He also says there was some discord among owners during more than three hours of discussions about the proposed settlement at a hotel near Atlanta’s airport.

Irsay says, “The morning gets a little ruined by not getting all the things you hoped to get when you hear the whole thing.”

The league has said it hopes to have an agreement ready for ratification on Thursday. At least 24 of 32 owners would need to OK the deal.

Players had been expected to vote Wednesday on a full proposal to settle the dispute, but they didn’t.

INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning had neck surgery Monday in Chicago to repair a disk problem.

It was the second neck surgery since February 2010 for Manning, the league’s only four-time most valuable player. The previous surgery was to repair a pinched nerve and this operation was less invasive and less complicated, Colts owner Jim Irsay said Tuesday at the league meetings.

“He had a bulging disk,” Irsay said. “The doctors removed a part of it.

“It’s usually a six- to eight-week recovery period. I think this is one you can bounce back from quickly.”

Even though the NFL has locked out its players, communication between teams and players in these cases is allowed. Thus Manning was able to contact the team and its doctors before heading to Chicago for the operation.

“Now is the time to do it, the end of May,” Irsay said. “He’s had things tougher than this before.”

Illegal hits could

lead to team fines

League officials said they will begin fining teams whose players collect a significant number of disciplinary actions for illegal hits, a move designed to encourage franchises to emphasize tacklers must avoid hits to opponents’ heads.

The measure comes after last season’s crackdown on enforcement of illegal hits to the head. But last season’s efforts were aimed at players, not their teams.

“It is going to be implemented,” said Adolpho Birch, NFL senior vice president of law and labor policy. “Some of the details, we’re still working out.”

Those details include the number of disciplinary actions or the amount of fines against players that would yield a fine against a team, and the size of penalties against teams.

Furthermore, the owners expanded protections for “defenseless” receivers and banned players from launching themselves to hit defenseless opponents. Under the no-launching rule, an offender can be ejected.

Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay has been awfully patient in the team’s drawn-out negotiations with 11-time Pro Bowl quarterback Peyton Manning(notes) to make him the league’s highest-paid player. And that patience is now finally running out.

Irsay is saying that the Colts’ last offer to Manning should have been good enough to complete a deal, according to ComcastSportsNet New England.

“It should get done,” Irsay said, the site reports. “If you ask me, it should have gotten done. You’ll have to ask (Manning’s agent) Tom Condon why it’s not done.”

Manning will be the Colts’ franchise player this season and make $23 million unless the two sides can agree to a long-term deal.

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Source: ComcastSportsNet

Related: Peyton Manning, Indianapolis Colts

Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay is frustrated by the state of contract talks with Peyton Manning.

Irsay, who has said he intends to make Manning the NFL’s highest-paid player, believes the Colts’ last offer to their franchise quarterback before the lockout was good enough to complete a deal.

“It should get done,” Irsay said Monday at the NFL Annual Meeting in New Orleans, according to Comcast SportsNet New England. “If you ask me, it should have gotten done. You’ll have to ask (Manning’s agent) Tom Condon why it’s not done.”

Manning is scheduled to receive $23 million next season as the Colts’ franchise player, but the sides would rather agree on a long-term contract. While the Colts would like to reward Manning for his 11 Pro Bowl seasons, Irsay also indicated the quarterback is willing to take a deal that will allow the Colts to remain competitive.

“(Peyton had) always said ‘it’s not about money to me, it’s not about how much money I make. It’s about making sure we have a great team, making sure I’m surrounded by other players that can be resigned,’” Irsay said. “The Pierre Garcons, the Austin Collies. The young guys that make the difference.”

Added Irsay: “The money’s there. I’m already offering more than any player’s being played in the league. So why wouldn’t it get done?”

Irsay said he thought the sides would have been able to come to an agreement by this point in the offseason. The sides can’t have further discussions until the league and the players reach a new collective bargaining agreement.

“I would have thought it would have been done already,” Irsay said. “But these things get done when they do.”

 

Move the kickoff up five yards to the 35? Great. Bring a touchback out to the 25? Fantastic.

Kickoff man Pat McAfee could put a good share of kickoffs in the end zone, and the kick cover unit would happily take a 25-yard start for the opposition instead of risking a big play against it.

If the other kicker can get it to the goal line, the Colts can find guys to take knees and not get tackled inside the 20, providing better field position for Peyton Manning.

After a kickoff, the Colts starting field position of the 22.7-yard line was the NFL’s worst last season. Defending kickoffs they put the opposition at the 26.5, 15th in the league.

But we all remember how the Jets crushed them with a 47-yard kickoff return by Antonio Cromartie that helped set up a winning field goal at the end of a first-round playoff game in January. (A failed kick return play doomed them in the Super Bowl the season before, though these changes won’t help them do better recovering a surprise onsides kick.)

Philosophically, the Colts just don’t put a lot into special teams. They don’t carry a lot of veteran backups, the core of most franchise’s special teams, because their roster is constructed to be top-heavy with star salaries and kid-reliant at the bottom of the 53. Those kids play a lot of special teams, so there isn’t a lot of experience and there is a lot of turnover.

Last year, with a ton of injuries, the Colts’ special teams’ roster wound up filled by a lot of guys who won’t be in the league on opening day this fall, presuming we have one.

Anything that minimizes the influence on special teams will be good for Indianapolis. It will also help the Colts against Tennessee, which has a Pro Bowl return man in Marc Mariani, and Jacksonville, which has a Pro Bowl cover guy in Kassim Osgood and another top-flight one in Montell Owens.

The three teams in pursuit of the Colts could see an avenue where they saw advantages narrow to an alley.

The purpose of the alterations would be to minimize some of the most dangerous collisions in the sports. The side-effects are something Indianapolis has to welcome.

Former Indianapolis Colts safety Bob Sanders is in New York meeting with the Jets on Wednesday, according to a league source.

Sanders, the 2007 NFL Defensive Player of the Year, was released Feb. 18 by the Colts. He previously visited the Jacksonville Jaguars and Buffalo Bills.

A possibility remains that Sanders could re-sign with the Colts at a dollar figure lower than what he was previously scheduled to earn. Sanders signed a five-year, $37.5 million contract after the 2007 season but played in just nine regular-season games over the next three seasons.

When healthy, Sanders has been one of the league’s top defenders.

Sanders played in 14 games in 2005, earning the first of two Pro Bowl selections. A knee injury limited him to four regular-season games in 2006.

Sanders was healthy again in 2007, playing in 15 games, earning another Pro Bowl trip and becoming the first Colts player to win the league’s top defensive award, but injuries limited him to just six regular-season games in 2008. In 2009, he missed the first five games after knee surgery and, in his second game back, tore the biceps in his left arm and missed the rest of the season.

Sanders didn’t even make it through that many games last season. He tore his right biceps on the first defensive series of the season opener and didn’t play again.

Sanders has 290 tackles, 3.5 sacks, two forced fumbles, three recoveries and six interceptions in seven NFL seasons.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Former Indianapolis Colts safety Bob Sanders is visiting Wednesday with the New York Jets, a league source told ESPN NFL Insider Adam Schefter.

The free safety, who was recently released, also has made visits with the Jacksonville Jaguars and Buffalo Bills, according to sources.

Since signing a five-year deal worth $37.5 million after being named the defensive player of the year in 2007, the oft-injured Sanders has played in only nine regular-season games.

Sanders played in just one game last season, leaving the Colts’ opener on the team’s first defensive series with a torn left biceps.

With safety Antoine Bethea signing a four-year, $27 million contract last summer; Melvin Bullitt, Sanders’ backup, emerging as a competent starter; and the Colts still trying to sign four-time league MVP Peyton Manning to a new long-term deal, there wasn’t enough room to keep Sanders.

When Sanders was healthy, he was one of the league’s top defenders.

He played in 14 games in 2005, helping the Colts go 13-0 and earning the first of two Pro Bowl selections. A knee injury limited him to only four regular-season games in 2006, but when he returned for the playoffs, the Colts’ run defense improved dramatically and was a key reason they won the Super Bowl.

Sanders was healthy again in 2007, playing in 15 games, earning another Pro Bowl trip and becoming the first Colts player to win the league’s top defensive award.

Injuries limited Sanders to only six regular-season games in 2008. He missed the first five games in 2009 following knee surgery, then in his second game back, tore the biceps in his left arm and missed the rest of the season.

Sanders has 373 tackles, 3½ sacks, two forced fumbles, three recoveries and six interceptions in seven NFL seasons.

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

With less than a week to go before the league’s collective bargaining agreement expires, both sides say they have made progress on the quarterback’s deal, though neither appears to be rushing to finish the agreement.

“We’re having conversations so that’s a positive,” said Tom Condon, Manning’s agent. “But I would agree with [Colts vice chairman Bill Polian] that nothing’s imminent.”

SOCCER: Chelsea will take “appropriate action” after defender Ashley Cole reportedly shot an intern with an air gun by accident at the team’s training facility.

The News of the World reported Sunday that the English player was playing around with a .22-caliber air gun he had brought into the locker room seven days ago and hadn’t realized it was loaded.

The newspaper said sports sciences student Tom Cowan, who is on a one-year work placement at Chelsea, was hit in the side by a lead pellet.

Birmingham ended a 48-year wait for silverware by upsetting Arsenal, 2-1, with a last-minute winner in the League Cup final.

Nigeria striker Obafemi Martins took advantage of a defensive mix-up to stroke the ball into an empty net and earn Birmingham its second major trophy, after a League Cup triumph in 1963. Arsenal remains trophyless since 2005. It still has the Premier League, Champions League, and FA Cup to play for.

WINTER SPORTS: Maria Riesch of Germany beat Lindsey Vonn by one-hundredth of a second to win a World Cup super-G race in Are, Sweden, and extend her overall lead over her American rival. Vonn watched at the bottom of the Olympia course as Riesch flew over the final jump, then gave a wry smile as Riesch clinched victory. Riesch won in 1 minute, 13.24 seconds.

Manuel Machata added a world championship gold medal to his overall World Cup title by winning the four-man bobsled race in Koenigssee, Germany.

Machata’s Germany 1 team finished the four runs in a combined time of 3:16.58.

LACROSSE: The East outgunned the West, 30-26, in the National Lacrosse League All-Star Game in Verona, N.Y. Max Seibald of the Wings scored a goal for the winners.

- Staff and wire reports

WASHINGTON (AP)—NFL Players Association executive committee members Brian Dawkins(notes), Jeff Saturday(notes), Mike Vrabel(notes) and Brian Waters(notes) participated in labor negotiations Wednesday, the sixth consecutive day of federally mediated talks between the league and union.

Denver Broncos safety Dawkins, Indianapolis Colts center Saturday, and Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Vrabel and guard Waters, along with former player Sean Morey(notes), arrived in the morning at the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, a U.S. government agency.

They joined NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith and their respective negotiating teams for the talks that consumed 35 hours over the first five days. The mediation is scheduled to continue Thursday—making for a full week.

Also on Thursday, at the NFL’s annual scouting combine in Indianapolis, the league is holding a meeting with general managers, coaches and other officials from all 32 teams.

“It’s a normal part of the combine, which is always filled with meetings galore,” NFL spokesman Greg Aiello wrote in an e-mail to The Associated Press after ESPN.com first reported about the GMs-coaches session. “There was such a meeting last year. It’s not the first time.”

Still, with the current collective bargaining agreement set to expire next week, the NFL is expected to update attendees on the labor negotiations— although Goodell and general counsel Jeff Pash would be in Washington, not Indianapolis, on Thursday.

The union called off a meeting it was supposed to hold Thursday in Indianapolis with some player agents, citing the ongoing mediation. Instead, the NFLPA will host agents on Friday.

The four active players who showed up Wednesday in Washington, and Morey, are on the NFLPA’s executive committee; at least nine of that panel’s 11 members have been present at some point during the talks in the office of mediator George Cohen.

All participants have been abiding by Cohen’s request not to discuss the talks publicly, and no details about what’s been discussed have been revealed by either side.

After months of infrequent and sometimes contentious bargaining, the league and union have been communicating face-to-face since Friday.

They agreed to try mediation in a bid to find common ground before the current labor deal expires at the end of the day March 3. The union has said it believes team owners want to lock out the players as soon as the next day, which could threaten the 2011 season.

The league and union went more than two months without any formal bargaining until Feb. 5, the day before the Super Bowl. The sides met again once the next week, then called off a second meeting that had been scheduled for the following day.

The most recent CBA was signed in 2006, but owners exercised an opt-out clause in 2008.

The biggest issue separating the sides is how to divide about $9 billion in annual revenues. Among the other significant points in negotiations: a rookie wage scale; the owners’ push to expand the regular season from 16 games to 18 while reducing the preseason by two games; and benefits for retired players.

AP Sports Writer Joseph White contributed to this report.

Former Indianapolis Colts Pro Bowl safety Bob Sanders will visit the Jacksonville Jaguars on Monday, according to a league source.

Sanders is open to meet with teams as a free agent this week after Colts owner Jim Irsay released the 2007 NFL Defensive Player of the Year on Friday. Irsay announced the move less than 24 hours after he told reporters he would make a decision about Sanders’ future before March 3.

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When healthy, Sanders has been one of the league’s top defenders, and the Jaguars are looking for help on a defense that ranked 28th against the pass (250.2 yards allowed per game) and 28th overall (371.8 yards allowed per game) this season.

Sanders played in 14 games in 2005, earning the first of two Pro Bowl selections. A knee injury limited him to just four regular-season games in 2006.

Sanders was healthy again in 2007, playing in 15 games, earning another Pro Bowl trip and becoming the first Colts player to win the league’s top defensive award, but injuries limited him to just six regular-season games in 2008. In 2009, he missed the first five games following knee surgery and, in his second game back, tore the biceps in his left arm and missed the rest of the season.

Sanders didn’t even make it through that many games this season. He tore his right biceps on the first defensive series of the season opener and didn’t play again.

Sanders has 290 tackles, 3.5 sacks, two forced fumbles, three recoveries and six interceptions in seven NFL seasons.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Bob Sanders was worth every penny for the Indianapolis Colts.

That might seem like a ludicrous statement to some. Sanders sat out with injuries more often than he played. The last three seasons have been an absolute wash, with Sanders sidelined by too many ailments to describe without a medical dictionary nearby. We saw him fly into the action at safety only once last season, in the opener in Houston. He made about $700,000 per snap.

Sanders, who was released Friday by the Colts, was worth every penny because of the 2006 playoff run.

Ironically, 2006 was a year when he missed the bulk of the season, playing only four regular-season games, right up until the playoffs.

Then, in one magical four-game run, Sanders returned as Superman, turning the Colts’ pathetic defense into the NFL’s best. He transformed the unit overnight and the defense inexplicably took the lead in driving the Colts to their only Super Bowl title.

Everyone ran all over the Colts during the regular season that year. No one ran on them in the postseason, save for one breakaway run by the Bears’ Thomas Jones. The Colts were last against the run in the regular season; they were first in the postseason. The difference was Sanders. In four playoff games, he had 22 tackles, four passes defended, one forced fumble and two interceptions.

I don’t believe the Colts could have won the 2007 Super Bowl without Sanders.

So, yes, given the historical value of a Lombardi Trophy, I believe Sanders was worth every penny. I had no problems when the Colts signed him to a $37.5 million deal after his 2007 NFL Defensive Player of the Year season. That may be Monopoly money to the rest of us, but in NFL terms, he’d earned it.

When Sanders was on the field, he was an absolute terror on opposing running backs, receivers and coordinators. You couldn’t contain him. You couldn’t ignore him. He was a force of nature.

“He’s what you would look for if you were designing a safety for this system,” then-Colts coach Tony Dungy said. “I think it’s a mesh of a perfect guy playing in a system that’s designed for him. Every now and then you get that guy who really fits the job description. I think that’s what we have in Bob.”

Do I understand why the Colts cut Sanders loose Friday? Absolutely. They had paid him, handsomely, for delivering that Super Bowl title and following that with a monster year. But the pay didn’t stop when his health finally did. And 2010 was the point when all the Colts were paying for were memories.

Sanders was due to make a base salary of $5.5 million next season, assuming there is a next season. Considering he has played in only nine games in the last three seasons, there is no justification to continue to pay him as if he’s the league’s best safety. Over the course of his seven seasons with the Colts, he played in 48 games and missed 64. It’s not his fault; he can’t help it that his body couldn’t keep up with his reckless abandon. Neither could he change the way he played.

I’ll miss Sanders because he was thrilling to watch, captivating to listen to on occasions when he talked at length with the media and an inspiration to average-sized guys everywhere. (Note: His biceps were the average size of most men’s thighs.)

The Colts will miss the Sanders of 2005, playoffs 2006 and 2007. There was no more dominant defensive force in the league during that stretch.

Colts owner Jim Irsay thanked Sanders for his contributions as he announced his release via Twitter. (This is the world we live in.) Sanders, in a statement released by the team, thanked Irsay and said he would always consider himself a Colt.

I’m guessing the Colts made an offer to Sanders that would have allowed him to return at a substantially reduced salary. Rare is the great player whose pride will let him accept such a deal without trying for more elsewhere.

I have no doubt that some team, probably the Tennessee Titans – who constantly collect cut Colts – will give him a chance to prove that he has some games left in him.

The Colts have a number of players up for free agency and they can’t afford to pay Sanders millions on hopes and dreams any longer.

In retrospect, however, Sanders was worth every penny while he lasted. If you need proof, stop by the Colts complex sometime and ask to see the Lombardi Trophy.

INDIANAPOLIS — The Indianapolis Colts have fired longtime running backs coach Gene Huey.

His star pupils included Marshall Faulk and Edgerrin James. Huey had five different 1,000-yard runners in Indy, but the Colts ranked near the bottom of the league in rushing in each of the last three seasons.

Huey has coached in 304 games since 1992.

The firing first was reported by WTHR-TV in Indianapolis.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

INDIANAPOLIS (AP)—The Indianapolis Colts have fired longtime running backs coach Gene Huey.

His star pupils included Marshall Faulk and Edgerrin James(notes). Huey had five different 1,000-yard runners in Indy, but the Colts ranked near the bottom of the league in rushing in each of the last three seasons.

Huey has coached in 304 games since 1992.

The firing first was reported by WTHR-TV in Indianapolis.