More than anything, I admire a GM's ability to build a SB contending team.
Then you must truly admire Pioli more since, after all, he's been more successful at it over the last several years.
Your sense is wrong.
I'm glad then 'cause at times lately you could have fooled me.
Do you think that the Colts should have paid Edge what he got from the Cards?? the Colts should have paid Thorton what he got from the Titans???
I didn't think they should have franchised Edge in '05, but the point wasn't what I would pay it was what Polian would have if he could have. He didn't let him go because he was asking too much, he let him go because he couldn't afford to keep him and Harrison and Wayne and Manning as well as Freeney in an all salary final rookie deal year even after the restructures and windfall. A month ago he was apologizing to Indy fans for letting his best LB go when teams were running all over the Colts. He threw silly money at Simon to no avail in '05 and now will wreak havoc if need be to try and weasle out of the balance of that deal.
Now I have a question for you - did you think the Patriots should have paid Branch and Givens what they got from the Seahawks and Titans??? Because at one time I could have sworn you didn't, but later it seemed as if you did. And what seemed to change your position was this team being in a position to afford it, rather than whether it represented good value.
Simply not true. Because of the Deion rules 23.3 million of Manning's 34.5 million has already been amortized. The Colts will amortize another $3.7 million in 2007.
Yup, but that will leave another $18M or so to be amortized over the remaining 3 years when you factor in those roster bonuses they have or will convert and amortize, and any new bonus amortization or salary from a new deal will rest on top of that in 2008-2010. And as I said, to do that will also require Irsay to fork over a huge signing bonus which in and of itself may result in his spending cash over cap when whatever other signings he must make are factored in. And they will likely face the same scenario in another 4 years when Peyton is past his mid 30's and once again all salary against the cap so primed for another restructure. Unless of course they cut or trade him and eat the dead cap or bite the bullet and have him play out his deal as is. It's a revolving credit card approach and sooner or later you have to pay principle in the NFL because unlike in real life players have an extremely limited shelf life and when they go their accounts must be settled. I think if they win this year nobody in Indy will care - at least for a time. But if they don't it may get harder and harder to keep proping up that window. Meanspirited as is may sound, I'm hoping they fail because we'll have so much more to talk about going forward that way.
A take that I totally disagree with. With the cap being so high and with the Colts having so many young players, they need to have players like Manning and Harrison taking so much cap space to meet the minimum floor requirement.
Unless they have so many young players because they can't afford to pay veteran salaries because of Manning and Harrison.
Once Harrison is not worth the new money, he will not get it. Starting in 2008 it will save the Colts cap space by releasing him.
Only because his salaries are backloaded. He will also represent a substantial dead cap hit for a couple of years that will probably limit who they can replace Wayne with after he replaces Marvin.
There is nothing more important than that fact.