TY Hilton signs new deal (Mega Merge)

[Gavin]

You think we won't?      Really?      Why?

I don't see why we would have to give him the BIGGEST contract in NFL history, If we have to then Im alright with that of course, But if it can be avoided then it would be wise to do so. Just speculation at this point

[zibby43]

I agree with most of this except this year we had the chance to take defense. And the year we took Werner we could've taken Rhodes

Collins

Brown

Top 2 picks still available when we picked but we took Dorsett

We're always gonna be drafting 24th or later, but that's where Grigson and his scouts come in. There's talent in every round. I think Anderson and Geathers are gonna be good. You gotta know how to draft late and deep into the draft

 

First off, absolutely love your camp update threads.  Many, many thanks for taking the time to do that for us!

Second, I do agree that there is some talent in every round.  It really starts to lean out toward the end though.  Also I concur about Anderson and Geathers.

 

Re: Collins though, he's not a good fit for the Colts' 3-4 defense.  I touched on this in depth a while back during the draft.

 

One of the major benefits/principles of the 3-4 (and I won't get into the differences between the one-gap and two-gap 3-4 defenses) is disguising coverages to confuse to the opposing offense (and I mean every position group on offense, particularly the QB and offensive linemen). 

 

That's why you see a lot of "amoeba" setups with the Colts D (the defensive linemen standing up at the LOS, LBs/DBs moving around, etc).  This makes the opposing QB question where the pressure will be coming from (if any), what the safeties are doing, etc.  The 3-4 also makes it difficult for opposing offensive linemen to establish the proper protections/blocking assignments.

 

Because of these tactics (and for other reasons as well), it's important that 3-4 safeties have very versatile and virtually interchangeable skill sets.  Landon Collins is more of a traditional, "in-the-box" safety that likes playing near the LOS.  He's a great run-stuffer but not necessarily the most dynamic/fluid safety in coverage.  

 

Collins will be an absolutely perfect fit for the Giants (who ran a 4-3 in 2014), but he wasn't a great fit for the Colts, despite being one of the more talented safeties in the draft.  Landry is another guy that is better suited in the 4-3.  He's much better near the LOS (despite whiffing a lot because of his tendency to go for kill shots instead of fundamentally sound tackles).  That's one of the reasons Landry departed. 

 

Hope that was at least mildly useful in addressing why the Colts probably passed on Collins. 

[CR91]

To much money for him how are they going to resign luck castanzo fleener allen just to name a few

 

you obvisouly dont have much knowledge on a player's value and cap structure

[ztboiler]

Like you said, solutions develop. If Moncrief is more Pierre Garcon than AJ Green (which is what his physical profile suggests he can become), then he can easily be allowed to walk in free agency. I'll take the third round compensatory pick and be fine with Hilton and Dorsett.

 

But I think we're assuming that Moncrief is worthy of being retained. In that event, you keep him, and let everything else work itself out. Personally, I think Moncrief can be better than Hilton and Dorsett, again, given his physical profile. But either of those two guys have Antonio Brown-like potential themselves, so let's wait and see. 

 

All I'm saying is that the numbers don't preclude us keeping Moncrief if he's worthy of being kept. And like you say, that's a matter for another day.

On a related but separate note, I think we are seeing a pattern which will define the Grigson retention strategy.  He seems very happy to wait and pay full price as he just did with Hilton rather than to move pre-emptively and extend ahead of the market to achieve a value price point.  I believe that the APY on Hilton was at minimum a million per year less back in March. 

 

Along these lines, philosophically, it is probably better to wait and pay too much for the right guys than it is to act early on the wrong ones.  My hope is that we don't get so heavily invested in "system guys" as we once were with the previous regime.  Letting guys get to the market like Grigs has (other than Hilton) does help to reduce the tendency to overbid for your productive system players.  

[dgambill]

1. I'm being facetious

2. You either didnt get 1, or intentionally trying to be annoying

3. Reread my post. I said championship"S"

Which means I am correct and you are wrong. We got 1, obviously, but that's it. Almost winning isn't winning.

It was meant to be a joke, but you went there.

Sorry...it didn't have a face or anything denoting it was a joke and we have had many people make such remarks not joking that I assumed this was one like that. I know what happens when one assumes so I apologize. I'm not trying to be annoying though...it REALLY BUGS me when people discredit the Manning Era saying it wasn't successful etc. We won 2 AFC Championships and a SB and were right there capable of winning more except we ran into a Dynasty in NE for a good number of years too. So we did win championships...and a world one. I just hate to take that for granted...its much more than all but a couple teams can claim so if we have the same result in the Luck era...I will be 100% happy!!

[Superman]

So are you saying that is a bad thing? It's certainly a what have you done for me lately kind of world. paying for future performance is just a crap shoot and does not make sense unless you are stuck and only have one player with two legs left. I just don't see our receiver situation being that. How much more is TY worth than any of the $435,000 per year guys? $10M?. Common, there is no way to justify that. That is just a bad business decision and sets a bad precedent for future deals, not to mention bad feelings. 

 

I disagree with pretty much everything you're saying, so I'm not going to get involved in a point by point. Just suffice it to say that we're worlds apart.

 

However, I did not say that it would be a bad thing to get rid of underperforming players. I only said that limiting guaranteed money wouldn't improve performance.

[Superman]

On a related but separate note, I think we are seeing a pattern which will define the Grigson retention strategy.  He seems very happy to wait and pay full price as he just did with Hilton rather than to move pre-emptively and extend ahead of the market to achieve a value price point.  I believe that the APY on Hilton was at minimum a million per year less back in March. 

 

Along these lines, philosophically, it is probably better to wait and pay too much for the right guys than it is to act early on the wrong ones.  My hope is that we don't get so heavily invested in "system guys" as we once were with the previous regime.  Letting guys get to the market like Grigs has (other than Hilton) does help to reduce the tendency to overbid for your productive system players.  

 

Two sides to each coin. Drew Rosenhaus had little incentive to go early with Hilton, whether the Colts wanted to pull the trigger back in March or not. The reasons you state as to why the Colts perhaps should have signed him sooner are the exact same reasons why an experienced agent would have been willing to wait. Everyone knew something was going to happen with Dez and DT, and all likelihood was that it would happen in July. If not, you could still get a camp deal done with Hilton.

[jabbanobadda]

LOL @ some of you guys! Signing Hilton is a good thing. As far as the "Oh noes, how are we going to sign this guy and that!!!" fear...do you think Grigs, 5 minutes after signing Hilton, said, "Crap, I forgot about those other guys, how will I ever get them signed now...woe is me." I'm sure he knows what he's doing.

Do you guys think that if the Colts saved the money on Hilton that all the sudden pro defensive guys would just fall into our lap? No. You get guys like Walden in free agency...You build through the draft and if we do hit on some picks they wont get paid until later.

[Andrew Luck fan club]

Like someone else said, gonna be awesome watching 13 and 15 straight taking the top off defenses.

[jabbanobadda]

To all those that don't like this deal..NFL teams must spend approximately 90% of their cap. If you want Defense and not TY, who do you spend your money on? Unspecified defensive free agent next year, who may not want to sign here..sheesh

You beat me to it.

[dgambill]

Good heavens...

Can we just get a great big pie so people can see what we have? mmm pie...maybe pumkin with some whipped cream lol....

It's like people don't understand that as time goes along money opens up from other guys like Mathis and Toler and Walden etc and we will have plenty of pie to go around. Sure Luck is going to get a big piece but even he is only likely at most to take up 15% at most of the pie. All this means is we have stars...we have to pay them...you can't have a championship caliber team filled with a bunch of mediocre talent. What it also means is we are less likely to be a big name FA destination for big contract guys and that we will have to build this team through young draft pics and cap friendly FAs...hopefully we get some good cheap young guys to step up and help us and maybe in a few years we have soo many stars we CAN'T sign them all....but that would be a good problem to have....THEN we can decide offense or defense and who to keep...right now that isn't even a worry. 

[Superman]

That may be, however they made the comparison statement about the Peyton era and that's what my comment was concerning. They were predicting that we would continue to pay tons to offensive weapons. Like our next WR, TE, line, etc. Like we did in the Peyton era.

 

The alternative is to let your good offensive players walk because you'd rather spend more money on defensive players that we don't even have right now.

 

And in reality, keeping Hilton and the other offensive players that we'll do new contracts for doesn't keep us from spending on defense, at all. I'm sorry if I come across as "I know what I'm talking about" and everything, but I've run these projections many times. Even if we keep all the young offensive guys on big money deals, we'll still have money to spend. And I don't think we'll keep both TEs, so that makes it even more possible.

 

I keep saying, it is NOT an either/or proposition. We can keep the offensive guys -- players that we've developed and who are good players and worth the money -- and still have a balanced roster and a good defense. Much more important than how we spend our cap space is how we draft on a yearly basis. Werner not being a first round talent and wasting a pick on Richardson are way more troubling than paying Hilton $13m/year. 

[Superman]

Can we just get a great big pie so people can see what we have? mmm pie...maybe pumkin with some whipped cream lol....

It's like people don't understand that as time goes along money opens up from other guys like Mathis and Toler and Walden etc and we will have plenty of pie to go around. Sure Luck is going to get a big piece but even he is only likely at most to take up 15% at most of the pie. All this means is we have stars...we have to pay them...you can't have a championship caliber team filled with a bunch of mediocre talent. What it also means is we are less likely to be a big name FA destination for big contract guys and that we will have to build this team through young draft pics and cap friendly FAs...hopefully we get some good cheap young guys to step up and help us and maybe in a few years we have soo many stars we CAN'T sign them all....but that would be a good problem to have....THEN we can decide offense or defense and who to keep...right now that isn't even a worry. 

 

I would much rather have too many people to pay than have not enough people to pay. Teams like the Bucs, Browns, Raiders, etc., always have a ton of cap space because their drafting sucks and their young players aren't worthy of big contracts. When you have to figure out how to pay your young guys, it means that you've drafted reasonably well.

 

And if past performance is an indicator of future results, that suggests that you'll continue drafting reasonably well, you'll have cheap young players for a little while, and you'll be able to replace the players you have to let walk.

[dgambill]

Personally I will be happy if we have so many mouthes to feed that this TY contract is seen as a negative. That means we have developed a ton of talent in the next few years. If that time comes then we can decide to cut or trade him but I doubt he will keep us from getting everyone signed. The only issue is if he can stay healthy. With the league moving away from illegal contact and protecting defenseless receivers and the fact he has wheels have been pretty healthy so far I feel confident he will remain around throughout his contract.

[Colt Forty-Five]

Can we just get a great big pie so people can see what we have? mmm pie...maybe pumkin with some whipped cream lol....

It's like people don't understand that as time goes along money opens up from other guys like Mathis and Toler and Walden etc and we will have plenty of pie to go around. Sure Luck is going to get a big piece but even he is only likely at most to take up 15% at most of the pie. All this means is we have stars...we have to pay them...you can't have a championship caliber team filled with a bunch of mediocre talent. What it also means is we are less likely to be a big name FA destination for big contract guys and that we will have to build this team through young draft pics and cap friendly FAs...hopefully we get some good cheap young guys to step up and help us and maybe in a few years we have soo many stars we CAN'T sign them all....but that would be a good problem to have....THEN we can decide offense or defense and who to keep...right now that isn't even a worry. 

 

"A fool and his money are soon parted"! There is only one position that can command big bucks and that is a top flight QB. And I said before, there are only about 6 of these in the league right now. The rest are all expendable and interchangable and replaceable. Receivers are a dime a dozen. We have lots of those. What we don't have is OL and that is a big problem!

[ztboiler]

Two sides to each coin. Drew Rosenhaus had little incentive to go early with Hilton, whether the Colts wanted to pull the trigger back in March or not. The reasons you state as to why the Colts perhaps should have signed him sooner are the exact same reasons why an experienced agent would have been willing to wait. Everyone knew something was going to happen with Dez and DT, and all likelihood was that it would happen in July. If not, you could still get a camp deal done with Hilton.

True - but could Rosenhaus advise his client to wait if a 5 yr. $60M extension is offered in March?  Seems unlikely.

[Grigs build the lines plz.]

After Luck, Hilton, Costanzo and either Allen or Fleener get paid, Grigson is going

to be speaking to free agents like a baseball game vendor "peanuts, get your peanuts here!"

 

I figured the number would have been less since he had another year left on his current contract.

[ColtStronger]

"A fool and his money are soon parted"! There is only one position that can command big bucks and that is a top flight QB. And I said before, there are only about 6 of these in the league right now. The rest are all expendable and interchangable and replaceable. Receivers are a dime a dozen. We have lots of those. What we don't have is OL and that is a big problem!

I wish more people saw that!  I completely understand the salary cap is going up every year, and we still have money to resign other guys, but what doesn't make sense is to pay everyone "what they deserve" before you take care of needs.  Why don't we have LB's who WONT allow big OL's run down our throats.  Although I do think we will see an improvement I'm not sure it will be good enough.  Same thing with our OL.  Maybe I have too high expectations, but with our weapons and a dominant offensive line, I think we should pass the production of the 2013 Broncos offense.  Maybe not this season, but next year anyway!

[bestQBever]

so basically his salary over the next 6 years is 11 mil per year. That's perfect.

[LJpalmbeacher2]

Indirectly, yes. Without fans, the league doesn't have money.

NO. Someone posted 90% of the cap MUST BE SPENT! We are not the Miami Marlins. The $ would be spent on other players anyway if not on TY. This will not affect a fans pocketbook. And again I'll say, we spent it on a playmaker, game changer and of the best receivers in the nfl.

[dgambill]

And that thinking isn't based in reality. That we kept our best WR doesn't mean that we'll have a great offense and no defense. It's pretty much unrelated, as a matter of fact. 

People act like during the Peyton years we didn't have big contracts on defense too....that isn't the case...Freeney, Mathis, Hayden, Brackett, Sanders etc we gave good money too...and had some stars on that side of the ball...we simply missed on a couple of those signings and some key injuries hurt us at some key times.....combine that with some poor play at the most critical time whether that was on defense, ESPECIALLY special teams, OL like in the Pittsburg game, or even Peyton and the offense being shut down by physical coverages things happen...but it wasn't because of lack of talent or ability....and not because we didn't have decent defenses...we did...we just got taken out of our game plan which often was get a lead and let our rushers wreck havoc...well when that didn't happen it came down to a few plays here and there and often the other teams made them....and how often did we lose to the eventual SB champions??? We were a great team..and I would be proud to have another one like it. Perhaps a few more breaks will go our way and we win a couple more SBs...but even if they don't I'll get to enjoy some excellent football and a very very entertaining team. Championships or not I won't be dissappointed with that.

[ColtRider]

I'm going to ask this one more time as no direct responses have been given.

What is the number one goal of a GM/and/or team to achieve successful longevity?

(hint: Superman has already indirectly answered this along with a couple others since my 1st attempt at this!)

[Yoshinator]

I'm going to ask this one more time as no direct responses have been given.

What is the number one goal of a GM/and/or team to achieve successful longevity?

(hint: Superman has already indirectly answered this along with a couple others since my 1st attempt at this!)

I would guess without reading, build through the draft successfully and manage a team friendly salary cap.

[Larry Horseman]

That may be, however they made the comparison statement about the Peyton era and that's what my comment was concerning. They were predicting that we would continue to pay tons to offensive weapons. Like our next WR, TE, line, etc. Like we did in the Peyton era.

 

It is a bit of a misconception that the Colts did not invest on offensive line or defense in the Manning era. Check out this website: http://content.usatoday.com/sportsdata/football/nfl/colts/salaries/2007. It is sortable by year. Note that a consistent split or majority of top 10 highest paid are defense or offensive line vs. QB and offensive skill players. 

[ColtsLegacy]

more like 1 good TE and another who is made of glass.....

And when Mr. "Made-of-glass" has a great season this year, you and the ficklebunch will be singing a different tune.

[dgambill]

"A fool and his money are soon parted"! There is only one position that can command big bucks and that is a top flight QB. And I said before, there are only about 6 of these in the league right now. The rest are all expendable and interchangable and replaceable. Receivers are a dime a dozen. We have lots of those. What we don't have is OL and that is a big problem!

I don't think Grigson has been foolish or is now. He has shown anything but in how he has structured his deals so that they are cap friendly...that we can walk away from any contract on this team and not be totally handcuffed in the future. I do think a qb like Luck can make avg receivers good but when you get to that elite level...the playoffs and winning it all..you need elite level players surronding your qb to make plays. If we had some better weapons around Luck this past post-season perhaps we keep that defense fresh and get some stops and its a closer game against NE. All we had was TY out there and NE doubled him because they knew we didn't have anyone else that scared them. Well TY is a big part of what makes our offense go and if you think just any receiver could just step in and do that then I think your very much devaluing TY. I think we have to be careful in how we attack the salaries and who to sign but you look at teams like KC, Oak, Jax, Cle, NYJ, Tenn, Stl, SF and if they had some better play makers at wr would make a huge difference. If Seattle had another playmaker in the SB...great wrs don't grow on trees. I agree that they are becoming more and more abundant but players that make big plays like TY has aren't just all over the place. He is special and I'm glad we have him at a fair market rate.....or perhaps we should just let him go and re-sign DHB, Avery, and Nicks back...because after all great wrs seem to just grow on trees.

[dgambill]

I wish more people saw that!  I completely understand the salary cap is going up every year, and we still have money to resign other guys, but what doesn't make sense is to pay everyone "what they deserve" before you take care of needs.  Why don't we have LB's who WONT allow big OL's run down our throats.  Although I do think we will see an improvement I'm not sure it will be good enough.  Same thing with our OL.  Maybe I have too high expectations, but with our weapons and a dominant offensive line, I think we should pass the production of the 2013 Broncos offense.  Maybe not this season, but next year anyway!

So what LBs do you think we should re-sign to a HUGE contract....Freeman?? What LB have we missed out on in FA that would have upgraded us to an elite run stopping defense? You can't spend money on a ficticious LB that doesn't exist! Now you CAN argue why haven't we DRAFTED one of those but since one isn't on the team well Hilton isn't taking his money because there is no such player to PAY.

[HtownColt]

TY is so under appreciated by some here

[dgambill]

I'm going to ask this one more time as no direct responses have been given.

What is the number one goal of a GM/and/or team to achieve successful longevity?

(hint: Superman has already indirectly answered this along with a couple others since my 1st attempt at this!)

I'm assuming you mean draft well, sign players to cap friendly deals/flexibility, put a great coaching staff in place, and establish a culture of personal responsibility and high integrity within all parts of the organization. If that is done for the most part we've seen franchises succeed.

[NewColtsFan]

To much money for him how are they going to resign luck castanzo fleener allen just to name a few

 

How are they going to sign them?

 

Easily.     We can afford all three.

 

We've been planning for this for years.

 

It's not going to be a problem.

[ColtRider]

I'm assuming you mean draft well, sign players to cap friendly deals/flexibility, put a great coaching staff in place, and establish a culture of personal responsibility and high integrity within all parts of the organization. If that is done for the most part we've seen franchises succeed.

Along with keeping your best core players within reason and feasibility. Kudos to you, Jared C., Superman, & others about the deal.

Ref. point : Signing T.Y. Hilton!

[Horse Shoe Heaven]

Nice job!

[esmort]

I would much rather have too many people to pay than have not enough people to pay. Teams like the Bucs, Browns, Raiders, etc., always have a ton of cap space because their drafting sucks and their young players aren't worthy of big contracts. When you have to figure out how to pay your young guys, it means that you've drafted reasonably well.

 

And if past performance is an indicator of future results, that suggests that you'll continue drafting reasonably well, you'll have cheap young players for a little while, and you'll be able to replace the players you have to let walk.

 

^^^ This!

 

Having an too many talented players is a good problem. Not only does it give us the flexibility to choose which talent we like/fits us best, but it also allows us to start banking some decent comp picks for the talent we have to let go. It may feel like we are losing when we let talent walk; but If we still have a roster full of talent even after we let high caliber players go and we are collecting high comp picks every year to boot, than the team is in a very good situation. 

[Colt Forty-Five]

I don't think Grigson has been foolish or is now. He has shown anything but in how he has structured his deals so that they are cap friendly...that we can walk away from any contract on this team and not be totally handcuffed in the future. I do think a qb like Luck can make avg receivers good but when you get to that elite level...the playoffs and winning it all..you need elite level players surronding your qb to make plays. If we had some better weapons around Luck this past post-season perhaps we keep that defense fresh and get some stops and its a closer game against NE. All we had was TY out there and NE doubled him because they knew we didn't have anyone else that scared them. Well TY is a big part of what makes our offense go and if you think just any receiver could just step in and do that then I think your very much devaluing TY. I think we have to be careful in how we attack the salaries and who to sign but you look at teams like KC, Oak, Jax, Cle, NYJ, Tenn, Stl, SF and if they had some better play makers at wr would make a huge difference. If Seattle had another playmaker in the SB...great wrs don't grow on trees. I agree that they are becoming more and more abundant but players that make big plays like TY has aren't just all over the place. He is special and I'm glad we have him at a fair market rate.....or perhaps we should just let him go and re-sign DHB, Avery, and Nicks back...because after all great wrs seem to just grow on trees.

 

Without Andrew TY is a 65M bust and with Andrew the rest will all be stars. Don't believe it just put MH in at QB and see what happens. I don't think we were a TY 65M contract or Frank Gore $12M contract away from beating the Pats in that 45-7 drubbing. What you needed was an O-line and some defense!  

[csmopar]

And when Mr. "Made-of-glass" has a great season this year, you and the ficklebunch will be singing a different tune.

I like Allen, but i wont be heart broken if we have to let him go.  I hope we can keep him but if he gets hurt again, or has a year like last.....i'll be banging the drum to get rid of him

[BlueCollarColts]

Glad Hilton will be here long term.

[Narcosys]

The alternative is to let your good offensive players walk because you'd rather spend more money on defensive players that we don't even have right now.

And in reality, keeping Hilton and the other offensive players that we'll do new contracts for doesn't keep us from spending on defense, at all. I'm sorry if I come across as "I know what I'm talking about" and everything, but I've run these projections many times. Even if we keep all the young offensive guys on big money deals, we'll still have money to spend. And I don't think we'll keep both TEs, so that makes it even more possible.

I keep saying, it is NOT an either/or proposition. We can keep the offensive guys -- players that we've developed and who are good players and worth the money -- and still have a balanced roster and a good defense. Much more important than how we spend our cap space is how we draft on a yearly basis. Werner not being a first round talent and wasting a pick on Richardson are way more troubling than paying Hilton $13m/year.

Lol, I'm not saying it's right or wrong. Just saying.

[Larry Horseman]

Without Andrew TY is a 65M bust and with Andrew the rest will all be stars. Don't believe it just put MH in at QB and see what happens. I don't think we were a TY 65M contract or Frank Gore $12M contract away from beating the Pats in that 45-7 drubbing. What you needed was an O-line and some defense!  

 

It isn't that cut and dry. Peyton would not have had the career he has had with Marv, Reggie, DT, etc. Also, the Colts could not complete a pass to a WR or run the ball effectively against NE. That's more than just the offensive line or defense. The Colts also needed more playmakers aside from TY on offense to break down NE's great secondary. 

[antipatriot]

Congrats to T.Y.

 

I have said before and I stand by it T.Y. is overrated on this board but is still an above average receiver, he is not a guy you can just replace with anyone as someone suggested about receivers.  It does however seem he is a quality person and that is worth so much when he is also very talented.  He fits what we do.  We bought the whole package not just the base model and I am more than good with that.

 

GO COLTS

[New Zealands #1 Colts Fan]

Im just happy we dont have to worry about trying to defend T.Y if he had left.