Seventeen days before free agency formally arrives, the negotiating table between Ray Lewis and the Ravens is littered with propositions, mixed signals and perhaps even some wishful thinking.
Ravens coach John Harbaugh is the latest to enter the dialogue. While in Honolulu for the Pro Bowl last week, Harbaugh sounded cautiously optimistic that the team will keep its All-Pro middle linebacker.
"Ray Lewis is going to be a guy we're going to pay a lot of money to in order to keep," Harbaugh told USA Today. "Steve [Bisciotti, team owner] said he thinks we'll be willing to pay more than anybody else.
"I know Ray has to take a look around. But I'm definitely convinced that Ray wants to finish his career a Baltimore Raven. And there's no question the Baltimore Ravens definitely want Ray."
Harbaugh was unavailable to clarify his comments yesterday because it is believed he was traveling back from Hawaii, where the Ravens staff coached the AFC team in Sunday's Pro Bowl.
But he seemed to intimate the Ravens will not use the franchise tag on Lewis, as Bisciotti said at a news conference Jan. 21.
Unless the Ravens use their franchise tag on Lewis, he will become an unrestricted free agent for the first time in his 13-year NFL career Feb. 27. If he plays under the tag, Lewis would receive a one-year contract at a salary based on the average of the NFL's five highest-paid linebackers.
According to a National Football Post article and Scout.com, which first published the franchise numbers, that contract would call for Lewis to receive $8.3 million in 2009.
Lewis, who participated in his 10th Pro Bowl on Sunday, completed a seven-year, $50 million contract he signed before the 2002 season. He received a then-NFL record signing bonus of $19 million in that deal.
It is not known whether negotiations between the Ravens and Lewis have begun. General manager Ozzie Newsome will be in draft meetings all week and was unavailable to comment. Joby Branion, who is listed as Lewis' agent with the NFL Players Association, did not return a phone call to his office yesterday.
But a lot of rhetoric has already been passed around.
Bisciotti opened the discussion in March when he suggested the Ravens "would probably outbid other teams" if Lewis became a free agent. In January, at his season-ending news conference, the owner said he was hoping for a "hometown discount."
