Before showing their support at the 35th Annual Sports Breakfast, benefitting the Boy Scouts of America, Head Coach John Fox and Executive Vice President of Football Operations John Elway addressed a number of topics, including the decision to release defensive linemen Justin Bannan and Jamal Williams and re-sign Kevin Vickerson.
“Those things are never easy,” Fox said. “In this process you have a budget and a cap, and all those things come into play. I think right now we were able to sign a youthful guy in Kevin Vickerson. We got Champ Bailey — I don’t know how youthful he is — but you guys know as well as I do what he brings to the table, both on the field and in that locker room.”
Elway said the team needs to get younger on the defensive side of the ball, and Fox noted that Vickerson’s play in 2010 stood out as the team decided which players to retain.
The sixth-year pro set career highs last season with 42 tackles, two sacks, an interception and a forced fumble, adding three passes defensed. He played in 15 games for the team, starting 12.
“I think he probably had his most productive year a year ago,” Fox said. “He’s a young guy that has bounced around a little bit, and I don’t know if he’s turned the corner but he’s definitely on the curve. He’s a guy we think can definitely help us. He’s got a lot of the tools physically that we’re looking for.”
As for the depth along the defensive line, Elway said much of that depends on how the next few months play out.
“We’ll still hopefully get a chance to talk to Jamal and Bannan down the way, but we’ll see how this whole thing unravels,” Elway said, adding that Marcus Thomas has decided to test the free agent market. “We’re still waiting kind of in limbo seeing what’s going to happen. Hopefully we get a deal this Friday and we continue to go forward.”
HEADING TO CAMPUS
As Broncos TV covered in this morning’s video, Fox, Elway and General Manager Brian Xanders headed to Auburn, Ala., with a Broncos contingent to watch the Tigers’ Pro Day today, featuring two potential top-five picks in quarterback Cam Newton and defensive tackle Nick Fairley.
“Brian, John and I, we’re going on this one together,” Elway said of the first trip to a college campus. “We haven’t determined what the schedule is going to be after this, but obviously on the first one we’re going to be going together.”
From there, the group will head to Alabama’s Pro Day — where top players like defensive tackler Marcell Dareus and receiver Julio Jones will work out — make a pit stop in Boca Raton, Fla., to meet with a player, then travel to Texas A&M for the Aggies’ Pro Day, featuring another top-five prospect in linebacker Von Miller.
“This process is important because you’re evaluating them not just as a player but as a person and what they’re going to bring to your organization,” Fox said. “It lets us get to know the player outside of the helmet.”
With about seven weeks left until the 2011 NFL Draft, Elway said the club is on a busy schedule to “get as much done as we can,” so the team can build a successful draft board as the weeks count down.
-Gray Caldwell, DenverBroncos.com
Exactly TRB
If you guys are so bent out of shape by how the owners are treating the players, how on Earth do you deal with the way our governement is running our country financially?
Haha this is going to get deep! I think compromises should be made, if there are more games the players should be compensated better! I could never contemplate arguing over 9 BILLION dollers, but whatever. let them fight….I think they have no regard for the middle man! THE FANS!
Bay, There are alot of injustices in the world, so much that eventually you just suck it up and it all becomes white noise cuz theres not much you can do about it. Im glad the players are calling them out on it. Theres alot of them. same goes for how this Government not to mention the Government in my country of birth handles things financially. Not much the lil man (citizens) like us can do. Same with the CBA, not much the lil man (fans) can do but im glad someone called em on it. If not the organizations will just keep squeezing until theres nothing left. Its all “business”. Was just trying to point out to strand how its a lil different than the scenario he posed. Only thing im with the organization on is rookie salaries cuz those are ridiculous.
Man I just want football to be played next year a CBA reached for us to get a good off-season for training, FA, trades and all that good stuff.
ESPN.com’s Gene Wojciechowski says NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has a simple job: Get a new CBA on time or get out of office check this article out its a great read. http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?columnist=wojciechowski_gene&page=wojciechowski/110308&sportCat=nfl
This is dumb! Goodell is just doing what the owners want him to do, they feel they lost their arses in the last cba deal and they are not about to go down that road again, to lay the blame on Goodell is just plain ignorant, just my opinion.
bay
do you believe the owners lost their “arses” in the last CBA deal?
Some teams are actually not doing as great as you all seem to think, ask the Jaguars for example.
“Mo Money Mo Problem” – It’s not like they can’t work this all out:
PLAYER WANT: 16 game regular season (with 4 PRE-season games)
OWNERS WANT: 18 (with 2 Preseason games)
Common Sense 17 games with only 3 PRE-season games
************
Owner: 60%-40% split of the 9 BILLION
Players: 50-50 split
Common Sense 55%-45%
************
THE ONLY PROBLEM IS COMMON SENSE ISN’T COMMON AT ALL!!!
As a previous business owner in most of my working life I will always look at a business from an owner’s point of view, nothing will change that, not even the NFL but I don’t really care to argue it much over here even though guys like TRB know where I stand. Everything is a two way street, the way the fans side up with the players is kind of funny to me. Poor players…
It just pisses me off that they can’t have a common arbiter step in and meet eveyones demands half way!!!
an excerpt from the above posted article:
as The Wall Street Journal noted several months ago, the least valuable NFL franchise (the Oakland Raiders) is worth more than the Chicago Cubs or the Los Angeles Lakers.
So you can see why the players’ union is reluctant to take a salary haircut. And if you can’t see why it’s reluctant, then you’ve been listening to Goodell for too long.
The players didn’t create this crisis; the owners did. They’re the ones who signed off on the last CBA in 2006.
and true2broncos I think you hit the nail on the head with “THE ONLY PROBLEM IS COMMON SENSE ISN’T COMMON AT ALL!!!”
Bay,
I thought the Jags were going to ship their team to LA if last season did not fix things? What ever happened to that?
You know I’ve always thought it was funny that a CITY that had at one time two NFL Teams and the second biggest market/market share would lose both teams and sit empty for over ten years! LOL
They are suppose to get the next expantion team , by why not the JAGS???
true2broncos
Thats what George Cohen federal mediator is suppose to be doing obviously he isn’t doing too good of a job. This should be last weeks news
The only reason everyone is having such great income in the NFL is because the league has made it a good business for decades now, unlike the NHL or the federal government it has not been in danger of going bankrupt. That’s something to thank the onwers and their league for, not the players, all players are replaceable, 10 years from now they will all be different, only the league and the majority of its owners will remain the driving force that makes it so solvent. That ought to be worth something in my opinion and the deal the owners got in the last cba is now seemingly not good enough to keep that solvency going in these tough economic times, so they need to make changes and even so pulling out of a deal is wrong they feel they must and they are for the good of the league long term whether anyone agrees with that or not.
BroncoRoyaltyEst.1979,
The problem is “LAWYERS”!!!
The Lawyers would be happy to drag this out for the next 20 years if they could and like you said George Cohen isn’t doing his job and quite honestly the OWNERS don’t trust him – and I don’t blame them!!!
This is terrible. I have no idea who we should pick between fairley or dareus. Both of these guys scare me big time. Fairley had one good year and Dareus only got 11 sacks in 3 years. Its the middle of march, almost a month away from the draft, and we’d usually for sure know who #1 and #2 picks are going to be, but I think its safe no say noone has any idea. Im just saying between Fairley or Dareus theres no clear cut better player as of now. I usually say in the first round especially draft for need, but in this particular draft DENVER TAKE PETERSON. We might not be able to get all of our needs filled in 1 draft and free agency. I know weve been avoiding dline in the first round but this year they need to take PETERSON. By the way we can trade up in the first do snag another dlineman, chances are either bowers, fairley, or dareus are going to drop a little.
Well that’s about a record for a day I think, all the way til 2:44 pm before the word Peterson appeared, LOL. I was truly starting to enjoy it!
That is true the owners are billionaires for a reason but if they believed that the players were just throw aways why would they even concede to a CBA in the 1st place?
Now the NFL is a force, but it wasn’t always like that college actually had the higher ground.
The NFL made a business off of the popularity of players coming out of college had.
So its both the players and the NFL why the pro game is so popular.
AWE its over!!! I was starting to enjoy it as well
LOL i thought we were going to break a record before the word Peterson came out we should have held a pool behind the scenes bay. LMAO
Maybe we should take peterson then if everyone is saying to take him?
Honestly, the players don’t deserve the money they are getting now! how can you make millions of dollars over several years and 2 years after retiring you find yourself broke…I respect these players on the field, but there are only a handful that I respect outside their uniforms…If there are more games give them a pay raise, but quite honestly they don’t deserve more then they are making now! I don’t mean to speak negatively about these players, but most of them don’t realize how lucky they are!
Respect the fans and agree so we can have a season in ’11
Excellant plan HorseWhisperer! Peterson it is!
This isn’t even about a pay raise its about players trying to keep their CBA.
A lot of players don’t make the millions you think the average football career is only 3.5 years with the wear and tear that their bodys’ take. Plus i’m not talking about the Payton Mannings of the league i’m talking the bulk of the locker room a lot of them which come from poor backgrounds and football was their only way out, now their supporting their entire family. What if you spent your whole life trying to get a career knowing your not going to have that job after the age of 30. but you will have crazy health issues giving your body to that job. Plus if you ever played football you would know its not luck that gets you to the next level its talent.
You keep saying you can replace the players but would you go and pay to see a game if there was no talent? I think not it would be like watching a pee wee football game. That is what brings fans in its the long passes, the highlight reel runs, the Ray Lewis hits that brings in money not the owners that sit and watch and listen to their advisors.
That’s why the NFL stand for “NOT FOR LONG”!!! It’s not the current players I worry about at all – I think the average salary is about $850,000 per year now (Or that might be the low???)
Anyway, I worry about those poor guys that gave up there “GOLDEN YEARS” and ruined there bodies in the 70′s and 80′s . . . that are getting like $50 per year of service per month!!! That sucks for a 9 BILLION DOLLAR indutry like football. Seriously, those are the guys that made this game GREAT in the first place!!!
I haven’t seen this many guys line up to suck another man’s D!<k for a long time = PETERSON is good, but he certainly isn't the end all be all of this draft!!!
I am still for a GREAT DE!!! BOWERS comes to mind!!! LOL
GO BRONCOS
& thats why these new players have the NFLPA and are fighting for a new CBA because what mikeyb1203 & true2broncos just pointed out.
lol t2b about Peterson
Good debate finally something other than the usual.
I’m out, take care
-Royalty
The unions will be the unraveling of this country as we know it, in any walk of life, including the NFL. That’s about as far as I’ll ever go talking politics with friends here, but it is just too big an issue for me to just sweep under the rug. Unions sound so much like Soviet Unions, don’t they? LOL.
I totally AGREE about Unions – they out lived there usefulness and now just take money from good workers and only help the bad ones – i.e. Teachers Unions!!!
Unions SUCK!!!
P2
Do away with Unions, huh?? … well, if we had NO unions, what do you think would be the result … we’ve already had that … that’s why so many fought so hard, against terrible odds, to get representation … c’mon, the little guy has NO leverage whatsoever … have Unions gotten too big for their britches – YES!!! … have they been greedy?? – definitely, YES!!! … have some of the politicians sold out the store?? – they sure have … but – do away with Unions?? … that’s ridiculous … talk about common sense – somehow there has to be a middle ground … if the players had to make it on their own, individually – that would be a disaster for them … just like the current Middle East upheavel, the current NFL Owners/Players will probably have to get worse before it gets better … in fact – it probably HAS to get worse before it gets better … maybe they lose a season – we’ll agonize over that – they will, too, because of the lost revenue … hopefully, some “common” sense will prevail, nobody will be happy, but life will go on … let me know when it’s over …
Wiemin,
If anyone wants to know how I feel about the unions debate, I will refer them to your post. You said it perfectly.
In retrospect I regret bringing up the unions at large issue in this medium, but since this wind of controversy over the unions is taking up all over the country now I guess I just got carried away in the moment. This is not a political platform and I will refrain from saying what I feel about that from now on.
Pick up Deangelo Williams in FA since Fox is a 2 back set type guy, Trade Orton for a second rounder, Draft Peterson with the 2nd pick, then draft Rahim Moore, Stephen Paea, and Casey Matthews with the three 2nd round picks, then if Drake Nevis is avaliable in the 3rd he would be a steal that low, but if not grab some O Line depth
my .2cents
I would agree on D. Williams in FA but i wouldnt want to take the corner on the number 2 pick. The whole point to fox defense is pressure from the dline and a LB blitz from either 1 of the outside linebackers. With the add of Dennis Allen also from the saints he will more then likely do the same approach. I feel we will give Ayers a year at his natural position and have doom back at DE. meaning the biggest holes to really fill will be the DT and a MLB if we decide to move DJ to weak. so with the 2nd pick i would like to see go to a disruptive big man in the middle. My eggs will go in the basket of Marcell Dareus. All because he has great explosion and has great explosion ability with his hands to either knock the line back or take away their hands to where he can make a play. Only thing i see wrong is you can see from film with him is he could take plays off and be nowhere to be found sometimes.
Dareus Is the defiantly the pick I hope to get
I believe we should get Fairly with the 2nd pick then go for D. Williams and Nnamdi Asomugha in free agency. Then get more defense players in the draft. Keep Orton cause he has a better arm then all our QB’s.
Oh I forgot……………GO BRONCOS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
All I hear is negative….And the remark about players getting too much money???? You go out there on that field and risk your body for a game then tell me they get too much money. How about yoy??? You worth your wages? I will be happy when every one else is happy. I can hardly wait to see how the team is put together. McDaniels tore it apart. He got rid of all the good players just because of Shannahan.. What a moron! Yes keep Orton!!
broncogram65, to call out bloggers on stuff, I highly recommend posting on a current blog, hiding out on an old blog may be a good way to avoid some heat but it definitely doesn’t carry much merit. Just trying to help.