Some big name players, considered past their prime, have moved to new teams. There has also been considerably more trading in this uncapped year due to the lack of unrestricted free agents. Continue on for a look at the players in their new uniforms along details of the transactions and if you missed them check out the first set and second set of screens.

Thomas Jones
Signs with Kansas City Chiefs
2 Years $5 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 89

Jamal Williams
Signs with Denver Broncos
3 Years $16 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 90

Brady Quinn
Traded to Denver Broncos
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 72

Will Witherspoon
Signs with Tennessee Titans
3 Years $11 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 86

Antonio Bryant
Signs with Cincinnati Bengals
4 Years $28 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 84

Marlin Jackson
Signs with Philadelphia Eagles
2Years $6 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 82

Maake Kemoeatu
Signs with Washington Redskins
2 Years $7 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 76

Larry Johnson
Signs with Washington Redskins
3 Years (up to) $12 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 82

LaDainian Tomlinson
Signs with New York Jets
2 Years $5 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 86

Ben Watson
Signs with Cleveland Browns
3 Years $12 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 80

Jake Delhomme
Signs with Cleveland Browns
2 Years (First Year) $7 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 72

Brodney Pool
Signs with New York Jets
1 Year $1 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 73

Chris Baker
Signs with Seattle Seahawks
2 Years $5 million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 79

Kamerion Wimbley
Traded to Oakland Raiders
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 78

Coming out of a media event held yesterday are some hints towards the focus for Madden 11. While we now know that NCAA Football 11 is centered on “core experience, authenticity, and innovation” Madden is being described as “simpler, quicker, and deeper”.

Citing different statistics collected through Madden 10, including one that put the average game length at 63 minutes, EA Sports is hoping to compact that or provide options to ease the strain on gamers. An hour long is understandably just too great of a commitment for many to take on. According to EA, of those 63 minutes, only 17 were spent during on-field action. The rest was in navigating plays and menus or through presentational elements.

Hopefully EA doesn’t take this to mean that quarter length needs to be shortened. All that does is pressure people to pass more, which results in more incompletions and clock stoppages. The limited number of possessions puts more pressure on the user to conserve time therefore defeating the whole purpose of shortening quarters. The accelerated clock with longer quarters seemed to provide a really nice balance in Madden 10.

What will hopefully be done is to provide different options such as in-game saves which has been on the to-do list but missed the cut for the past few years. A quick-play option to skip through the presentation that slows the pace down would also be beneficial, we’ve seen the baseball games go this route.

There is also discussion about the streamlining of playbooks, as the average gamer only used 13 plays out of the hundreds available. Ultimately people are going to get comfortable with a handful of plays especially when the playbooks are all relatively similar. I think a great addition, one that has been discussed before, would be custom playbooks. If people could construct their own playbooks from the wide array of plays included in the game (not necessarily create new plays) then it would be much more likely that person would mix up their play selection as well as know where to find each play when they are looking for it.

What do you think about EA laying out the plan for Madden 11 to be “simpler, quicker, and deeper”? What would you like to see done to accomplish that? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

With many of the big names coming off the market on the opening day of free agency, and a few significant trades having been made, the movement the last few days hasn’t been as drastic. Still a couple impact players have moved and more role players have signed on. If you missed it click here for the first set and continue on for a look at the latest screenshots with the players in their new uniforms.

Kerry Rhodes
Traded to Arizona Cardinals
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 88

Aaron Kampman
Signs with Jacksonville Jaguars
4 Years $26 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 89 (99 at DE)

Seneca Wallace
Traded to Cleveland Browns
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 72

Tony Pashos
Signs with Cleveland Browns
3 Years $10 million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 72

Scott Fujita
Signs with Cleveland Browns
3 Years $14 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 75

Fred Robbins
Signs with St. Louis Rams
3 Years $12 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 83

David Carr
Signs with San Francisco 49ers
2 Years $6 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 65

Chris Houston
Traded to Detroit Lions
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 67

Antwaan Randle El
Signs with Pittsburgh Steelers
3 Years XX Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 73

Arnaz Battle
Signs with Pittsburgh Steelers
3 years $4 million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 72

Will Allen
Signs with Pittsburgh Steelers
3 years $4 million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 70

Reggie Brown
Traded to Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 70

As I did last year I will be tracking the movement in NFL free agency and any trades that are made and posting screenshots of the players in their new uniforms using Madden 10. The first complete day of free agency saw a handful of big names sign and a few trades completed. The Bears and Lions have been the two most active teams but the Dolphins, Ravens, Falcons, Giants and Jets have acquired new players as well. The Cardinals take the biggest hit having lost four of the best players since the end of the season.

Karlos Dansby
Signs With Miami Dolphins
5 Years $43 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 87

Anquan Boldin
Traded To Baltimore Ravens
New Extension Makes Deal 4 Years $28 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 93

Dunta Robinson
Signs With Atlanta Falcons
6 Years $57 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 83

Julius Peppers
Signs With Chicago Bears
6 Years $92.5 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 95

Chester Taylor
Signs With Chicago Bears
4 Years $12.5 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 79

Nate Burleson
Signs With Detroit Lions
5 Years $25 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 79

Kyle Vanden Bosch
Signs With Detroit Lions
4 Years $26 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 80

Corey Williams
Traded to Detroit Lions
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 81

Antonio Cromartie
Traded To New York Jets
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 83

Antrel Rolle
Signs With New York Giants
5 Years $37 Million
Final Madden 10 Overall Rating: 83

Kurt Warner, Bertrand Berry, and Junior Seau have been returned to Madden 10 as the last roster update that will be provided for Madden 10 has arrived. Originally meant to be the final update in early February, the removal of players who had retired following the ending of their season but before the completion of the NFL season created a strong reaction in the community.

The comments left in multiple articles and poll results were largely credited with prompting a response. It was the first time off-season transactions had ever made their way into the Madden meant to represent a particular season, and EA Sports responded to the feedback by providing this latest update to bring them back.

In addition to the standard roster update one has finally been provided for Online Franchise as well. This is the first time the rosters have been refreshed for the start of the mode since October. Hopefully next year whatever caused difficulty with providing roster updates for Online Franchise will be alleviated and they will be provided on a more consistent basis.

Late last week I posted a poll regarding the removal of a few players in the final Madden 10 roster update who had retired following the end of their season but before the NFL season was officially over. Kurt Warner, Bertrand Berry, and Junior Seau were completely taken out of the game in the update. The poll and accompanying comments were heavily in favor of keeping players on the rosters given that they finished off the seasons with their respective teams. Lead producer from the Madden series Phil Frazier has sent over the following statement:

Over the last few days we’ve kept an eye on the poll in your story about our final roster update. Due to the overwhelming response, we are going to release another update that adds the retired players previously removed back into the game. Our fans have spoken and we’ll do our best to have this update done before the weekend. We also plan to push this update to Online Franchise shortly after it’s ready.

This is a good move by EA Sports not just in how they are responding directly to community feedback and taking action on it but also just in terms of consistency. There have been more transactions that have taken place and the final update even missed some players such as 49ers LB Jeff Ulbrich who had retired and accepted a position on the Seahawks coaching staff. Then there are players such as Brett Favre who may retire, but because of the timing Vikings fans would have had him in the game for the next six months regardless while Cardinals fans wouldn’t have had their starting QB. Madden 10 was meant to represent the 09-10 season and off-season transactions are meant to be held for the upcoming year.

Online Franchise will finally be receiving a roster update in Madden 10 next week. This has been confirmed and will be the first update for the mode since way back in October. The updated roster will be utilized when any new online franchise is created.

It will be interesting to see if this update will be identical to the final Madden 10 roster update that was released last weekend. That one of course sparked some controversy when a few players that had announced their retirement, most notably Kurt Warner, were completely removed. In the poll I posted yesterday it has been a consistent 80/20 return with most favoring the idea that players who retire following the completion of their season but before the end of the NFL season should remain on their respective teams.

If the same roster update is used that would mean any new online franchise would be started up without Kurt Warner on the Cardinals or available to choose from in a fantasy draft.

When the final roster update for Madden 10 was released one change caught everyone by surprise. Players who had retired in the time between the end of their season and when the update arrived were removed, most notable of them being Kurt Warner. Upon discovering this I posted the article on the subject and hoped to get a comment on why the action was taken. As far as I know their removal represented the only time that off-season transactions were made in the game for a season that had just completed.

The response I got back was that the decision to remove the players in question was made because they retired before the end of the season. This being the first time it was ever done it feels like an opportunity to get feedback on the subject. Whether it could ultimately result in those players being brought back or if it would be used just for consideration in the future appears up in the air right now.

Do you feel that transactions that take place after the season is over for a player/team but before the final Super Bowl update arrives should be included? Or should players that spent the season with a team stay on that particular roster regardless of what happens in that time period? Leave your thoughts in the comments and vote in the poll below.

While the Super Bowl halftime video blog for Madden 11 focused on the vision going forward rather than any specific details about the game there may have been more to it than first realized. Users in various forums have attempted to dig through the video and pull out game related info from the whiteboards in the background.

Over at ncaaStrategies one post summarizes everything that has been found so far. It includes screencaps pulled from the video and attempted transcription of everything that can be seen.

Included are some new defensive formations, gameplay related notes, audio improvements including possible fight songs and crowd chants, and even some early hints towards specific player ratings. What do you make of what has been discovered in the video? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

For the second straight year EA Sports has posted a blog at halftime of the Super Bowl. Rather than focus on a feature or addition this time it is a video blog that goes over the development team and direction and vision for Madden 11. Continue on to watch the video and leave your thoughts in the comments!