Indianapolis Colts one of the league's most potent offenses

The reason the excuse doesn't hold up is this is Tom Brady we're talking about!  Who gives a crap what the salary cap will be in the future? Cap or no cap, the Patriots are going to sign him to whatever he wants! The whole friggin team is built around his talents, and his asking price is well within reason. I mean, if the friggin Green Bay Packers are making a yearly $9.8 million profit, the larger market Patriots are likely making triple  that. So, please, the owners (Jim Irsay included) need to stop parroting this "we need to know how the collective bargaining agreement shakes out" crap. Agreement or no agreement, people like Tom Brady should be signed to extensions.

Brady signing now would be big because it likely would lead to the Colts football jerseys signing Peyton Manning to a bigger extension. Once those two extensions are in place, players like Robert Mathis, Reggie Wayne, and Ryan McNeil have a baseline ceiling for which to request reasonable extensions of their own. "Gee, Peyton makes $20 mil a year now. I should be making $10 mill."

Of course, the owners do not want this to happen right now, and thus the Donald Brown accusations of "collusion" by the players.

All signs point to 2011 being a year where the owners will lock the players out from football without a new collective bargaining agreement. If that happens after they have signed players like Manning, Brady, and others to big extensions, they will be players millions of dollars to players the are preventing from playing football. Of course, regardless of whether there is or isn't football in 2011, the owners will be collecting checks from TV networks.

 The new Indianapolis Colts jerseys have agreed to a four-year, $1.95 million contract with rookie fifth-round tight end Brody Eldridge, according to a league source.

Eldridge received a signing bonus of nearly $163,000 and the standard base salaries Dwight Freeney of $320,000, $405,000, $490,000 and $575,000 as well as a fourth-year escalator clause that can significantly boost the maximum value of the contract.

Eldridge is a classic blocking tight end at 6-foot-5, 261 pounds.

James was arguably the NFL's top running back during the 2000s. He teamed with Peyton Manning and Marvin Harrison to give the Indianapolis Colts one of the league's most potent offenses.

He rushed for 2,960 yards, the second-highest total in UM history.