Broncos general manager John Elway was asked during a press conference Thursday whether the team will consider signing Colin Kaepernick as a veteran backup. Elway responded by saying Kaepernick “had his chance” to join the team in 2016 but turned down a contract offer from Denver. There have been mixed reactions on Twitter. Some feel that Kaepernick should have agreed to take a pay cut in order to join the Broncos: Kaepernick could have taken over the Super Bowl champs. Peyton Manning's seat was HIS TO TAKE. I still believe he would have excelled in Denver but he chose not to. Regardless of the cost financially for Kaepernick he should have taken Elway's deal for the situation. — Sayre Bedinger (@SayreBedinger) August 16, 2018 ^ This…he could have been in DEN in 2016 and he chose not to. I like Kaepernick, but this idea that he was blackballed by EVERY team for erroneous reasons doesn't hold water when he literally was offered a job and turned it down. — James Hicks (@Broncoclimber) August 16, 2018 Others feel that the QB was reasonable to want his full salary. "Colin Kaepernick should have been happy to have his salary reduced by half" is quite the take — Chris Spooner (@SpoonfulOfSport) August 16, 2018 And there are some that simply didn’t like (or, in some cases, believe) Elway’s comments. I don’t believe John Elway’s account of offering Colin Kaepernick a contract at all. — Exavier Pope (@exavierpope) August 16, 2018 If Kaep had been a free agent and turned down Denver's offer, that would be one thing, but the Broncos asked him to willingly give up more than $10 million that he already had coming too him. Why would he do that? — Ben Baldwin (@benbbaldwin) August 16, 2018 Those John Elway comments on Kaepernick need context. Chance to play for Broncos he’s referring to involved pay cut and was pre protest. Totally disingenuous to pass off as relevant to current situation. — Robin Lundberg (@robinlundberg) August 16, 2018 It's the full quote, but it's full of half truths. Kaepernick's guarantee was for $12 million. Elway offered him $7M. That's a pretty significant paycut (nearly 50% ?!) for someone of Kap's caliber at the time. That's what Elway is calling "a chance." https://t.co/S0Fore7VI1 — April (@ReignOfApril) August 16, 2018 And some felt that this really isn’t news. Funny the reaction to this Elway comment. We've already known of this info. This isn't new news regarding Kaepernick and the contract that was offered to him a while ago. #Broncos — Ronnie Kohrt (@RonnieKRadio) August 16, 2018 Good call, @Vonster58. Before the anthem controversy, the @Broncos and 49ers tried to work out a trade deal. Broncos tried to negotiate a new contract w/ Kaepernick. Kaepernick declined to take a pay cut. The trade opportunity disappeared. This is old news. — Matt Branaugh (@MattBranaugh) August 16, 2018 After Peyton Manning retired in 2016, Elway tried to trade for Kaepernick but the deal with the 49ers fell through after the quarterback declined to restructure his contract. Kaepernick’s protests during the national anthem started that fall. In May, Elway was deposed by lawyers in Kaepernick’s collusion lawsuit against the NFL. The GM indicated during his press conference Thursday that the said the same thing when he was deposed: “He had his chance to be here. He passed [on] it.” Kaepernick, 30, completed 59.2 percent of his passes for 2,241 yards with 16 touchdown passes and four interceptions in 12 games with the 49ers in 2016, the last season he played in the NFL.<doc-sep>So passing on one chance to sign a contract with the Broncos hasn’t always meant a point of no return for Elway, and there’s not reason to think it would. After all, that would hardly be an effective way to run an operation in the NFL, where there is annually plenty of roster turnover and the relative lack of guaranteed contracts means that players are always incentivized to take as much money as they can, as soon as they can.<doc-sep>Getty Images As the NFL tries to show that the collective shunning of Colin Kaepernick didn’t result from collusion, one of the teams at the heart of the before/after anthem protest attitude toward Kaepernick may have made things a bit more difficult. Broncos G.M. John Elway, who recently opened the door to bringing in a backup quarterback from outside the organization, attempted on Thursday to explain his lingering lack of interest in Kaepernick, a player for whom the Broncos tried to trade in 2016. Here’s Elway’s full quote, from Ian Rapoport of NFL Media: “Colin had his chance here. We offered him a contract. He didn’t take it. So, as I said it in my deposition, I don’t know if I’ll be legally able to say this, but he’s had his chance to be here. He passed it.” There are two potential problems with this response. One logical, one legal (as Elway seemed to realize while he was uttering the words). First, here’s what happened in March 2016. The Broncos needed a starting quarterback, after Peyton Manning retired and Brock Osweiler (more on him in a second) left via free agency. Kaepernick had a contract that paid him $12 million for the coming season, and it was due to become fully guaranteed on April 1 of that year. So if the Broncos traded for Kaepernick, they would have been saddled with his $12 million salary. Elway wanted to pay less. Kaepernick didn’t want to take less, and he had no reason to take less. He had undergone a trio of offseason surgical procedures, he wouldn’t have passed a physical before April 1, so he was getting $12 million for 2016, no matter what. Thus, while Elway clearly wanted to trade for Kaepernick, Elway didn’t want to pay Kaepernick as much as Kaepernick could have gotten from the 49ers. It’s no different than what Osweiler did that same month. Elway wanted to keep Osweiler, Elway offered Osweiler a contract, and Osweiler declined to accept the contract (signing instead with the Texans) because Osweiler wanted more. And what happened a year later, after Osweiler was unloaded by the Texans to the Browns and later cut by Cleveland? When Elway needed a backup quarterback, did he say, “Brock had his chance here. We offered him a contract. He didn’t take it. So . . . he’s had his chance to be here. He passed it”? Nope. Elway brought Osweiler back. Second, when Elway said that he doesn’t know “if I’ll be legally able to say this,” Elway wasn’t talking about any potential illegality arising from the substance of his comments but from the fact that he was commenting on what he said during his sworn deposition in Kaepernick’s collusion case. As lawyer Mark Geragos explained it last month, an order issued by arbitrator Stephen Burbank precludes any public discussion of the collusion case. And it’s clear that Geragos strongly disagrees with the gag order, which means that the NFL wanted the gag order. So, by making direct reference to his deposition testimony in the Kaepernick collusion case while commenting publicly about the lack of interest in Kaepernick, Elway arguably has violated the terms of the gag order that the NFL wanted to be imposed. It’s unclear what the consequences could be; it’s not as if Burbank will, or even could, throw Elway in jail for contempt of court or fine him for violating the gag order. As a practical matter, Burbank could take a dimmer view of the NFL’s current effort to knock out the Kaepernick case via the pending motion for summary judgment, and Burbank eventually could look more skeptically at the NFL’s overall defense if there’s a full-blown collusion hearing. Regardless, Elway’s remarks will do nothing to make the NFL’s case stronger. They easily could make the league’s position weaker.<doc-sep>
If anyone’s giving out an NFL award for Disingenuous General Manager of the Year, the early front-runner is the Denver Broncos’ John Elway. On Thursday, when asked if the Broncos would consider Colin Kaepernick if the team decides to sign a veteran backup quarterback, Elway said, “Colin had his chance to be here. We offered him a contract, he didn't take it.’’ That contract offer came in 2016, before Kaepernick famously began his protests during the national anthem. Kaepernick, who has not played since the end of the 2016 season, has filed a collusion claim against the NFL that alleges his unemployment is a result of his social justice activism and protests, not his on-field skills. Elway, it turns out, was among the league executives to give a deposition, for which Kaepernick was present, earlier this year. MORE:John Elway: Colin Kaepernick 'had his chance' with Broncos MORE:How Tony Dungy would address NFL players protesting during anthem MORE:NFL should ignore fascist frenzy over national anthem protocol “I don't know if I'm legally able to say this," Elway said, “but he's had his chance to be here. He passed it." Forget the legality. The real issue here is the stupidity — for Elway to think anyone should buy his explanation. As USA TODAY Sports’ Lindsay H. Jones reported, the Broncos tried to trade for Kaepernick in 2016, shortly after Peyton Manning announced his retirement. But the Broncos wanted Kaepernick to accept a pay cut as part of the deal. Kaepernick declined and decided to stay with San Francisco for another season. Somehow, Kaepernick’s very reasonable decision — to decline a pay cut — has disqualified him from getting a shot with the Broncos. It would be foolish not to mention that Elway is one of the greatest quarterbacks in NFL history, and he won Super Bowl rings in 1997 and 1998. He’s also proven to be an adept general manager and executive vice president of football operations. Without him the Broncos would not have won a third Super Bowl in 2015. But all of that and Elway’s bronze bust in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, was not enough to spare him embarrassment Thursday. Elway's disingenuous comments regarding Kaepernick were as easy to spot as a football player kneeling during the national anthem.