Manning Willing to Take Less Money?

Peyton Manning insists that he's not above his team.

Mike Chappell of the Indianapolis Star reports this evening that Peyton Manning has finally spoken out about his ongoing contract negotiations with the Colts.  Manning insists that he never intended to break the bank and that being the highest-paid NFL player is not his goal.   In fact, Manning relates that he’s willing to take less money than the Colts have already offered and said as much to Chris Polian and Jim Irsay in a meeting yesterday.   So why, then,  are these negotiations still dragging out.   A few possibilities:

• Irsay wants to keep his public promise of giving Manning the richest contract, and he has to convince Manning to take the money.  *cough*  yeahright *cough*
• Manning is dealing in semantics and will take less money only in terms of the cap hit, but he still wants to get paid.   In this case, it may be that some creative bookkeeping is being done behind the scenes.
• Manning’s sentiment is real, the Colts are taking him up on his offer and, consequently, some other big deal is in the works.