Sports briefly: Packers reach deal with kicker Crosby

The Green Bay Packers didn't need the franchise tag for kicker Mason Crosby, because just hours after the deadline passed for using it, the veteran agreed to terms on a four-year deal, an NFL source told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Tuesday.

Crosby's agent, Mike McCartney, later confirmed a deal had been reached on Twitter.

According to the source, Crosby's deal is worth $16 million and includes a $5 million signing bonus. The $4 million average yearly salary of the deal ranks second in the NFL behind New England's Stephen Gostkowski ($4.3 million). That does not include Baltimore's Justin Tucker, who received the franchise tag and will make $4.572 million if he signs the one-year offer.

The deadline for applying franchise tags came and went Tuesday and the Packers chose not to use it for a sixth consecutive offseason.

Realistically the only candidate for one of the two tags was Crosby, who would have drawn some interest on the open market if Green Bay wasn't able to reach a deal with him by the start of free agency March 9.

Crosby has mainly been a reliable specialist since the Packers took him in the sixth round of the 2007 NFL draft out of Colorado. He hit 85 percent of his field-goal attempts in 2015 and didn't miss inside of 40 yards.

Super Bowl MVP Von Miller of Denver and fellow All-Pro players Josh Norman of Carolina and Eric Berry of Kansas City were given franchise tags. In all, nine players were slapped with the franchise tag and one, Miami defensive end Olivier Vernon, got the transition tag. Miller was the only one to get the exclusive tag, at $14.129 million, meaning no other team can make him an offer.

In a major change in the handling of positive drug tests at the Olympics, the International Olympic Committee is set to remove itself from the process and have a group of independent sports arbitrators rule on doping cases during the games in Rio de Janeiro, officials familiar with the plans told the Associated Press.

The move is intended to make the prosecution of doping cases more independent by taking it away from the IOC and putting it in the hands of a special panel of the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

Under current rules, doping cases during the Olympics are dealt with by a special IOC disciplinary panel appointed by the IOC president. The panel schedules hearings with athletes who test positive and decides on sanctions. Most athletes who test positive during the Olympics are disqualified, expelled from the games and stripped of any medals.

Under the proposal, positive cases would go directly to a group of specially appointed CAS arbitrators on site. They would hold hearings and issue rulings without IOC involvement.

College football: Buffalo defensive end Solomon Jackson died a week after experiencing a medical emergency during a team conditioning session, the school said in a statement. A redshirt sophomore from Stone Mountain, Ga., the 20-year-old Jackson had eight tackles and two sacks in 12 games during the 2015 season.