From a nationwide panel of 50 members, 31 voted to give Indianapolis Colts safety Bob Sanders the AP Defensive Player of the Year in 2007. Several weeks before that, the Colts signed Sanders to a five-year contract worth $37.5 million with $20 million guaranteed -- the highest salary for a defensive player at the time. Along with being an All-Pro in 2005 and 2007, Sanders was a key player in Super Bowl XLI, forcing a fumble from Bears running back Cedric Benson (where have we heard that before) and intercepting a fourth quarter Rex Grossman pass.
That being said, Sanders has played in only nine of the Colts' 39 games in the past three seasons. With $5.5 million in base salary (and a $500,000 offseason workout bonus), Colts owner Jim Irsay tweets that the Colts have released Sanders on Friday.
We have released Bob Sanders today. We thank Bob 4 all his incredible contributions from his Sup Bowl pic 2 def player of year honors.
Jim Irsay
JimIrsay
So the obvious conjecture among Bengals fans is this. As of this posting, the Bengals have two safeties signed for 2011 (Chris Crocker and Reggie Nelson) and only one safety signed through 2012 (Crocker). Do the Bengals run the risk on signing another injury-prone safety? Or has the whole Roy Williams experience soured them on taking such risks?
Your turn Cincy Jungle. Bob Sanders. Yay or nay.