Colts To Monitor Philip Rivers' Toe, Braden Smith's Thumb

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» Braden Smith is working his way through a "weird" thumb injury: Smith suffered the injury in practice last week and was labeled as questionable heading into the Packers game, although Reich had expressed confidence that his third-year right tackle would likely be good to go.


But Smith would end up being a late addition to the inactives list on Sunday. So what happened?


"In trying to protect the thumb last week, I was thinking there was a 99-percent (chance) he was going to be able to make it through," Reich said Monday. "We could not find a way to protect his thumb that he could get comfortable and that he could play. That was unfortunate."


Le'Raven Clark got his third-career start at right tackle in Smith's place, although the Colts would end up using a rotation of sorts at the position with Chaz Green; in the end, Green ended up playing 62 offensive snaps (74 percent) to Clark's 22 (26 percent).


"Strauss (offensive line coach Chris Strausser) and I talked about it when we saw Braden was going to be down and we just said we'll rotate those guys through," Reich said, "I kind of just let that up to Strauss. I said, 'Hey, Le'Raven (Clark) starts, just kind of go every two or three series. However it was playing out, you judge and feel how it's going and rotate them as you see fit.' I think overall – both guys in a very difficult situation stepped up and did more than adequate. I was more than happy with their ability to step up and perform at a level that would help us win that game."


So what's Smith's status moving forward, starting with this Sunday's Week 12 matchup against the Titans? Reich said he's "hopeful" to get his starting right tackle back.


"Hopefully it gets better," said Reich, who added that Smith had thumb surgery on a Monday last season and ended up playing in the game the following Sunday. "We'll take it day-by-day, we'll experiment with it every day and as soon as he gets to the point where he can function and do what he has to do with his right hand, then he will be back out there."