The Broncos have made contract offers to star wide receiver Demaryius Thomas and tight end Julius Thomas but Broncos General Manager John Elway says that we shouldn’t expect a deal to be struck in the next week.
“Nothing is going to get done before camp, but we’ll keep talking to them in camp,” Elway told Lindsay H. Jones of USA Today Sports. “I’m never going to go into the season, but the first couple of weeks, we can continue to talk about it. After the second week of the preseason, we’ll want to have had something done, one way or another.”
The two men, who combined for 157 catches, 2,218 receiving yards, and 26 touchdowns in Denver’s record-setting offense last year, are entering the final years of their rookie contracts. Meanwhile, Elway indicated that the Broncos have not received a response from Julius Thomas’ camp after making the offer, believing that his reps wanted to see how Jimmy Graham‘s grievance against the NFL and subsequent contract negotiations played out. Graham wound up getting a hefty four-year, $40MM deal, but Elway has no intentions of going near that range for Thomas.
“Even though Julius had a tremendous year for us, he’s only (played) 23 games. We want Julius to be a Bronco for a long time and we think he has tremendous upside, but he’s not at that level,” Elway said.
Earlier this month, our own Luke Adams predicted that the Broncos’ standout tight end could land a five-year deal in the range of $35-40MM with a $10-13MM guarantee. That’s not Graham money, but that would be a solid payday for the 26-year-old.