I think Indy's prospects for next year are looking good. They've got a group of young talent on defense which includes Freeney, Thornton, Doss, and Harper who are just getting better...and are pretty cheap right now. On offense they've got Harrison and Wayne, a great tandem (and Wayne is nice and cheap at the moment), they've got Edgerrin and about 3 more RBs who are actually capable of running the ball really well (Rhodes, Mungro, and Williams). They are getting rid of Adam Meadows but he had already lost the job to Ryan Diem.
The best way to cut almost $15 million of salary off the Colts salary cap? Cut Adam Meadows, Chad Bratzke, and Brock Huard. Each has almost a $5 million dollar base salary, and thats a laundry list of cuts that I think ANY team can deal with. From there Brandon Stokley has a $1.2 million base salary that can be reduced by either cutting or restructuring him, and I'm sure they'll be knockin down Walt Harris' door about his $2.2 million base salary. And of course, Harrison's got a $5.6 million salary just itching to be turned into bonus. From here, the problem gets tricky. I don't know exactly how far over the cap they are...but I do know they have to fit Peyton's $18 million under it if they tag him. So if you cut Meadows, Huard, and Bratzke, restructure Stokley, Harris, and Harrison...I'm guessing that after signing bonuses get through, the Colts will have saved something close to $18 million. I'm looking at the total of their base salaries for 2004 and if they are over the cap its cuz they have lots of signing bonus out there eating at them.
The problem after that though, is that hardly anyone else on the team has base salaries above a million. Rob Morris ($1m), Brad Scioli ($1.3m), and Edgerrin James ($1.3m) are the only ones. This means that they have 7 RFAs they need to tender, that they probably cannot afford to tender!
TE Joe Dean Davenport (undrafted)
FS Cory Bird (3rd Round)
SS Jason Doering (6th Round)
RB Dominic Rhodes (undrafted)
LG Rick DeMulling (6th round i think)
RT Ryan Diem (4th round i think)
CB Nick Harper (undrafted i think)
The last three of those guys would be the most interesting prospects to us, the Dolphins. Harper finished his 3rd year as a pro with a bang and he did extremely well in Dungy's system. Diem actually beat Meadows for the start at RT and he can play guard too. DeMulling was a pretty good LG for them this year as well.
If the Peyton Manning situation goes down the tubes with the franchise tag being placed, I think THESE are the dudes you gotta look at...cuz I think the Colts will do whatever is in their power to keep Peyton even with a "poison pill" type contract. Of course once he's out there teams can begin negotiating and I think there's a lot of them that would be willing to give their two first round picks for Manning. Heck Miami would probably trade for New England's #32 pick just to be able to do it.
BTW that 4000 yard idea is a pretty good one...but would Manning and his agent go for it knowing they wouldn't have much chance of reaching it in Miami?
