Falcons Rout Colts 34-6 as Indianapolis Backups Get Overrun
The Atlanta Falcons rolled over the Indianapolis Colts 34-6 in a preseason game Saturday, Aug. 22, 2026. The scoreline was ugly. The performance behind it was worse for a Colts squad that got dominated at home by Atlanta's second and third-string players.
This was the second week of the 2026 preseason, the game where rosters start taking shape. The Falcons treated it like an audition and passed decisively. Indianapolis treated it like a formality and paid for it. Any Colts backup hoping to make the roster likely watched their chances shrink with every missed tackle and stalled drive. There's no stat sheet here to break down, no individual hero to anoint. The story is the gap between the two teams' depth, and it was a canyon.
For the Falcons, this is exactly what you want from a preseason blowout: the young guys show out, the coaching staff gets a stress-free film session, and the team builds a little swagger heading into the final preseason stretch. For the Colts, the concern isn't the scoreboard. It's the lack of fight. Getting beaten by a better roster happens. Getting beaten while your backups look disinterested is a red flag for the coaches evaluating them.
The result doesn't count in the standings, but it counts in the meeting rooms. Atlanta's roster bubble players just made the case to stick around. Indianapolis's bubble players just made the opposite case. Preseason games are about the backups. On Saturday, the Falcons' backups won decisively, and the Colts' backups lost with equally decisive clarity.
Here's the take: this game says more about Indianapolis's depth problem than Atlanta's depth solution. The Falcons look ready to withstand injuries. The Colts look one or two injuries away from a collapse. For a team that expects to contend, that's the worrying part.