Dwight Freeney (1 Viewer)

[Weiner Dog]

Colts | Team signs Freeney

Fri, 13 Jul 2007 08:51:06 -0700

John Clayton, of ESPN.com, reports the Indianapolis Colts signed DL Dwight Freeney to a six-year, $72 million contract Friday, July 13. The deal includes a $30 million signing bonus.

 

[Bob Magaw]

highest paid defender in league history (peppers is coming soon)...

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=2935483

link to story weiner dog's (scooped me ) business part of the article may be excerpted from...

 

[Sigmund Bloom]

Big ups to Mike Chappell from the Indy Star for calling this almost exactly:

Link to transcription of our interview with Mike

SB: Mike, my last question for you is about another one of the huge playmakers on defense who also had a bit of a down year in 2006, but right now the team is looking to lock him up long term. In a very classy move, Dwight Freeney still showed up for the minicamp, even though he wasn't under contract. How soon do you see that long term deal getting done? How close are the team and Freeney on making him a Colt for the better part of the rest of his career?

MC: I don't know if they're close. The deadline is July 15, that you have to have a franchise player signed to a long term contract. They'll get it done because they have done. They simply can't carry Freeney at $9.4 million, it just would cripple them, and they have things to take care of later on. You know, you franchise him this year, and then you have to do it again next year, and that's 11 million dollars. You get a long term deal done, and his cap number this year is probably four and half million which gives you a lot of room. It makes sense for the team, it makes sense for Freeney. It's just that they have to find the middle ground on what is probably going to be the richest contract by a defensive player in league history. He had a down season last year number wise, but when you talk about a player that if you don't have a gameplan for him, he will disrupt your offense completely. You can't single block him. I think the team understands completely how important he is to this team. They'll get it done. It's just one of those that will take its time, July 13 or 14, they'll get something done and they'll both be happy.

I know he didn't go out on a limb, but it's still an impressively accurate answer.

 

[Warpig]

30 ####in million signing bonus?!?! Holy####!

 

[TheGreatest]

highest paid defender in league history (peppers is coming soon)...

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=2935483

link to story weiner dog's (scooped me ) business part of the article may be excerpted from...

Highest paid will be short lived....Peppers has been waiting for this deal to happen before he negotiates as he is going to be the highest paid shortly. J. Peppers is jumping for joy right now cause he knows he will at least get more than that deal!!

 

[Sigmund Bloom]

30 ####in million signing bonus?!?! Holy####!

Mario Williams got 26.5 mil guaranteed last year without playing a doubt. Its not that insane.

 

[Weiner Dog]

Even with Freeney's foot injury, the Colts just exercised his $15mm option.

ESPN Insider:

Indy keeping Freeney: The Colts exercised the $15 million option bonus on defensive end Dwight Freeney Thursday, which was no surprise. Freeney has made $30 million over the past calendar year with the deal he signed last summer. It was considered a formality that the team would exercise that bonus.

 

[redman]

Even with Freeney's foot injury, the Colts just exercised his $15mm option.

ESPN Insider:

Indy keeping Freeney: The Colts exercised the $15 million option bonus on defensive end Dwight Freeney Thursday, which was no surprise. Freeney has made $30 million over the past calendar year with the deal he signed last summer. It was considered a formality that the team would exercise that bonus.

This signing isn't looking so good right now. Freeney can be devastating rushing off the edge, especially on turf, but he's not a well-rounded and truly elite DE who can also play the run ably, and after two down years with some injury problems he doesn't seem like someone you'd want to keep around for that price.

 

[Jene Bramel]

Even with Freeney's foot injury, the Colts just exercised his $15mm option.

ESPN Insider:

Indy keeping Freeney: The Colts exercised the $15 million option bonus on defensive end Dwight Freeney Thursday, which was no surprise. Freeney has made $30 million over the past calendar year with the deal he signed last summer. It was considered a formality that the team would exercise that bonus.

This signing isn't looking so good right now. Freeney can be devastating rushing off the edge, especially on turf, but he's not a well-rounded and truly elite DE who can also play the run ably, and after two down years with some injury problems he doesn't seem like someone you'd want to keep around for that price.

It probably won't look too bad in the coming market. And Dungy's defense doesn't need Freeney to be a run stuffer. He needs to disrupt the pocket and attract blockers. The injury issues are concerning, and the Lisfranc thing may be a big problem, but he's been better than his sack numbers suggest over the past two seasons.Be interesting to see how it turns out.

 

[Weiner Dog]

Just for the record...

The Lis Franc injury is not the devastating injury of yester-year. For reference, Brian Westbrook had 1,900 rushing/receiving yards and 11 TD's the year following his Lis Franc injury. Also for reference, Wesbrook was injured in Dec of the preceeding year.

 

[trader jake]

The Colts are saying that Dwight Freeney won't be ready for training camp. Obviously Indy isn't going to rush him back until the games count.

 

[Rozelle]

The Colts are saying that Dwight Freeney won't be ready for training camp. Obviously Indy isn't going to rush him back until the games count.

Same is being said about Mr. Sanders (shoulder)