I think Tony's financial best interest clearly is served by continuing to play under this contract. To give up this contract, he gives up nearly $20m total, minus whatever he can negotiate with a new team, which is a classic bird-in-the-hand vs. two-in-the-bush dilemma. You just can't do much better as an NFL QB than to be playing under the contract he has... then, when you add-in his age and injury history as factors... it's more like he already has two birds, so why go looking in the bush?
I think Jerry's content to accommodate that (ie, not release him) b/c Jerry's actually already making out better than he'd expected--there's a 2nd string salary between $2m and $5m that he now doesn't have to budget for, since the guy he'd anticipated being 3rd string did what he did.
I think Jerry and Tony end up making an agreement that he'll only be traded this off-season, not released, and to a team that meets the expectations of both sides--i.e., a place where Tony thinks he can be successful and a team from whom Jerry feels he's getting an adequate asset in return.
So, going back to where this thread started... I think DEN, especially with Linehan hired, satisfies Tony's expectation, but then they'll have to come up with some asset that gets Jerry's attention though at minimal sacrifice to their current roster or their 2017 draft.
I think they have one. Introducing your next #2 QB... Trevor Siemien. Signed for the next two seasons at the ridiculous price of ~$600K. Get Elway to add to that the best 2018 draft pick you can negotiate, and call it a day.
Next time Jerry or Stephen calls me, I'll give them that advice, and tell them Plan B is to just wait to see if you can pull off a Sam Bradford robbery right before the season starts with some team acceptable to Tony and also in desperate need as MIN proved to be.
