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Peyton Manning reportedly close to pay cut to return to Broncos

Peyton Manning reportedly close to pay cut to return to Broncos

Since last season ended and Peyton Manning couldn't say if he'd retire, we've heard that Manning felt good and wanted to come back, and the Denver Broncos have repeatedly said they wanted him back. Yet, weeks have passed with no official "He's back!" word from Manning or the Broncos.

Like most situations such as this, the final holdup appears to be money, but that's almost cleared too.

Manning is close to taking a fairly significant pay cut, according to an ESPN report. ESPN said Manning is close to reducing his 2015 salary from $19 million to $15 million.

There will be two thoughts on this news. Those who love Manning will laud him for helping the team by taking $4 million less this season. Those who hate Manning will call him greedy for taking $15 million when he has already made so much. He's a divisive guy that way, for some reason.

[Check out Shutdown Corner's full 2015 free agent rankings – click here for offensive players, and click here for defensive players and specialists]

Manning's 2015 salary was scheduled to become guaranteed on March 9, so the Broncos were working on a deadline. It will be interesting to see if this will be just a straight pay cut and that's it, or if the entire final two years will be restructured, maybe giving clues on if he plans to play in 2016 as well.

For all the talk about how Manning started to decline late last season at age 38, he's still by far the Broncos' best option at quarterback. He had a QB rating of 101.5 last season. This is a league in which teams just acquired Matt Cassel and Josh McCown to presumably start for them this season. There's a quarterback shortage in the NFL and the Broncos could do much, much worse than Manning, who had maybe the greatest season for a quarterback in NFL history in 2013.

It appears the final hurdle is almost crossed for Manning's return to the Broncos, and then we'll have almost a full year before we start asking again if he's going to retire.

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Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdowncorner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!