Anthony Richardson & Gardner Minshew have a bond that keeps growing despite QB competition

INDIANAPOLIS - Anthony Richardson and Gardner Minshew are locked in a position battle, but it's gotten hard for anyone to tell.

Out on a practice field, the rookie will drop back, set his feet with nobody around him and loft an effortless pass to a net 15 yards away, but he'll be greeted by a few howling cheers. That's Minshew in his ear, celebrating the simple and trying to make the moment feel small, as if they're back in Gainesville training like the friends they were before they shared a Colts quarterback room.

Sometimes Richardson will turn to Minshew and see the veteran holding two hands out by his waist. Then Richardson will launch that 244-pound body with the explosion that got him drafted No. 4 overall, just to come down and slap the double high-five -- all in the moments surrounding an individual drill.

"It’s been a lot of good energy, a lot of good camaraderie being built, a lot of high-fives and smiles," Minshew said. "I think those are all things that when times get tough, you’ve got to be able to rely on those strong relationships. It’s good to see those getting built.”

This is the Colts quarterback vibe during the most pivotal time of transition the franchise has seen since it drafted Andrew Luck. They're trading off with first-team reps, a rookie chasing down a veteran in his knowledge of the playbook in a way that neither one wants to call a competition.

"I can go out there and be great and it’s not going to affect him," Minshew said. "He can go out there and be great and it’s not going to affect me."

This isn't a zero-sum game to them, even if it can feel that way on the outside. From Colts fans to gambling experts to fantasy football analysts, everyone wants to know who is starting Week 1 and, more importantly, when the Richardson experience will finally take off. The coaching staff is doing everything it can to temper expectations, such as having Richardson throwing more with the second team on the days when practice is open to viewing by the media.

But they're teammates, ultimately, and that's what the arrangement was going to be the moment the Colts turned in the card on draft night. Minshew signed here on a one-year deal worth $3.5 million before he knew which rookie he'd mentor in the Shane Steichen playbook he's lived in the past two seasons. But he knew that time was coming.

It just so happened the kid they drafted was one of his friends. Minshew and Richardson have trained together with the guidance of Denny Thompson in Jacksonville. It's where Minshew began his NFL career as a sixth-round pick of the Jaguars in 2019 and just 70 miles from where Richardson was growing into that 6-4 frame in Gainesville, first as a kid at Eastside High School and then as a quarterback at the University of Florida.

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It was a meeting of two quarterbacks who shared little in common beyond their position. Minshew was already in the NFL after a long career at Washington State; Richardson hadn't started a game above high school. Minshew stood 6-1, drafted for his accuracy despite some average measurables; Richardson was 6-4 with historic athleticism, a kid still learning the finer points of passing.

But they went to work in the same program, 6 Points, where they'd drill similar fundamentals and start to build a bond. Minshew is a stranger to nobody he meets in these settings, and he wasn't to Richardson, who tends to be quiet around people until he knows them. The ice melted quickly beneath the Florida sun.

Those days set the stage for the life they share now, as the present and future of the Colts quarterback room.

“Coach is going to teach it the way he does and as a QB that has played in the offense, (Minshew) might see it a little different because he’s on the field," Richardson said. "Just getting information from Gardner and Sam (Ehlinger) is definitely helpful. It keeps me sane.”

That sanity comes in the smiles, the handshakes, the hip checks, the high-fives and the howls. Bit by bit, it's pulling Richardson out of a rookie shell and out into the open for his teammates and everyone watching.

He's even working on his own humor. Take the first question of Tuesday's news conference before veteran minicamp, when Richardson was asked what this high-stakes NFL life has been like so far.

"I'm just here so I won't get fined," he deadpanned, a nod to former Seahawks star running back Marshawn Lynch.

The room erupted in laughter.

"I told my mom I was going to do that," he said, and he could no longer keep the smile inside.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Colts: Anthony Richardson and Gardner Minshew share a bond