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No-the reason that the cap hit is so severe is that when a player signs the contract, their signing bonus gets to be prorated over a certain number of years. A 6 year 70 million dollar deal with an 18 million dollar signing bonus for example, means that the signing bonus can be charged 3 million per year against the cap. If the player gets traded though, all the remaining signing bonus goes against the next years cap. If that same player with 3 years left gets traded, the 9 million left on the signing bonus applies against that year's cap (in this case for the Eagles on this year's cap), and that player is not even on the team anymore-it is simply "dead money".

If he gets traded, does he still have the option to opt-out? If you trade for A-Rod, and then use 2007 to rebuild, he'll just opt out rather than stay with a losing team-and then you lose Z for nothing.

If you're going to leave Izturis in the lineup, you might as well shift A-Rod to second and leave Izturis at his best defensive value at short-I would think trading for A-Rod would be to get Izturis out of the lineup.

I'm not predicting that's what will happen, but I think 4-5 year windows for the great teams is the norm these days. They usually end up mixing in a 8-8 or sub .500 season after 4-5 good years. Indy could break the trend of course, especially with the greatest QB of this generation at the helm. This offseason is going to be a big key for the Colts in my opinion. With guys like Dwight Freeney, Corey Simon, Cato June and Nick Harper all eligible for free agency and coming off a Super Bowl victory, the question will be can they re-sign the guys they want (Freeney and Harper) for a price that will not handicap them down the road and replace the ones they don't want back (Simon? and June) adequately. They already saw a in their defense after choosing not to pay David Thornton to come back, will they find a Gilbert Gardner-type terrible player to replace them or someone of quality? The answers to those questions will decide if they can keep the run going. Freeney will be back-Harper may not need to be replaced whatsoever with the corners that the Colts have. June may be back, if not that's a question mark for the Colts. Defensive tackle should be fine if Monte Reagor and Mcfarland comes back, even if Simon does not. The big key for the Colts is OLB-so far there is no penciled starter for either postion. Who the Colts choose to put there next season could have a difference on how their defense is-even with a bad defense though, the Colts offense almost alone gives them a great chance at a decent seed in the playoffs every year. Don't forget, that's what ya'll said for multiple years before this year's Super Bowl. Great as Peyton, Marvin and Reggie Wayne are, you must have at least a solid D to win the Super Bowl again. I'm sure you're like me when the Titans were winning 12-13 games a year but getting eliminated before the Super Bowl, that's not satisfactory. You, like me, want the Super Bowl and you have to have a defense to get the job done. And I refuse to give up hope that Freeney will be a free agent, he'd fit too perfectly in the Titans' defense, plus we have the money to pay him. 8-) The team played solid D in 2005-just because the team lost in the playoffs doesn't change that fact. I'd be perfectly happy with a team that played like that 2005 team, and I think that's certainly possible.

I would say he was mostly healthy prior to the past 2 seasons, but he only played in 10 games in 2002 and broke an ankle. And any QB who relies so heavily on his legs is going to get hurt. So he's missed big chunks of 3 of the past 5 seasons with various lower body injuries, and is now 30. The cap hit to Philly puts a huge strain on any possible deal. My apologies, I missed the fact that he played only 10 games in 02. But still, a broken ankle is not a lingering injury. If he had sprained a ligament I might be a little more worried, but most of his injuries have been one-time fluke things. The cap hit to Philly is only one reason why I think this is ludicrous from their persepective. What QB are they going to get that is better than McNabb right now? If they drafted a Chris Leak, Kevin Kolb, etc in the second or third round to develop behind McNabb I could understand and likely agree. But why trade a great QB if you plan on contending? Doesn't make sense to me. They think they can trade McNabb for more talent, start Garcia, and get better overall. I've heard though that part of the reason that Philly might want to make this deal is that McNabb is Philly's "franchise QB". What happens if he stays in Philly and he gets hurt next year for a few games? Do you stay with him the next year? Especially with Garcia doing so well, there are a lot of questions like that going around Philly right now, and this might be the best time for Philly to move on-although the cap hit suggests that this is not the case.

I'm not predicting that's what will happen, but I think 4-5 year windows for the great teams is the norm these days. They usually end up mixing in a 8-8 or sub .500 season after 4-5 good years. Indy could break the trend of course, especially with the greatest QB of this generation at the helm. This offseason is going to be a big key for the Colts in my opinion. With guys like Dwight Freeney, Corey Simon, Cato June and Nick Harper all eligible for free agency and coming off a Super Bowl victory, the question will be can they re-sign the guys they want (Freeney and Harper) for a price that will not handicap them down the road and replace the ones they don't want back (Simon? and June) adequately. They already saw a in their defense after choosing not to pay David Thornton to come back, will they find a Gilbert Gardner-type terrible player to replace them or someone of quality? The answers to those questions will decide if they can keep the run going. Freeney will be back-Harper may not need to be replaced whatsoever with the corners that the Colts have. June may be back, if not that's a question mark for the Colts. Defensive tackle should be fine if Monte Reagor and Mcfarland comes back, even if Simon does not. The big key for the Colts is OLB-so far there is no penciled starter for either postion. Who the Colts choose to put there next season could have a difference on how their defense is-even with a bad defense though, the Colts offense almost alone gives them a great chance at a decent seed in the playoffs every year.

The one thing that I can take comfort in is this....the Bears are MORE LIKELY to make to Super Bowl 42, then the Colts. If they don't improve that defense, they won't beat Pats/Chiefs/Ravens again. The Colts playoff defense is fine-it's the same defense that the Colts had in 05 with basically the same personell. I don't know what made them forget it for most of 16 weeks (although Bob Sanders being gone and Gilbert Gardner starting both didn't help), but I'm just glad they re-learned it. Plus, they have a small possibility of getting Corey Simon back, which would be a huge lift, a better possibility of getting Monte Reagor back, which would be a pretty big lift as well. This Colts team should be as good or slightly better next year, and the defense should be just fine. However, you are right that the Bears have the easier chance to make it back, as there still have to be multiple teams to step it up in the NFC to make it as hard of a playoff run as it is in the AFC right now.

Matt Giordano Giordano is a badass. I'm not sure what his flaws are that kept him from starting over Bethea, but the dude can run and hit very well. From what I've seen of him, he doesn't always seem to have those great football instincts to use his natural skills to good use.

I think the Bears fanbase contributed a wee bit too... That's definitely true-I'm just saying that when the Colts have 4 of the 5 highest rated regular season games over the last 5 years, the highest rated conference championship game ever, and the 3rd highest television program in the Super Bowl ever, it stands to reason that they are the nation's big draw. Of course, Chicago has a large and great fanbase that certainly made the game what it was, and they probably wouldn't have been that high if the Colts had played somebody like the Seahwaks for example.

The Colts tear through the ratings continues. They've had the highest rated regular season games over the last few years, had the highest conference championship game, and now the Colts-Bears Super Bowl has been reported the 3rd highest watched program in the history of television-only the Mash finale and the 1996 Super Bowl beat it.

I think they don't care as much because most of the dunks have already been done-it's hard to have any sense of accomplishment, and so most of the top guys simply don't want to bother.

The Around the Horn panelists were actually bringing a lot of good points today, except for Jay Mariotti of course. I posted it because I was very surprised by this (again, except for Jay Mariotti :D ).

Disagree, the only players without blame are Hester and Gould, imo. The defense gets off a bit for being on the field for 40 minutes, but the lines were awful, the coaching was awful, Benson and Reed had crucial turnovers, Grossman wasn't that great, Chris Harris blew the coverage on the Colts' first TD and the defense missed tackles all over the map. The defense also gets a bit of a break for generating a couple fumbles, and for shutting down Indy in the red zone for the bulk of the game. Thomas Jones didn't really do much to get a lot of blame either...when a running play was called, he was pretty effective overall. For the vast majority of the game, I disagree with you on that-Jones was not good other than 1 run before picking up most of the rest of his yards late. Part of that was due to his blocking on several runs though, so that big run might be enough to take any blame away from him.

Did the TV announcers get it wrong then? Every call I've heard has Harris blowing the coverage.

I guess Arizona gets to stay in the AP poll no matter what-I was hoping IU would stay in even with their loss to Iowa because of the huge Wisconsin win, but I guess not. The voters basically kept Indiana at the same spot in both polls. In the AP poll, Indiana went from 141 points and #26 to 117 and #27. In the Coaches Poll they went from 62 points and t-#25 to 74 and #24. And Arizona actually did drop out in the Coaches poll. That's true-I forgot that IU was only in the coaches poll last week-thanks for the clarification. Oh well-find a way to win on Saturday, and back in the top 25 they should go-it's not like basketball rankings mean anything anyway.

I guess Arizona gets to stay in the AP poll no matter what-I was hoping IU would stay in even with their loss to Iowa because of the huge Wisconsin win, but I guess not.

well at least you prove the committee wrong by losing home NIT games to Holy Cross!!! Oh, brother. When was the last time a team that got the shaft from the tourney won that joke of a "tournament"? ND played freshmen that game that hadn't played all season, shows you how important it was. To answer your question, Michigan from a couple of years ago.

Matt Giordano Yeah, it was Giordano. He was the guy who ran Ellis Hobbs down last week, and he was the guy who put the big hit on to make the Bears miss that 4th down conversion with about 5 minutes left. The thing that I don't understand is that if Hester was not going full speed why did he allow himself to be tackled even at the goal line? If it were me, I'd rather run a little faster and avoid getting hit at all-regardless if Hester was going full speed though, Giordano was absolutely flying-look how fast he was going compared to the other Colts defenders. I didn't realize till the last two weeks that Giordano had that kind of speed in him-he should be good as the first backup safety next year if Doss is not re-signed.

Garcia's the type of QB who needs weapons around him to make him really good. He has his limitations as a QB that can be exploited if there aren't the proper pieces-Cleveland and Detroit were not good fits for him, but a team like the Bears would be a much better fit.

Garcia was fine for half a season. Can he play a full season? If he goes to a bad team where he's going to get drilled often, my guess would be no. The Bears don't need him to do that though-they just need him to make the throws that move the chains to balance out their good run game. Garcia has a much better chance of staying healthy and effective in that type of scenario, especially with the pretty good weapons that he will have.

Wouldn't even consider it. His issues go beyond just injury "concerns". He makes Rex look like Favre in the stability department. He's always limping around, even when he does play. He might not be a high risk for disaster, but he doesn't have a ton of upside in my opinion. This would just be a grass is always greener move, taking on somebody else's headache. If I found somebody who stood a good chance of being a very good QB, I'd be fine to replace Rex. But I don't see it. A move like this has to be an obvious upgrade. To me, a guy like Leftwich is nothing more than a lateral move. It would be starting over with a guy who has at least as many questions as Rex. I was just looking through the list of potential tradesor free agents...Leftwich, Garcia and Huard are the "big names"... I'm admittedly frustrated with the QB situation, and looking for quick remedies. If you truly want to replace Rex, signing Garcia and then drafting a QB will give you a great chance to win the SB next year while at the same time preparing for the future.

I know that's going to be the official accepted story, but I refuse to believe that to be true. A 70+ completion percentage, a 68.3 rating. That's not taking a dump. That's not disaster Rex. That's better than what Roethlisberger did while winning last year's Super Bowl and he doesn't face anywhere near the scrutiny Grossman does. Rex did not have a good game, but he did not crap the bed either. rex wasnt that bad. he only made 1 bad pass really, the int to muhammad. the second INT came late in the 4th down by two TDs. Berrian was open but he underthrew him, but at that point he was just trying to make something happen to spark an unlikely comeback. He wasn't great, but he wasn't horrible. Unfortunately too many bears fans are blind to the fact that defense couldn't get off the field if their life depended on it as a main reason for losing. All year people blame rex and refuse to ever blame the D. Well the D was about as good/bad as rex in the super bowl. I mean the criticism of rex has really gotten out of hand. I hear people saying he threw so many bad balls....well he only threw 8 incompletions, a couple of which were drops. If you are going to criticize him at least do it for something that he actually did wrong (bad exchanges with kreutz, ints) I'm watching the Sportscenter highlights right now, and I don't think Grossman's worst pass was even the INT for the TD. It was the pass where he scrambled around, got away from pressure, could have ran for a first down but instead lofted it straight unto a Colts guy's hands. The Colts guy dropped it, but it was still a horrible pass. With that said though, Grossman was not "the reason" that the Bears lost. He wasn't good, but neither was the running game to help him, so he shouldn't shoulder all of the blame for the mistakes.

The Bears are not a wet track team, never have been. Cold and a little snow is helpful, but a wet track is not good for a speed team. True, but that just makes it neutral, because the Colts are just as much of a speed team.

So, you forfeit a draft pick? I don't know that much about NFL free agency other then a restricted player's original team has so long to match a deal. I didn't realize that you had to give up draft picks though?!?! In Restricted Free Agency, you (usually) have to give up a draft pick. For the bigger names, it can cost up to 1st rounder. Very true. Atlanta has to decide what value of contract they want to give him. There are 3 levels: Top level: if another team signs him and Atlanta doesn't match, Atlanta receives 1st and 3rd round draft picks Second Level: Atlanta would receive 1st round draft pick Third Level: Atlanta receives pick equal to round Schaub was drafted in (in this case, a 3rd rounder). I bet Atlanta protects Schaub with one of the top 2 levels-I can't see the Bears getting him without giving up a 1st rounder unless they can work out some deal some other way with the Falcons.

LOL! Dwight Freeney is a FA as well. What a year to be a FA, after winning the SB. Freeney's not going anywhere-if they can't come to a long-term deal with him , they are franchising him. Bill Polian already said that there is 0 chance that Freeney hits free agency this year.