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INDIANAPOLIS – The Colts had just finished their first game in three weeks that didn't end with a Matt Ryan game-winning drive. They ran off the field after a 19-10 loss to the Titans and into the locker room, where Frank Reich told his players he believed in them and what they could still accomplish this season.

Then he took a press conference stage and made some definitive statements -- he said, to maintain perspective.

"We're 3-3-1. We're 3-3-1. We're 3-3-1."

"Matt's our quarterback."

As he spoke, Ryan was in a trainer's room around the corner in the bowels of Nissan Stadium, peeling a jersey off a shoulder red with turf burn that would later reveal a Grade 2 separation.

But the 37-year-old's mindset was to find a way to play again, because that's all he's ever known to do, and it's why the Colts brought him here on a two-year commitment. So he boarded a plane along with the rest of the team, including his backup, a 24-year-old named Sam Ehlinger. He flew back to Indianapolis to prepare for his 230th career start.

Defying history

The next morning, the Colts had a different starting quarterback.

Reich called both men into his office to tell them the news: Ehlinger was the starter for the rest of the season. He'll throw his first NFL pass on Sunday against the Commanders at Lucas Oil Stadium.

And so, for the first time in his 15-year career, Ryan was a backup. And it wasn't because of the injury.

Ryan might some day have a book written about him, about taking over for Michael Vick in Atlanta and winning an MVP and reaching the Super Bowl. He's one of four quarterbacks all-time to win an MVP and rank in the top 10 in passing yards and comeback victories, joining Peyton Manning, Tom Brady and Dan Marino.

For now, the book on Ehlinger is this: He's a sixth-round pick out of Texas in his second year in the NFL. He has never thrown a regular-season pass. He had a flashy preseason this year, with 289 yards and four touchdowns on 29 attempts -- or seven fewer passes than Ryan has averaged per game in his 229 starts.

He is at the center of a nearly unprecedented decision in NFL history.

The Colts are moving on from a quarterback who has started in the NFL for the past 15 years. They're doing it for a Day 3 draft pick who has yet to throw a regular-season pass. And they're doing it while firmly in playoff contention.

Finding another example in the 55 years of the Super Bowl era is nearly impossible.

In 1999, Doug Flutie was in his second season as a starter and one year removed from a Pro Bowl berth when he led the Bills to a 10-5 record but did not start the wildcard playoff game. Rob Johnson did, in a game now known as the Music City Miracle. The difference was Flutie had just 54 career touchdowns at the time, or 322 fewer than Ryan has now.

In 2001, the underdog story of the century took place when a sixth-round pick named Tom Brady took over for a three-time Pro Bowler in Drew Bledsoe and led the Patriots to the first of six Super Bowls. But Bledsoe left because of a serious injury, a blood vessel in his chest ruptured, and the job remained open until Bledsoe returned and Bill Belichick decided to stick with Brady.

The NFL has had other situations where star quarterbacks lost jobs after injuries opened the door to backups. In 1996, eight-time Pro Bowler Warren Moon broke his collarbone and missed the final six games, allowing Brad Johnson to step in, finish third in passing and send the 40-year-old Moon out the next offseason.

In 2016, four-time Pro Bowler Tony Romo suffered a preseason back injury that would sideline him for 10 weeks. The Cowboys turned to a fourth-round pick in Dak Prescott, who played so well he won Offensive Rookie of the Year and never gave the job back, leading to Romo's retirement.

Perhaps the most shocking benching came to Kurt Warner, who racked up two MVP trophies, two Super Bowl trips and a Super Bowl MVP award in his first three years in the league. But in 2002, he threw three touchdowns to 11 interceptions while fighting through a broken finger, and the Rams eventually shut him down for Marc Bulger. This was an MVP benched in favor of a sixth-round pick, but the Rams were 5-7 at the time and finished 7-9.

Manning ran the risk of losing his job in 2015, when he struggled to the tune of nine touchdowns and 17 interceptions. Denver started 7-2, but during a loss to the Chiefs, it pulled the 39-year-old Manning for Brock Osweiler, a second-round pick it was grooming for the future. Manning had developed plantar fasciitis, so Osweiler started the next seven games, but Manning returned to guide the Broncos on a Super Bowl run before retiring on top.

One of the rare benchings for a contending team came in 2017. The Bills were 5-4 with third-year starter Tyrod Taylor and decided to roll with fifth-round rookie Nathan Peterman amid the outrage of one of the NFL's loudest fan bases. Peterman threw five interceptions against the Chargers, so the Bills went back to Taylor, who led them to a wildcard playoff game. Taylor was never a star, finishing with just 53 career starts, or 176 fewer than Ryan.

The league has seen decorated quarterbacks head to the bench with teams in contention, like Warner for Eli Manning in 2004, Joe Flacco for Lamar Jackson in 2018 and Manning for Daniel Jones in 2019. But all three lost jobs to first-round picks. Those players were drafted to take their jobs.

Ehlinger never was. He was the only quarterback on the roster when the Colts traded for Ryan and signed Foles this spring. Indianapolis believed so much in the top two that it gave their preseason reps to the sixth-round pick. Ehlinger impressed enough as a dual-threat against backups with vanilla schemes that they elected to keep all three quarterbacks to open the season.

That was seven weeks ago. Now, he's the starter, and an MVP and a Super Bowl MVP are on the bench.

'It was a shock to everybody'

If you want to know what an unprecedented decision at the most important position feels like in a locker room gunning for a division title, just ask about it and listen for the common thread.

Said Ryan: “There is that surprise and shock in the beginning."

Said wide receivers coach Reggie Wayne: "It's a shock to everybody."

Said All-Pro defensive tackle DeForest Buckner: "Obviously, I was shocked like everybody else."

Said All-Pro linebacker Shaquille Leonard: "I think for everybody, it was shocking."

Said slot receiver Parris Campbell: "I would say, probably, just shocked."

In conversations with more than a dozen Colts starters this week, it was hard to find a player who didn't use the word. The leader they followed all spring and summer, the one they grew up watching on the Falcons, who quizzed them on plays in the hallway and invented routes for them to ad-lib during fourth-quarter comebacks, is not going to play.

Two players said they were not shocked: Ehlinger and tight end Kylen Granson, who played with him at Westlake High School in Texas.

"I was just excited," Ehlinger said. "I've learned in this league that you can never be surprised."

Ehlinger has been learning from Ryan, "an education I can't pay for," and Ryan said he was shocked. After all, the Colts convinced him to become their fourth starting quarterback in four years since Andrew Luck retired by promising two years as their QB1. They proved it to him by guaranteeing $18 million in his salary for 2023.

Owner Jim Irsay told reporters he wanted at least three seasons with Ryan as the Colts starter.

The message to the players was that the quarterback carousel was done for a couple years. They didn't have to worry anymore.

Plenty has happened since. Ryan has made some crushing mistakes, such as a league-high 20 turnovers, but players are quick to say it wasn't all his fault. He played behind an offensive line that has allowed the most sack yards in the NFL and has also produced the league's worst rushing attack, even with Jonathan Taylor carrying the ball.

Through it all, the Colts were 3-3-1, and they'd been here before with Reich and new starting quarterbacks. Through five seasons, they've shown a tendency to start slow and finish fast, climbing out of holes of 1-5 and 0-3 to finish with winning records.

That's why Reich’s words after the loss on Sunday went down smooth, like water on a 90-degree day.

The news the next day froze their insides.

Reich called the decision "collective," meaning it involved general manager Chris Ballard and Irsay. The owner is the boss of the group, and the three had a meeting for about an hour after Sunday's loss, when the tenor of Reich's words began to change.

"His vote is always going to carry," Reich said of Irsay. "It’s a one-man crew in that respect. But what I appreciate about him is this is a collective decision."

At 3-3-1, this is about trying to win. The Colts are not experimenting with youth or trying to develop it. They are gunning for the AFC South title, with Ehlinger as the new plan.

"I can tell you this for sure: There is nobody waiving the white flag," Reich said. "That is not in the DNA. It’s not in my DNA. It’s not in our players’ DNA. I would never do that in a million years."

Now, the players on the Colts' 12-man leadership council not named Ryan must find a way to push forward.

"We have the right guys in the locker room to overcome adversity," Buckner said.

A watershed moment

No road map exists for how this could turn out.

At 3-3-1, the Colts are one game and a half back in the AFC South with 10 games to go. Ehlinger is the enigma, and he has a chance to spark a dead offense in order to win Indianapolis a division for the first time since 2014.

He would have to play at an astronomical level to convince the Colts not to finally draft another quarterback to develop as a starter. No player drafted in the fifth round or later has done that for a team since Brady in 2001, back when Ehlinger was a toddler, before quarterbacks had to be the reason teams won games.

If Ehlinger struggles like most sixth-round picks, he could set the Colts up to draft a replacement. If he becomes overwhelmed by the moment and playoff expectations like Peterman was, he could find a shell-shocked locker room asking for change.

He could land somewhere in the middle, leaving the Colts in neutral, or their natural habitat since Luck retired.

The futures of many players and coaches, including nine Pro Bowlers, hang in the balance.

This is a watershed moment in the history of the Colts, one Ehlinger never could have imagined two months ago, back when he was a sixth-round pick who'd made a roster, a quarterback learning a new throwing motion, a kid who just felt blessed to share a depth chart with his idol.

“If I want to play in this league for 15 years, I should spend really the first three learning,” Ehlinger said then. “I have a great opportunity to learn and soak up as much information as possible while still developing physically and not being asked to play on Sundays.”

Now, Ehlinger is being asked to play on Sundays. Ryan, for the first time in his 15 years, is not.

He's approaching it with a smile.

"It's that dawg in him," Granson said. "This guy is stone-cold. He's different."

He'll need to be. He's living in a moment that almost no one has ever experienced before.

Contact Colts insider Nate Atkins at natkins@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter @NateAtkins_.