yard touchdown in the second quarter. No one else on this roster can make that play, and there is tremendous value in a 6-3, 220-pound, sure-handed receiver whose best attribute is catching touchdowns.

Moncrief also came up clutch in Sunday’s win over the San Francisco 49ers, grabbing a vital third-down catch in overtime that kept the game-winning drive alive.

“I think he’s played really well the last couple of weeks,” Pagano said of Moncrief.

Key in Pagano’s response there: “The last couple of weeks.”

Because Moncrief most certainly did not play well in an overtime loss to the Arizona Cardinals in Week 2; his two catches on eight targets were the result of bad effort and bad communication and bad play. Moncrief stopped running on a deep ball, later explaining he lost it in the lights. He was out-toughed by a defensive back on a third-and-2. Other times, he simply looked lost, even disinterested. 

That’s not how you want to play in a contract year.

“The opportunities presented themselves,” Pagano said a day later. “You’ve got to make plays.”

In Moncrief’s defense, it was his first game with new quarterback Jacoby Brissett. The hiccups are going to come, and they have. The rhythm built with Andrew Luck simply isn't there. 

But with Luck returning to the fold, as he’s expected to do in the ensuing month, Moncrief’s skillset will remain valuable. His 14 touchdowns are the most on the team since 2015, and that includes Pro Bowler Hilton and steady-as-ever tight end Jack Doyle.

On Monday, Moncrief made it clear what he hopes will happen in the spring. He doesn’t want to play anywhere else.

“I love it here,” he said. “I love Indy. Indy is home. I love the guys. I love the crowds, the stadium. I love everything about it here.”

Another wrinkle this season has been the arrival of new receivers coach Sanjay Lal, whom his lieutenants haven’t been hesitant to classify as one of the toughest position coaches they’ve ever played for. Lal is on them — every catch, every block, every snap, every detail.

Which may very well turn out to be a good thing for the unpredictable yet dynamic Moncrief, who at 24 has so much of his career in front of him.

“He’s gonna demand what he wants, and he gonna get what he want,” Moncrief said of Lal. “It’s not, ‘You do what you want and if it works, it works.’ It’s, ‘You’re gonna do it the way I want it, and it’s gonna work.’”

It was Lal, back in the spring, who looked at Moncrief and saw so much untapped potential.

“I don’t know how he was coached and what was demanded of him in the past,” Lal said, “but all I know is with me, it’s a blank slate. And I see this piece of clay that can be one of the better receivers in this league.”

A piece of clay?

A touchdown machine?

An Indianapolis Colt in 2018?

Donte Moncrief has 11 games to decide it.

Call IndyStar reporter Zak Keefer at (317) 444-6134. Follow him on Twitter: @zkeefer.