“This is going to be a rough year,” Clark said. “There’s always guys, but this year there are guys, they make this locker room. When you hear, Reggie, you think Colt. Robert, he’s a Colt.”

Clark let out an exasperated sigh.

“It’s not going to be good,” he said.

But the perfect choice would be Jeff Saturday. He won a Super Bowl with the Colts, and he was an instrumental guy as a member of the NFLPA’s executive committee who was a giant influence on getting the CBA in place and saving the season. 

Without him, maybe there wouldn't even be a presentation.

Considering TE Dallas Clark’s injury history — he missed five games this season and was sidelined for the last 10 games of the 2010 season — Tamme makes a lot of sense. Tamme’s base salary was about $600,000 this season. It won’t take much more than that per year in a standard three-year offer to keep him. The vet minimum this year was $810,000 per year.

Imagine how history would have been changed if the Packers just did what they should have done that day in Tempe and lost. Aikman a Packer. Barry Sanders, most likely, a Cowboy. And who knows what happens with the rest of the draft. But think further. With Aikman, the Packers likely wouldn't have been the pathetic team that hired Ron Wolf late in 1991 to be the GM. And Mike Holmgren likely wouldn't have been hired. And surely Brett Favre wouldn't have arrived in trade early in 1992.

If Manning is healthy, do the Colts keep their core and shoot for another Super Bowl, or two, over the next four years?

"That's the million dollar question," seven-time Pro Bowl defensive end Dwight Freeney said. "Will they keep guys around or will they say it's time to rebuild? Yeah, blow it up.

"I don't know if the bomb's going to go off. It might."

"Man, I can't see myself anywhere else," he said. "I felt like this was the place for me. Still feel like that. I understand the business. I understand things happen and that's cool. I understand if I'm not here, I'm not here.

"Like they say: The ball's brown everywhere."

Wayne is wistful now, awash in the memories. Every player has his journey. Every player has his home.

I could see a proven and solid commodity like Mike Sherman making a lot of sense in Indy. Maybe a Jay Gruden, a Mike Mularkey, or even a Brian Schottenheimer. But whoever it is, he'll have a passing game pedigree and hopefully be able to pick up the pieces of a disastrous 2011 in Colts-dom.