Tom Krasovic: Is Philip Rivers’ comeback inspirational or irresponsible? We’ll find out Sunday.

By deciding to return to the NFL at age 44 and play Sunday in his first NFL game in almost five years, Philip Rivers has already created positive outcomes.

Start with Seattle Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald.

Rivers’ comeback handed him a gift-wrapped message, sure to fire up his team.

“Fellas,” Macdonald can tell his players, “this guy believes he can come out of retirement and beat your butts at age 44. We can’t allow that to happen.”

This improbable comeback is sure to be a boon to the prayer life of many Rivers fans. Seattle’s scary defense will take aim at the grandpa QB in one of the sport’s loudest environments. Dear Lord, indeed.

“Fun story,” an NFL executive told The Athletic this week, “but I think it’s going to be a disaster.”

Say this for Rivers, the former Chargers star who led the 2020 Colts to an 11-6 record: His arrival perked up Colts blockers and their teammates.

They’d seen quarterback Daniel Jones fall to a season-ending Achilles injury last week in a defeat. Jones was trying to overcome a fractured fibula that had slowed him and deepened the team’s recent tailspin following its 7-1 start.

With Jones out, the Colts turned to Riley Leonard. He’s a rookie trying to overcome a sore knee. Colts coach and play-caller Shane Steichen said that his buddy Rivers, by accepting the offer to join the team, provided much-needed “juice” to the whole squad.

“It’s just a humbling experience to know that a guy like that still has a burning passion for the game of football and is willing to come back and help us in whatever way we need,” said Colts right tackle Jalen Travis, a rookie who’ll be pressed into the starting lineup Sunday.

For NFL media partners tasked with voicing strong opinions, the Rivers comeback was a Week 15 pastry platter.

Availing himself, ESPN’s Ryan Clark ripped the Colts’ brain trust.

“I believe this is incompetent. And I also believe it is irresponsible,” said the former NFL safety.

“This is not Michael Jordan coming back to play basketball after three years off for the Washington Wizards. This is a man in Philip Rivers who was always a stationary target taking five years off to coach high school football and then coming back to play against the Seattle Seahawks, who would get after your keester if you were freaking Michael Vick.”

Back in his whippersnapper days, Rivers couldn’t outrun 350-pound tackles, much less linebackers and ends.

But most of his other traits stood above average, enabling him to start 240 consecutive NFL games.

What about Rivers has changed since his most recent NFL game — a strong January 2021 playoff performance for the Colts?

The Seahawks will reveal those truths.

It’s doubtful he’s appreciably slower afoot. The hardwired quick-throwing release and accuracy could still be there. Impressed by his passing Monday night, the Colts signed him on Tuesday to their practice squad. He led the team’s practices across the next three days.

You can be sure he watched dozens of NFL games the past five years, and that in some of his frequent chats with Steichen, they discussed Macdonald’s clever designs that earned much NFL praise in 2023, when the coach was coordinating an NFL-best Baltimore Ravens D.

It seems a reach that five years would’ve eroded Rivers’ durable physiology. His ruggedness seemed to owe more to a gift of nature than an obsessive Tom Brady-like attention to working out and dieting.

So, again, it’s not surprising that this rusty father of 10 believes he can still handle the basics: get the play called on time, make the adjustments before the snap and let it rip.

Unfortunately, he’s never had to gin up NFL clarity and precision in circumstances comparable to these. It’s an audacious thing to attempt.

Steichen held the door open. Rivers, in his words, said he had to choose whether to “walk through it and find out if you can do it, or run from it.”

It’s inspiring stuff, and that includes for the Seahawks, too.