Indianapolis Lays Off Offseason Priorities
Saturday, October 10th, 2009
Robert asked:
Colts president Bill Polian has embarked on his usual off to do list saying they might be forced to move the training camp. He is currently involved with negotiations with agents to keep the players that are preparing for the draft and dealing with NFL salary cap rules, though things seems to be a bit tougher this year. The NFL revised cap rules and the economy have led to the current financial pinch for the colts, forcing the team to look for other options including a possible option of having to change their training camp.
Just like any other person in the country, expense are an issue to them as a team, they have opted to look at everything they do to cut down on the cost be it travelling cost or training camp. One area that they really need to look at is the training camp, they need to decide on where they should be training.
For the past ten years colts have been holding camp in Terre Haute but their contract came to an end and now they are considering returning to Andersons which they used to call home for close to 14 years before moving to Terre Haute. Anderson is near Indianapolis thus will be the better option for the team.
Not only is the training camp an issue to the team but recently they announced that they are cutting down 25 jobs in the front office alone and as if that is not enough they are trying to re-sign three of their prominent free agents. Polian would love to re-sign all the three but he considers the one who won the top priority starting job two years ago. All is not well with the negotiations though it looks like they will be forced to go for the franchise tag or something else, polian is yet to disclose how much they need but he has agreed to convert some of the roster bonus into a signing bonus as one way of clearing room under the cap.
Doing this will help the team to spread the money out over the years. The choice he is going to take will determine how much more money is going to remain to cater for the other players which may force the team to look for ways of cutting other veterans. The cuts are going to come with hefty prices too.
These being the last year of the salary cap new rules are there. This year for example if players with expensive bonuses clauses are cut then it will be the team’s responsibility to take the value fully of the bonus remaining. The money used to be prorated over the contracts life over the past years. So if a player received a $10 million bonus on a 5 year deal, teams will have to pay $ 2 million a year. And if the player is cut when he’s got only two years remaining on his contract, the team would take a $4 million cap hit in the same.
Polian says they are not sure if the projected $123 million cap will stand, possibilities are it could go up. Adding that they have not had a cap problem for the last 11 years but this year they have. It will depend on what is going to happen as for now they do not know yet.
ZACHARY
___________________________________________________________________
Colts president Bill Polian has embarked on his usual off to do list saying they might be forced to move the training camp. He is currently involved with negotiations with agents to keep the players that are preparing for the draft and dealing with NFL salary cap rules, though things seems to be a bit tougher this year. The NFL revised cap rules and the economy have led to the current financial pinch for the colts, forcing the team to look for other options including a possible option of having to change their training camp.
Just like any other person in the country, expense are an issue to them as a team, they have opted to look at everything they do to cut down on the cost be it travelling cost or training camp. One area that they really need to look at is the training camp, they need to decide on where they should be training.
For the past ten years colts have been holding camp in Terre Haute but their contract came to an end and now they are considering returning to Andersons which they used to call home for close to 14 years before moving to Terre Haute. Anderson is near Indianapolis thus will be the better option for the team.
Not only is the training camp an issue to the team but recently they announced that they are cutting down 25 jobs in the front office alone and as if that is not enough they are trying to re-sign three of their prominent free agents. Polian would love to re-sign all the three but he considers the one who won the top priority starting job two years ago. All is not well with the negotiations though it looks like they will be forced to go for the franchise tag or something else, polian is yet to disclose how much they need but he has agreed to convert some of the roster bonus into a signing bonus as one way of clearing room under the cap.
Doing this will help the team to spread the money out over the years. The choice he is going to take will determine how much more money is going to remain to cater for the other players which may force the team to look for ways of cutting other veterans. The cuts are going to come with hefty prices too.
These being the last year of the salary cap new rules are there. This year for example if players with expensive bonuses clauses are cut then it will be the team’s responsibility to take the value fully of the bonus remaining. The money used to be prorated over the contracts life over the past years. So if a player received a $10 million bonus on a 5 year deal, teams will have to pay $ 2 million a year. And if the player is cut when he’s got only two years remaining on his contract, the team would take a $4 million cap hit in the same.
Polian says they are not sure if the projected $123 million cap will stand, possibilities are it could go up. Adding that they have not had a cap problem for the last 11 years but this year they have. It will depend on what is going to happen as for now they do not know yet.
ZACHARY
