Fisher Signing 1 Year Deal

[throwing BBZ]

14 minutes ago, stitches said:

Here's the terms of the contract: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Thank you and good luck Eric. I hope you earn all of that per game bonus.
Of course that is hard to do Any year. lol

[throwing BBZ]

On 5/23/2021 at 9:04 AM, ColtsBlueFL said:

 

I think we all hope it, but some of us are not going to 'bank' on it. Desire it, yes. Expect it, not quite.

 

 

May well be, as everyone is different, and not predictable.  Drew Brees had a similar (and even more intense) shoulder surgery than Luck. He recovered notably quicker than Andrew. Luck just seemed to be the outlier in the 'other' direction in healing time on his injuries; taking slightly longer.  Terrell Suggs (Achilles) and Adrian Peterson (ACL) outliers in quick healing and return to playing.

 

How Dayo and Eric respond is still in question, but the Colts doctors and training staff know where they are physically versus the projected timelines. Apparently, it's on track or better from what we fans can tell.

 

 

I hope the best for him, but I know with his injury, JT and Hines in the mix, it will be hard for him to rack up incredible stats. But I hope he shines, but I'm not expecting it. I'm interested to see how all these injuries play out.

 

 

 

 

 He is an insurance policy against Taylor's health.

[throwing BBZ]

On 5/13/2021 at 5:09 PM, Wentzszn said:

It makes sense now why we signed him with the Achilles. They want to keep him for a couple more years. I just don’t see how they make this work. You are going to have to let several players go that we all love if they signed Fisher. You can’t hurt the rest of the team like that.

 

 So Ballard should devalue the LT position enough to keep players "we love"?
Seems like that would hurt the rest of the team more.
 Perhaps when it is time, "when it is over", we can have an inkling how they have made it work. I have no doubt their Cap Guy already has intricate spread sheets on what we need to do with Q, Leonard, and Smith long term, so as to remain as flexible as possible to keep as many of "OUR" players as possible. That is all they can do.  
 To start, i know i don't Love Glowinski so there is a place to save $4M or so.
Pinter should be ready to take over perhaps. Name another spot to save some $$$? There is at least one obvious one that saves Millions.

[Superman]

1 hour ago, stitches said:

Here's the terms of the contract: 

 

 

 

That's a solid structure, given the circumstances. I wasn't expecting that much in per game bonuses, and I definitely wasn't expecting a voidable year. So his 2021 compensation is $6m, plus $140k for each game he plays, and the team will have a $2m cap penalty in 2022. I wonder how this early void day affects the comp pick formula.

 

If he plays 8 games, his 2021 cap hit will be $7.12m. I can live with that, it's about 25% less than I thought it would be when this deal was first announced. And if he doesn't play at all, it's $6m total. 

[stitches]

39 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

That's a solid structure, given the circumstances. I wasn't expecting that much in per game bonuses, and I definitely wasn't expecting a voidable year. So his 2021 compensation is $6m, plus $140k for each game he plays, and the team will have a $2m cap penalty in 2022. I wonder how this early void day affects the comp pick formula.

 

If he plays 8 games, his 2021 cap hit will be $7.12m. I can live with that, it's about 25% less than I thought it would be when this deal was first announced. And if he doesn't play at all, it's $6m total. 

To me this structure is very confusing. What does it mean voids automatically if he's on the roster? So if we don't release him, he collects 4M for '22 and his contract is voided? What? Is this a forced termination with penalty for the team? What do we gain from this?

 

Or is this ... '22 voids if he's on the roster 23 days before the start of year 1? And if he's not, his 2nd year comes in effect? So in essence - if he's not on PUP he gets to play year 1 for 6m+bonuses and incentives and voids year 2, but if he's on PUP then his year 2 is in effect for 12.38m?

 

I don't get it. That year 2 thing is super confusing.

[Superman]

33 minutes ago, stitches said:

To me this structure is very confusing. What does it mean voids automatically if he's on the roster? So if we don't release him, he collects 4M for '22 and his contract is voided? What? Is this a forced termination with penalty for the team? What do we gain from this?

 

Or is this ... '22 voids if he's on the roster 23 days before the start of year 1? And if he's not, his 2nd year comes in effect? So in essence - if he's not on PUP he gets to play year 1 and voids year 2, but if he's on PUP then his year 2 is in effect for 12.38m?

 

I don't get it. That year 2 thing is super confusing.

 

He typed this: "2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st year 2022 league year"

 

I'm pretty sure he meant this: 2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st day 2022 league year. (That's how Spotrac interprets it also. Their breakdown should help. https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/indianapolis-colts/eric-fisher-12281/)  

 

So if the 2022 league year starts on March 8, Fisher's contract voids on February 14, if he's still on the roster at that point. If he's released before then, his contract does not void because it's already terminated. 

 

He gets a $4m signing bonus. Because it's a two year deal, that signing bonus is split evenly between the two seasons, but the second year of the contract is basically a dum-my year, just meant to allow the team to push $2m of his cap hit into 2022. This is what lots of teams did to restructure contracts this offseason, but it's not something the Colts have shown any inclination toward doing. Until now.

 

Fisher's base salary for 2021 is $2m, and it's fully guaranteed. So if he does not play a single game in 2021, he gets the $4m signing bonus, plus the $2m base salary = $6m. 

 

He has a per game roster bonus of $140k/game ($2.38m if he plays 17 games; he played all regular season games in 2020, so this roster bonus is considered likely to be earned, and will count against the cap proactively. There will be a cap reconciliation after the season, and if he plays fewer than 17 games the Colts will receive a prorated credit to the 2022 cap.) He also has a $750k incentive bonus, but I don't know what that incentive is. Aaron Wilson calls it not likely to be earned, so this is another area for cap reconciliation after the season, depending on whether he reaches that incentive threshold or not.

 

So right now, his 2021 cap hit is $6.38m (assuming 17 games played), with the potential for another $750k in incentives = $7.13m max 2021 cap hit. Then there's an additional $2m in dead money in 2022 (prorated signing bonus), which takes the total value of the contract to $9.13m. There may be an additional detail missing that would get us to $9.4m, as initially reported.

 

TL;DR -- Prorated signing bonus of $4m is split evenly between 2021 and 2022, but 2022 is just a voidable/dum-my year, meant to reduce his 2021 cap hit. He will be a free agent in 2022.

[stitches]

3 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

He typed this: "2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st year 2022 league year"

 

I'm pretty sure he meant this: 2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st day 2022 league year. (That's how Spotrac interprets it also. Their breakdown should help. https://www.spotrac.com/nfl/indianapolis-colts/eric-fisher-12281/)  

 

So if the 2022 league year starts on March 8, Fisher's contract voids on February 14, if he's still on the roster at that point. If he's released before then, his contract does not void because it's already terminated. 

 

This is one way to interpret it. What if instead he meant: "Eric Fisher (Colts) two years, 2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st year" (then he meant to hit enter and start new line with the following containing details for the 2022 year:

 

"2022 league year: $12.38M total; $4M signing bonus, $6M gtd; salaries $2M 2021 (gtd), $4M 2022; up to $2.38M per game active total roster bonus '21, salary-cap figure 2021: $6.49M"

 

Does that make any sense? So if he's on the roster to start this year, year 2 gets voided. But if he's on PUP, we get to have him on the second year for 12.38M that second year? 

 

 

3 minutes ago, Superman said:

He gets a $4m signing bonus. Because it's a two year deal, that signing bonus is split evenly between the two seasons, but the second year of the contract is basically a * year, just meant to allow the team to push $2m of his cap hit into 2022. This is what lots of teams did to restructure contracts this offseason, but it's not something the Colts have shown any inclination toward doing. Until now.

Yah, that makes sense, but usually the teams do it because they need to spread money out... do we need to? We have 12M of capspace for this year remaining if we do it like this... or 10M without doing it like this... does it matter? We are not desperate to get under... Are we trying to make more acquisitions... like... any specific acquisition with 12M cap hit? What's the hit on Julio for example? This seems weird, first because we haven't done anything like this before... and second because we don't seem to need it right now... and if we needed something like that it seems like it's about as easy to just restructure one contract and spread current money over future years?

 

3 minutes ago, Superman said:

Fisher's base salary for 2021 is $2m, and it's fully guaranteed. So if he does not play a single game in 2021, he gets the $4m signing bonus, plus the $2m base salary = $6m. 

 

3 minutes ago, Superman said:

He has a per game roster bonus of $140k/game ($2.38m if he plays 17 games; he played all regular season games in 2020, so this roster bonus is considered likely to be earned, and will count against the cap proactively. There will be a cap reconciliation after the season, and if he plays fewer than 17 games the Colts will receive a prorated credit to the 2022 cap.) He also has a $750k incentive bonus, but I don't know what that incentive is. Aaron Wilson calls it not likely to be earned, so this is another area for cap reconciliation after the season, depending on whether he reaches that incentive threshold or not.

"Not likely" bonus usually means it's a condition he didn't meet last year. He played 15 of 16 games of his team so I doubt it's a "games/snaps played" bonus. There aren't many individual performance stats that are kept for OL - he made the pro-bowl so this would be deemed likely, he didn't make all-pro, so it's possible it's all-pro bonus. Team-based bonus could be winning the super bowl or something of the sort. 

3 minutes ago, Superman said:

So right now, his 2021 cap hit is $6.38m (assuming 17 games played), with the potential for another $750k in incentives = $7.13m max 2021 cap hit. Then there's an additional $2m in dead money in 2022 (prorated signing bonus), which takes the total value of the contract to $9.13m. There may be an additional detail missing that would get us to $9.4m, as initially reported.

 

TL;DR -- Prorated signing bonus of $4m is split evenly between 2021 and 2022, but 2022 is just a voidable/* year, meant to reduce his 2021 cap hit. He will be a free agent in 2022.

I wonder what that means for the comp pick possibility? 

[Superman]

3 minutes ago, stitches said:

This is one way to interpret it. What if instead he meant: "Eric Fisher (Colts) two years, 2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st year" (then he meant to hit enter and start new line with the following containing details for the 2022 year:

 

"2022 league year: $12.38M total; $4M signing bonus, $6M gtd; salaries $2M 2021 (gtd), $4M 2022; up to $2.38M per game active total roster bonus '21, salary-cap figure 2021: $6.49M"

 

Does that make any sense? So if he's on the roster to start this year, year 2 gets voided. But if he's on PUP, we get to have him on the second year for 12.38M that second year? 

 

I missed the 2022 $4m salary part. But the math doesn't work out to $12.38m in 2022. It's most likely just a voidable year, and the $4m salary is a placeholder needed to satisfy league rules, but won't be paid because the contract voids. That's how OTC and Spotrac are interpreting it, and that seems to be what makes sense. 

 

Maybe Aaron Wilson will clarify, or another report will come out that offers more detail. 

 

Quote

Yah, that makes sense, but usually the teams do it because they need to spread money out... do we need to? We have 12M of capspace for this year remaining if we do it like this... or 10M without doing it like this... does it matter? We are not desperate to get under... Are we trying to make more acquisitions... like... any specific acquisition with 12M cap hit? What's the hit on Julio for example? This seems weird, first because we haven't done anything like this before... and second because we don't seem to need it right now... and if we needed something like that it seems like it's about as easy to just restructure one contract and spread current money over future years?

 

We don't necessarily need to, but it saves a little cap space in 2021 by doing a voidable year. Not a huge amount, but he'll come in significantly lower than the initially reported $9.4m for 2021, so I'll take it.

 

Julio is a non starter. If he's traded for, his new team is on the hook for $15.3m in 2021. We could restructure him, but do the Colts seem like the kind of operation to trade for a 32 year old WR, and then give him more money? Not to mention we've already tied up our first/second round pick in 2022. Call me out if I'm proven wrong on this, but the Colts aren't trading for Julio Jones.

 

They just want more cap buffer, and the potential to add another player as the year goes on.

 

Quote

"Not likely" bonus usually means it's a condition he didn't meet last year. He played 15 of 16 games of his team so I doubt it's a "games/snaps played" bonus. There aren't many individual performance stats that are kept for OL - he made the pro-bowl so this would be deemed likely, he didn't make all-pro, so it's possible it's all-pro bonus. Team-based bonus could be winning the super bowl or something of the sort. 

 

Right, but we don't know what the condition is at this point. As you point out, he played 15 games last year (I thought it was 16, so my earlier math is off by a little), and there's a per game roster bonus. It could be accolade-based, probably has to be for an OL. 

 

Quote

I wonder what that means for the comp pick possibility? 

 

Same. I don't think voids usually happen that long before the league year starts, so I don't know how it affects the comp pick formula. (Comparison, Brady's contract voided the day before the 2020 league year started, not 23 days before. Also, there's a new wrinkle in the CBA that affects voidable years/comp picks, but I'm not sure of the mechanism. I'll do so research on that.)

[shasta519]

24 minutes ago, stitches said:

I wonder what that means for the comp pick possibility? 

 

Here's the language for voidable years:

 

Quote

No UFA shall qualify as a CFA unless and until the maximum possible term of the player’s contract (“Maximum Possible Term”) has expired, and all other requirements have been satisfied. The Maximum Possible Term of any Player Contract shall be determined as of the date of such contract’s execution and shall include all years of the contract (including, without limitation, option years and voidable years). Notwithstanding the foregoing, a UFA shall qualify as a CFA if the Maximum Possible Term of the player’s contract failed to expire solely as the result of a provision stating that a specified contract year or years shall void automatically upon a specified day or date or upon the achievement of a roster condition with no additional contingencies (“Automatic Voidable Year”), unless the expired contract is a renegotiated contract that included a new or earlier Automatic Voidable Year within the Maximum Possible Term of the player’s prior contract and such void occurred. For the avoidance of doubt, no UFA shall qualify as a CFA if the Maximum Possible Term of the player’s contract is reduced as the result of the player’s or the Club’s decision to exercise, or not to exercise, any contractual rights, whether individually or in combination. No UFA shall qualify as a CFA if the player’s NFL Player Contract is renegotiated to reduce the Maximum Possible Term of the contract. Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this Paragraph 9, in the event a Club elects not to exercise a Fifth-Year Option under Article 7, Section 7, nothing in Article 6 or this Appendix shall operate to preclude the player from qualifying as a CFA upon expiration of the fourth year of his Rookie Contract if all other requirements are satisfied.

 

Not a lawyer, but that sounds like he will still count as an UFA. 

[Superman]

4 minutes ago, shasta519 said:

 

Here's the language for voidable years:

 

 

Not a lawyer, but that sounds like he will still count as an UFA. 

 

Sure does. Is that language you quoted from the new CBA?

[shasta519]

24 minutes ago, Superman said:

 

Sure does. Is that language you quoted from the new CBA?

 

Came from the 2020 CBA. That's the one that goes into effect this season, right?

[Superman]

13 minutes ago, shasta519 said:

 

Came from the 2020 CBA. That's the one that goes into effect this season, right?

 

Yup. Thanks for finding that.

[throwing BBZ]

On 5/13/2021 at 8:54 AM, DougDew said:

Yes, and if a few of those down hill guys blitz, the coverage by the other downhill guys would suffer even more.  Our defensive personnel is not that good and it limits what the coaches can do.  They have to protect weaknesses too much to let loose the aggressiveness..  JMO.

 

 You are correct.
  Our back seven is full of very young players that have played little together.
 Let's hope by the last 1/3 of the season they will much more in sync and have considerably fewer so called mental errors.

[Four2itus]

1 hour ago, Superman said:

 

I missed the 2022 $4m salary part. But the math doesn't work out to $12.38m in 2022. It's most likely just a voidable year, and the $4m salary is a placeholder needed to satisfy league rules, but won't be paid because the contract voids. That's how OTC and Spotrac are interpreting it, and that seems to be what makes sense. 

 

Maybe Aaron Wilson will clarify, or another report will come out that offers more detail. 

 

 

We don't necessarily need to, but it saves a little cap space in 2021 by doing a voidable year. Not a huge amount, but he'll come in significantly lower than the initially reported $9.4m for 2021, so I'll take it.

 

Julio is a non starter. If he's traded for, his new team is on the hook for $15.3m in 2021. We could restructure him, but do the Colts seem like the kind of operation to trade for a 32 year old WR, and then give him more money? Not to mention we've already tied up our first/second round pick in 2022. Call me out if I'm proven wrong on this, but the Colts aren't trading for Julio Jones.

 

They just want more cap buffer, and the potential to add another player as the year goes on.

 

 

Right, but we don't know what the condition is at this point. As you point out, he played 15 games last year (I thought it was 16, so my earlier math is off by a little), and there's a per game roster bonus. It could be accolade-based, probably has to be for an OL. 

 

 

Same. I don't think voids usually happen that long before the league year starts, so I don't know how it affects the comp pick formula. (Comparison, Brady's contract voided the day before the 2020 league year started, not 23 days before. Also, there's a new wrinkle in the CBA that affects voidable years/comp picks, but I'm not sure of the mechanism. I'll do so research on that.)

 

2 hours ago, stitches said:

 

This is one way to interpret it. What if instead he meant: "Eric Fisher (Colts) two years, 2022 voids automatically if on roster 23rd day prior to 1st year" (then he meant to hit enter and start new line with the following containing details for the 2022 year:

 

"2022 league year: $12.38M total; $4M signing bonus, $6M gtd; salaries $2M 2021 (gtd), $4M 2022; up to $2.38M per game active total roster bonus '21, salary-cap figure 2021: $6.49M"

 

Does that make any sense? So if he's on the roster to start this year, year 2 gets voided. But if he's on PUP, we get to have him on the second year for 12.38M that second year? 

 

 

Yah, that makes sense, but usually the teams do it because they need to spread money out... do we need to? We have 12M of capspace for this year remaining if we do it like this... or 10M without doing it like this... does it matter? We are not desperate to get under... Are we trying to make more acquisitions... like... any specific acquisition with 12M cap hit? What's the hit on Julio for example? This seems weird, first because we haven't done anything like this before... and second because we don't seem to need it right now... and if we needed something like that it seems like it's about as easy to just restructure one contract and spread current money over future years?

 

 

"Not likely" bonus usually means it's a condition he didn't meet last year. He played 15 of 16 games of his team so I doubt it's a "games/snaps played" bonus. There aren't many individual performance stats that are kept for OL - he made the pro-bowl so this would be deemed likely, he didn't make all-pro, so it's possible it's all-pro bonus. Team-based bonus could be winning the super bowl or something of the sort. 

I wonder what that means for the comp pick possibility? 

I'm playing checkers. Superman and Stitches are playing 3D chess. Lol

[Zoltan]

On 5/21/2021 at 12:08 AM, EastStreet said:

August is purely coachspeak. Or GM speak.

Affording him this year is kinda easy. Next year and beyond is the challenge. Something will have to give next year or and after (in terms of keeping all of our high paid assets) unless the salary cap goes up more than the average in typical years (even if we factor it goes up bigly after the down 2021).

I imagine when he said August, he was saying back to practice not ready to play. I still don’t expect him to play til the end of September at the earliest

[philba101]

Glad to see the Colts at least use some incentives to lessen the cap hit!

[stitches]

34 minutes ago, Four2itus said:

 

I'm playing checkers. Superman and Stitches are playing 3D chess. Lol

Nah, not really, this is legitimately tedious and unclear contract description to read and it has at least 1 error. The question is which one... It's probably more likely the @Superman interpretation is right. 

[w87r]

From what I am seeing on contract, it is a 1yr $8.38m contract. $6m guaranteed($4m SB, $2m 2021 base)

 

Signing bonus($4m)spread over 2 years 21/22($2m per) with 2nd year voided.

 

2021 Cap Hit:$2m base, $2m SB, $2.38m RB =6.38m cap hit

2022 Dead Cap:$2m SB

 

 

And $2.38m in per game active roster bonus($140k/game).

 

Incentives:$750k(unlikely? Being reported)

 

EDIT:already seemed to be resolved above. So I will just throw in my .02 real quick.

 

 

$2m really doesn't help very much in regards to 2021 Cap Space. Not a fan of voidable years and hopefully Ballard stays away from them in the future. Not to big a deal though, in this instance.

 

Hopefully the willingness to accept 2022 dead cap hit, means that the Leonard and/or Smith extensions are close and need every bit of cap space they can retain. Locking them up would be monumental for the young team and set us up to lock down Q and have this core together at minimal another 5 years.

 

 

Hopefully Fisher only misses first few games, at least there are some money saving bonus potential if he misses some time.

 

Missed:(adjusted 2021 salary)(total $$)

4 games - $5.82m($7.82m)

6 games - $5.54m($7.54m)

8 games - $5.26m($7.26m)

17 games - $4m($6m)

 

Hopefully he earns that full $6.38m, not likely though. Happy the Colts protected themselves pretty well here.

 

I am definitely happy that 28% of his salary isn't guaranteed. I figured most of it would of been(guaranteed) while we waited for details.

 

 

Something I do like about signing Fisher over Leno, is, I believe Fisher was in the plans well before the draft. So signing him makes me feel like this was the main plan and Ballards offseason is going as he planned.

 

If we signed Leno, I wouldn't feel like that was in Ballards plan and he had Leno fall in his lap.

[EastStreet]

5 hours ago, Zoltan said:

I imagine when he said August, he was saying back to practice not ready to play. I still don’t expect him to play til the end of September at the earliest

People seem to read things and see what they want to see lol....

 

I'd love it if he was starting week 1. I'd bet some money though that it doesn't happen.

[EastStreet]

3 hours ago, w87r said:

From what I am seeing on contract, it is a 1yr $8.38m contract. $6m guaranteed($4m SB, $2m 2021 base)

 

Signing bonus($4m)spread over 2 years 21/22($2m per) with 2nd year voided.

 

2021 Cap Hit:$2m base, $2m SB, $2.38m RB =6.38m cap hit

2022 Dead Cap:$2m SB

 

 

And $2.38m in per game active roster bonus($140k/game).

 

Incentives:$750k(unlikely? Being reported)

 

EDIT:already seemed to be resolved above. So I will just throw in my .02 real quick.

 

 

$2m really doesn't help very much in regards to 2021 Cap Space. Not a fan of voidable years and hopefully Ballard stays away from them in the future. Not to big a deal though, in this instance.

 

Hopefully the willingness to accept 2022 dead cap hit, means that the Leonard and/or Smith extensions are close and need every bit of cap space they can retain. Locking them up would be monumental for the young team and set us up to lock down Q and have this core together at minimal another 5 years.

 

 

Hopefully Fisher only misses first few games, at least there are some money saving bonus potential if he misses some time.

 

Missed:(adjusted 2021 salary)(total $$)

4 games - $5.82m($7.82m)

6 games - $5.54m($7.54m)

8 games - $5.26m($7.26m)

17 games - $4m($6m)

 

Hopefully he earns that full $6.38m, not likely though. Happy the Colts protected themselves pretty well here.

 

I am definitely happy that 28% of his salary isn't guaranteed. I figured most of it would of been(guaranteed) while we waited for details.

 

 

Something I do like about signing Fisher over Leno, is, I believe Fisher was in the plans well before the draft. So signing him makes me feel like this was the main plan and Ballards offseason is going as he planned.

 

If we signed Leno, I wouldn't feel like that was in Ballards plan and he had Leno fall in his lap.

I like the contract overall. Wish the per game active roster check was more (and the SB was less) but I'll take it. At least there's a little protection. You know I hate pushing money and fake years, but we might as well do what every other team seems to be doing lol. Just hoping the cap goes up a good bit next season.

 

As far a Fisher being in the long term plans. I'm sure he was an option, but doubt he was "the plan". The info about draft strategy that came out (they were going OL before Paye fell) recently tells me they simply stuck to their board. 

[stitches]

 

[DoubleE Colt]

Just watching the Euro football tournament (soccer if you prefer) and amazingly there is a Belgian player in that who torn his Achilles tendon in January and is back now, apparently their was another Belgian player who did the same and played again 5 months later..... obviously medical science is moving on.....either that or the Colts need to put in a phone call or two to the Belgian FA.

[EastStreet]

36 minutes ago, DoubleE Colt said:

Just watching the Euro football tournament (soccer if you prefer) and amazingly there is a Belgian player in that who torn his Achilles tendon in January and is back now, apparently their was another Belgian player who did the same and played again 5 months later..... obviously medical science is moving on.....either that or the Colts need to put in a phone call or two to the Belgian FA.

The guy's name is Axel Witsel. Witsel was told 6-9 months for return. Keep in mind all Achilles injuries are not created equal. Also, Witsel is not a 6-5, 300+ pound guy :-)...

 

Benteke also returned early (soccer) after a similar Achilles injury a few years back. 

 

 

 

[Restinpeacesweetchloe]

8 minutes ago, EastStreet said:

The guy's name is Axel Witsel. Witsel was told 6-9 months for return. Keep in mind all Achilles injuries are not created equal. Also, Witsel is not a 6-5, 300+ pound guy :-)...

 

Benteke also returned early (soccer) after a similar Achilles injury a few years back. 

 

 

 

I don’t think anyone is saying every player with a Achilles is going to return in the same amount of time. But the people who keep guaranteeing he is going to miss a certain amount don’t know either. It’s very fluid.

[EastStreet]

5 minutes ago, Wentzszn said:

I don’t think anyone is saying every player with a Achilles is going to return in the same amount of time. But the people who keep guaranteeing he is going to miss a certain amount don’t know either. It’s very fluid.

Not sure who is "guaranteeing" anything. A lot of folks are simply forming opinions based on the data that has been provided, which has been specific to the sport (football), and position (OL). 

 

IIRC, Holder/Athletic reported that the Colts front office was internally estimating late September for a return. If I had to bet, I too would put money on somewhere between weeks 4 and 6. 

 

I'm sure we'll hear more come training camp.

[2006Coltsbestever]

When it comes to Fish, it is a crap shoot to when he will be back. Anyone's guess. Everyone's body is different and recovers in different ways. He may be ready come opening day or may not be back until November. If I had to guess just based off of past history of this injury, I would say he will be back by October but that is just a guess as he seems upbeat about his rehab. Today's technology medical wise is a lot better than it was even 10 years ago.