Catch 22 for the Broncos. While agents/players will notice and remember this, the league office would also remember if the Broncos did not jump on this opportunity to reinforce the strength of 31 other teams to leverage players to come into offseason workouts. James was coming in to the facility to practice, and the union explicitly told him and DaeSean Hamilton to stop. Both players suffered season-ending injuries, and the Broncos were put into a situation where they have two choices:Quote:
Originally Posted by Jaded
1. Show the players that they are a first-class organization and they will "do right" by the players.
2. Carry out the league's bidding for them, and in the process get rid of a bad contract and clear some cap space.
For a team with an OWNER, number 1 might actually be the correct choice. For a team without an owner, number 2 was the only choice. There would have been consequences for the franchise in upcoming league meetings and no doubt increased pressure to sell. Who knows what the ownership situation will look like in 3 years, but if the Broncos did not take advantage of this opportunity to win some favor with the league, certainly the other 31 franchises may have taken notice and looked to change the status quo in an undesirable way for the people currently running the Broncos.
The good news is, when whoever takes over for Ellis, they will have a clean slate and be free to set their own precedents. There is no way that the league office did not have at least an indirect hand in outright releasing James vs. reaching a settlement though.
James seemed to blame the union and not the organization though, based on his statement after being released. So, that's a positive for the Broncos.
