Zaire Franklin mockingly shakes hands with absent Pat McAfee after Colts win

The tension between Pat McAfee and the Indianapolis Colts hasn’t hit a boiling point — yet.

But after Sunday’s events, in which Colts owner Jim Irsay opted to retain both head coach Shane Steichen and general manager Chris Ballard, the former Colts punter seems poised to vent his frustrations on Monday’s episode of The Pat McAfee Show. And it would be surprising if he doesn’t also address the antics at Lucas Oil Stadium following Indianapolis’ 26-23 win over the Jacksonville Jaguars.

McAfee, notably absent from the season finale, recently expressed his frustration with the franchise, declaring he wished they could “transfer portal the whole f***ing team.” Whether his absence was to send a message or avoid witnessing a franchise clinging to an 8-9 record as progress is unclear. However, McAfee’s usual suite was empty — perhaps a glaring statement from the Indianapolis local who rarely misses a home game.

During the celebration of a meaningless Week 18 win, linebacker and team captain Zaire Franklin made his way to McAfee’s vacant suite and pretended to shake hands with imaginary members of McAfee’s absent party.

The two have a history together, even if Franklin attempted to squash the beef.

In a podcast episode with fellow linebacker E.J. Speed in late November, Franklin criticized the national media for flip-flopping weekly regarding what they think needs to happen. While Franklin eventually cited the drama that clouded quarterback Anthony Richardson, he didn’t call out any specific media members.

Franklin did cite “motherf*ckers talking crazy on national television,” and his comments weren’t seemingly directed at McAfee until they were. As Awful Announcing’s Sean Keeley noted, the conversation between Franklin and Speed would’ve likely flown under the radar if not for the choice to include an image of McAfee on the episode’s cover art on YouTube.

That left little doubt about the intended target.

“I appreciate if the fact of the matter is that the Indianapolis Colts team is going to use me as motivation,” McAfee said at the time. “Zaire Franklin and E.J. Speed, two men who play on the defensive side of the ball for the Indianapolis Colts. Good ball players. They have a podcast called The Trenches, and they say, ‘Zaire and E.J. clap back at the media,’ and they use my picture, okay, in the thing, as if I’m the only human that was talking about all the problems that were happening in your locker room, okay?

“Your locker room. The one that had people missing treatment and gambling on the team and being late to meetings and saying they don’t work hard and quarterbacks stepping out of… and I’m the problem? Okay. Okay. I think that’s a potential part of the issue with the Colts.”

Another potential part of the issue with the Colts was Franklin reigniting a feud he claimed to have squashed, which is why a fan on X (formerly Twitter) described it as “pathetic” and slammed the Colts for embodying “the loser shit” McAfee had been criticizing all along.

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With that, perhaps Monday’s episode of The Pat McAfee Show will reveal as much about the Colts’ culture as it does about their critics.

And if anything, it’ll prove that maybe Franklin and McAfee don’t want the same things, even if the Colts linebacker claimed otherwise.

[Zach Pauley on X]