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Broncos cut three prominent players

Financial considerations force cut of Pryce, Anderson, Putzier

Lee Rasizer, Rocky Mountain News

Published March 1, 2006 at midnight

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The financial reality caused in large part by the NFL's failed labor talks has hit home: The Denver Broncos released three prominent players today to comply with the salary cap in time for the start of free agency.

Defensive end Trevor Pryce, running back Mike Anderson and tight end Jeb Putzier all will be looking for jobs when the NFL's new year begins later this week. Getting rid of the three players will result in a total salary-cap savings of $15 million for the team, including $8.53 million for Pryce, $3.9 million for Putzier and $2.57 million for Anderson.

Because of the impasse between the league and players union on an extension of the collective-bargaining agreement, teams will have less wiggle room to keep their own players, and widescale cuts are expected around the league. Denver isn't expected to release any other players this week.

The salary-cap is expected to be set between $92 million and $96 million instead of a figure that might have risen as high as $108 million had there been labor peace. Denver entered Wednesday with $114 million in salary-cap commitments but now should be in compliance, even while still negotiating behind the scenes on other deals.

Denver is continuing to work toward a revised contract for defensive end Courtney Brown that will reduce his cap outlay from a scheduled $3.75 million.

Talks also are ongoing with two critical pending free agents. Left tackle Matt Lepsis and defensive tackle Gerard Warren had deals that were set to void but, for accounting purposes, still were applied to the team's top 51 salaries used for salary-cap compliance. Those contracts will drop off the books Friday, and the team hopes to reduce their combined hit of more than $15 million to more palatable figures before free agency begins.

That could allow the team to keep other Broncos set to hit the open market. Running back Ron Dayne, whose importance rises now that Anderson has been released, long-snapper Mike Leach and linebacker Keith Burns all are expected to return. Those players can't re-sign with Denver until Friday at the earliest, per league rules, because of the cap-friendly, one-year deals each signed last spring