NFL Rumors: Preseason, Bears, Broncos, & Buccaneers

Preseason

Packers president Mark Murphy confirmed that the NFL competition committee has had lengthy discussions about reducing the preseason to three games, via Rob Demovsky of ESPN.

“I think there would be support for three,” Murphy said. “I think Mike’s [idea], that’s what we’ve talked about. Rather than playing that fourth game on a Thursday … don’t play a fourth game and then you’d have an extra week. We’ve looked at different models, but I think that’s the one that makes the most sense.

“You’re giving up some revenue, but it’s one of the worst things we do. The move we made on variable [ticket] pricing helps a little bit in how preseason is viewed, but especially that fourth game is kind of a throwaway.”

Bears 

Bears GM Ryan Pace said there are a “handful” of quarterbacks they feel good about in the middle part of the draft.

“It’s a good [quarterback] class,” Pace said, via Jeff Dickerson of ESPN. “I don’t want to get into the specifics, but there are a handful of guys [who] are up near the top. There are also a handful of quarterbacks in the middle part of the draft that I feel good about and that we’ve got to make sure we’ve accurately graded and that’s where our scouts really earn their money.”

Broncos

Broncos president/GM John Elway confirmed that the deadline for Peyton Manning to decide whether or not to return for the 2016 season is March 9.

“I met Peyton two evenings ago and we sat and chatted for a couple of hours and I think that the thing that’s amazing is we’re only two-and-a-half weeks out from the Super Bowl,” Elway said, via Pro Football Talk. “Obviously everyone wants to know what Peyton is going to do and after 18 years in this league he deserves some time to think about and enjoy the game but also get away for a little and kind of figure out exactly what he wants to do. We’re going to afford him that, I told him we’ll get back together again in another week or 10 days and kind of see where he is and go from there. But he deserves some time to think about what he wants to do.”

Mike Florio then asked Elways if he expected to know what Manning plans to do before March 9, which is the start of free agency.

“Yeah and we will, and that’s hopefully what we’re going to do,” Elway said. “Until we get there and until we absolutely need that we’re going to give him that time to continue to, obviously when he gets farther away from the game and clears his head a bit, he could kind of see where he wants to go.”

Buccaneers

• Adam Caplan mentions that while the Buccaneers and RB Doug Martin are not close to an agreement on a new contract, he still wouldn’t rule out Martin re-signing with Tampa Bay.