Peyton Manning Sweepstakes

[Cujo]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

[WSU151]

I wonder what # he will wear, since 18 is retired. 16 maybe? He wore it with the Vols.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/redskins/former-broncos-qb-frank-tripucka-wouldnt-mind-seeing-no-18-reissued-if-it-helps-land-manning/2012/03/14/gIQAuZ0qCS_story.html

Frank Tripucka wore that number for three seasons in the early 1960s, when he was the first quarterback in club history.

After his tenure, the number was ceremonially retired.

But Tripucka is just fine with breaking it out of storage. The 84-year-old Tripucka said in a phone interview from his home in Woodland Park, N.J., that if Manning wants the number, ?He should have it. Let?s give it to him.?

Despite Tripucka's approval, it would be spitting in the history of the franchise. There's a lot of history behind that number

Not really, to both assumptions.

[Cujo]

There's no need to wear someone'e retired number, even if he offers. Manning should just break out the orange #16 like he did in Tennessee. Everyone would be fine with it.

i.e. Joe Montana didn't wear Len Dawson's number when he was traded to the Chiefs. I thought that was a classy move by Joe, and who really complained?

[WSU151]

There's no need to wear someone'e retired number, even if he offers. Manning should just break out the orange #16 like he did in Tennessee. Everyone would be fine with it.

i.e. Joe Montana didn't wear Len Dawson's number when he was traded to the Chiefs. I thought that was a classy move by Joe, and who really complained?

Len Dawson was a far better QB and a bigger part of the Chiefs's history and successes than Frank Tripucka was to the Broncos. Context matters.

Peyton should wear something other than 16 or 18. 16 is just going to remind everyone of Jake Plummer.

[FiddySicks]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

If Alex Smith bails (which I still cannot believe could happen after all the slack SF cut him), they'll be THAT desperate. The Niners are so royally screwed in all of this it's not even funny.

And actually, I hope Tebow does go to the Niners because it'll expose him for the fraud he is when he takes that much talent around him and pulls out five wins.

[Cujo]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

If Alex Smith bails (which I still cannot believe could happen after all the slack SF cut him), they'll be THAT desperate. The Niners are so royally screwed in all of this it's not even funny.

And actually, I hope Tebow does go to the Niners because it'll expose him for the fraud he is when he takes that much talent around him and pulls out five wins.

The Niners will go after a veteran free agent like Vince Young before they give up draft picks and wreck their team with Tebow.

[FiddySicks]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

If Alex Smith bails (which I still cannot believe could happen after all the slack SF cut him), they'll be THAT desperate. The Niners are so royally screwed in all of this it's not even funny.

And actually, I hope Tebow does go to the Niners because it'll expose him for the fraud he is when he takes that much talent around him and pulls out five wins.

The Niners will go after a veteran free agent like Vince Young before they give up draft picks and wreck their team with Tebow.

Honestly, they'd be best off just giving the reigns early to Colin Kaepernick. That's why I think they're hesitant to offer Alex Smith a big deal in the first place. It's not an ideal situation as Kaepernick could use a year or two more to develop, but doing it on the fly will work way better than signing a scrub like Vince Young or trading for Tebow.

But this is the York family were talking about, so welcome to the Niners Vince Young/Tim Tebow!

[BBTV]

There's no need to wear someone'e retired number, even if he offers. Manning should just break out the orange #16 like he did in Tennessee. Everyone would be fine with it.

i.e. Joe Montana didn't wear Len Dawson's number when he was traded to the Chiefs. I thought that was a classy move by Joe, and who really complained?

Len Dawson was a far better QB and a bigger part of the Chiefs's history and successes than Frank Tripucka was to the Broncos. Context matters.

Peyton should wear something other than 16 or 18. 16 is just going to remind everyone of Jake Plummer.

No, IMO it doesn't. It's retired. You don't take the drastic step of retiring a number for someone unless you mean it, and the retiree shouldn't be put in the awkward position of having to allow someone else to wear his number and therefore giving back the highest honor that a team can give. Of course he's going to say that Peyton can wear it - really, who would say "no - it's MINE!!!!"? Peyton shouldn't even ask, and even with permission, shouldn't wear it. He seems to be professional enough and understand things well enough to know that it would be wrong.

[Cujo]

Peyton should wear something other than 16 or 18. 16 is just going to remind everyone of Jake Plummer.

Not sure if I'm buying that. Plummer was several quarterbacks ago. I'm pretty sure Denver fans were over Plummer about the same time Cutler whined his way out of Denver -- and the Cutler hatred has since been replaced by all the Tebowdrama.

[dfwabel]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

That is not a talented as a four as you think it is. Moss/Manningham= 1 WR.

[Audiodrama]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

That is not a talented as a four as you think it is. Moss/Manningham= 1 WR.

I wouldn't be shocked to see them go after Chad Henne. Kid would be decent in a talented offense.

[WSU151]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

That is not a talented as a four as you think it is. Moss/Manningham= 1 WR.

I wouldn't be shocked to see them go after Chad Henne. Kid would be decent in a talented offense.

Henne is off the market. He signed with Jacksonville.

No, IMO it doesn't. It's retired. You don't take the drastic step of retiring a number for someone unless you mean it

Yeah, I see your point, but then again, I think it's stupid to retire a number for a guy that played 3+ seasons on your team, none of which were overly successful (13-25-1 record, 51 TDs, 85 INTs). Tripucka's number retirement was more of a "Thanks for being on the original team...look, we have to remember someone and you were a good player on that team." If you look at the Broncos' Ring of Fame, like 20 guys should have retired numbers before Frank Tripucka. Retired numbers should be for legends and guys who spend at least a decade (or the vast majority of the career if less than 10 years) with the team.

I doubt anyone would care if the Miami Heat unretired 23. LeBron should not have been restricted by a guy who didn't even play for them.

[Jigga]

Alex Smith was offered a three year deal at least a week before it was reported that the 49ers had worked out Peyton Manning. I've seen that it was worth $24 million with $10M guaranteed.

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What's the point of retiring a number if you're just gonna unretire it when some high-profile dude who has a legacy with the number comes to your squad? (LeBron announced before he even became a free agent that he was going to switch his number to 6 and would have worn it even had he returned to Cleveland)

[WSU151]

What's the point of retiring a number if you're just gonna unretire it when some high-profile dude who has a legacy with the number comes to your squad?

Ask the Seahawks.

The Broncos retired Tripucka's number a couple weeks after Tripucka retired in 1963. It was a great gesture based on keeping the Denver team afloat, but the consideration was not on the same level as retiring a number today. Retiring a number three years into the life of the franchise screams knee-jerk and short-sightedness.

[Audiodrama]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

That is not a talented as a four as you think it is. Moss/Manningham= 1 WR.

I wouldn't be shocked to see them go after Chad Henne. Kid would be decent in a talented offense.

Henne is off the market. He signed with Jacksonville.

Ah, missed that. I stand corrected.

[NEW.ERA]

With Alex Smith. I can understand if he feels hurt by the Niners talking to Peyton, but he's got a understand. The Niners, mainly Jim Harbaugh believed in you, when everyone else had written you off as a complete bust.

He got them within a few minutes of a Super Bowl, and reignited a fan base that has been hurt for quite sometime. Granted the defense was their, and they had a solid running, it wasn't all Alex, but still he saved his career and helped make the Niners contenders again. He's just kicking tires in South Beach and I think he'll eventually end up back in San Francisco, he owes to himself and Jim Harbaugh.

[BBTV]

I can absolutely see Alex Smith signing in Miami and the Niners being completely stupid and trading for Tebow. Gahh, this sucks.

No chance San Fran wastes the talents of Davis, Moss, Manningham, and Crabtree by signing a guy who can't throw a strike beyond 5 yards. The 49ers cannot be THAT stupid.

That is not a talented as a four as you think it is. Moss/Manningham= 1 WR.

I wouldn't be shocked to see them go after Chad Henne. Kid would be decent in a talented offense.

Henne is off the market. He signed with Jacksonville.

No, IMO it doesn't. It's retired. You don't take the drastic step of retiring a number for someone unless you mean it

Yeah, I see your point, but then again, I think it's stupid to retire a number for a guy that played 3+ seasons on your team, none of which were overly successful (13-25-1 record, 51 TDs, 85 INTs). Tripucka's number retirement was more of a "Thanks for being on the original team...look, we have to remember someone and you were a good player on that team." If you look at the Broncos' Ring of Fame, like 20 guys should have retired numbers before Frank Tripucka. Retired numbers should be for legends and guys who spend at least a decade (or the vast majority of the career if less than 10 years) with the team.

I doubt anyone would care if the Miami Heat unretired 23. LeBron should not have been restricted by a guy who didn't even play for them.

The Broncos and Heat things are a little different, since Jordan never played for them and the whole thing was just PR, though I'd have no problem with the heat enforcing the number even if Lebron didn't want to switch.

You could argue that the Tripucla thing was PR too, but it doesn't matter - the dude was given an honor and you shouldn't take it away due to no fault of his own. It's humiliating in a way. It's easy to say after the fact that a jersey shouldn't have been retired, but it was, so it is. The real lesson here is that teams (like the Heat and Seahawks especially) should think twice before retiring numbers on a whim. Even newer teams that retire them for marginal players just because they want to have an event should hold off for a minimum of several years after a guy is done playing, partially for this very reason.

[OnWis97]

What's the point of retiring a number if you're just gonna unretire it when some high-profile dude who has a legacy with the number comes to your squad?

Ask the Seahawks.

The Broncos retired Tripucka's number a couple weeks after Tripucka retired in 1963. It was a great gesture based on keeping the Denver team afloat, but the consideration was not on the same level as retiring a number today. Retiring a number three years into the life of the franchise screams knee-jerk and short-sightedness.

This seems like more of a lesson of "teams should really vet whether the retiring of a number is warranted." Should they have retired this guy's number? Probably not. But given that they did, I agree with the others that it's in poor taste for the team to say "sorry chump. We honored you and now we are going to take that away." I'd rather not see Manning ask for it and just take 16 (or whatever he wants).

You mention the Seahawks. I don't recall...did Rice wear Largent's number? If so, that's lame. Rice should have not even tried to wear that number in Seattle. And yeah, what's Largent supposed to do? Say "no". It's lose lose for him.

[sc49erfan15]

You mention the Seahawks. I don't recall...did Rice wear Largent's number? If so, that's lame. Rice should have not even tried to wear that number in Seattle. And yeah, what's Largent supposed to do? Say "no". It's lose lose for him.

Agreed - retired is retired. If you're not going to formally retire a number, do like the Cowboys (I think it's the Cowboys?) do and put it in the "ring of honor" but still issue it if need be.

One of the only exceptions (and even this is pushing it) is when the 49ers signed Trent Dilfer, he wore John Brodie's #12 because he was a close friend.

[Cujo]

Already reading reports that Jeff Saturday, Dallas Clark, and Brandon Stokley have lined up to visit with the Broncos this week. "Indy West" is coming.