RealGM

TSE wrote:How about we see what Jim Irsay from the Colts is looking at with all of his Twitter trade banter? We could give him Avril for his 1st Rounder and then get David Amerson. Or possibly the first pick in the draft to trade down to 5 and get Amerson and then some lol.

If Jim coughs up his first, I imagine it would only be for something outside of an end rusher, thats the only positions they have filled on the entire defense.

Filled with an old and aging Dwight Freeney and Robert Mathis. Good players but soon to be gone and needing long-term replacements plus Avril can help them this year. They don't have those spots filled to keep an elite set of rushers out there all the time, only with Avril can they do that. There is a lot they are missing now that he can fill. Those 2 guys are listed as OLBs though, and Avril would be more of a DE for them which they have crap. They need a DE possibly more than any other position!

But I don't think a straight first for Avril is a logical trade anyhow. If he was very excited about doing that and he called us with that proposal then we have leverage to build off of that. We can then ask him to buy other players and involve more picks and/or players and that changes the landscape completely as multiple pieces move around. It could be any position on the football team that he acquires or gives up, all positions are equally eligible to be involved here.

The Colts clearly need a good vet WR, another good vet OT, and DE help, plus help at everywhere else! We should sell them Nate Burleson, along with Jeff Backus, and Avril or KVB, and maybe more guys that they badly need.

The new rule changes allow one IR player to have the ability to return and it's good news for a team like Pittsburgh that has DeCastro injured for a long time but not quite long enough. I'm not sure how I feel about this rule, it waters down the impact of injuries and the importance of depth and provides more flexibility that takes away from a more hardcore serious game where you have very limited resources and options and the planning component to this game is affected. I find it thrilling and exciting that teams have to make choices of where to invest in single players at given positions that allows them to choose where they feel they need security and where they feel they can shoot for the moon with a boom or bust, or live or die by the sword type of mentality. I have sold insurance before and you know what I loved it, but I don't want to add injury insurance into the game of football, that's not as fun and dramatic, this isn't real life and I intentionally want it to be a game filled with high risk propositions! After decades of the Lions working towards building some depth the NFL now wants to decide to make rules to lessen the value of having depth; what timing!

The other rule change I like, it could potentially create more trades and that is fun and good for the game.

Oakland cut CB Demarcus VanDyke a 3rd rounder from last year who was the fastest player at the combine. The Lions added a FB Shaun Chapas to the PS, and Silva got cut for Drayton.

Tremendous CB shift in our roster from last year. CB Chris Houston is the lone survivor since CB Alphonso Smith was released, CB Aaron Berry was arrested on multiple charges, CB Eric Wright became a unrestricted free agent, signed a 5 year deal with the Buccaneers, CB Drew Coleman was signed but couldn't stay healthy to survive more than a month on the roster. In correspondence to the off season changes, Signing CB Jacob Lacey & CB Drayton Florence, trading the Redskins a 7th or 6th round pick for there 2009 3rd pick CB Kevin Barnes, Drafting CB Dwight (Bill) Bentley in the 3rd round, CB Chris Greenwood (PUP list) in the 5th round & DB Jonte Green in the 6th round.

I wish we could have kept Eazy instead of having to pick up Lacy. I still cant believe Tampa threw a 5 year contract at him.

joseph mamah wrote:I wish we could have kept Eazy instead of having to pick up Lacy. I still cant believe Tampa threw a 5 year contract at him.

I've always wondered if they really thought he was worth that deal, or if they were just trying to get to the cap floor. The world may never know.

Wright got arrested (again) just days after signing in TB. He would have been the sacrificial lamb ahead of Berry had he stayed.

The way the Bucs structured the deal, he's only going to be there two years, maybe three if he's really effective.

Whats up with all these Lions and former Lions and their troubles with the law, is it just bad luck/ coincidence or is there a bad element in that locker room? or is it bad evaluation on the FOs part, I remember there was a time when we wouldnt even think of drafting a guy with character concerns because of some player in the 80's who killed somebody drunk driving. supposedly thats why we passed on Moss back in the day, so whats changed in the past few years where we're bringing in all these knuckleheads?

Well I definitely think it's fully the responsibility of the GM. That's your job is to figure these guys out and decide who you want to bank on. I don't care if a guy has off the field problems or not, but a guy on my team that I vouch for is going to succeed or I'm not going to bring him on the team in the first place. A GM needs to have that attitude and then figure it out, one way or another, how they can be sure of themselves and their choices. Everybody has their different methods and I don't care what method is used, but at the end of the day it's the GM's job to figure out who can add value to this team and how they can do that and to make it happen. We didn't do that with MANY of these players, which means a mistake was made at the GM level at some point in time regardless of where and when and what that mistake was.

But you can't look at one year's worth of arrests and say that there is something in the water, it's just not a big enough sample size to draw a conclusion such that we are drafting bad apples for some specific reason. There just isn't a qualified amount of data where you could state that with high certainty.

To me the biggest cause of this is a failure at our philosophical strategy at the roots, and that indirectly creates opportunities for these inefficient experiences with so many players. In other words, that's Mayhew's bad, ALL of it, except for any blame that could go to the guy that hired him. He's just not a good GM, despite being one of the better GMs in this league.

Supposedly the Lions are working out RBs Steve Slaton and Ryan Grant. Ryans worked for the Lions before (I want to say last season), and this is Steves first tryout with the Lions.

Grant isn't good enough for how greedy he apparently is. He shouldn't have an invitation at this point unless I'm missing something. And why are we exploring RBs, we have had an entire offseason and almost 5 years to figure out who our RBs should be today, why is this still not figured out? Uggh, the point is we didn't have the right mix of RBs to enter the season, and now even the Lions officials are admitting they agree with me by showing they aren't 100% happy with what they have. The problem is they are late at arriving to that conclusion!

If Jahvid Best is done for, which I have a feeling he is. Slaton might not be a bad option as a change of pace back. theyve been talking up Leshoure since he was drafted, Smiths always serviceable until he inevitably gets injured and Bell hasnt looked too bad. I dont really see where Grant would fit until Smith goes down.

Yeah Slaton has more upside than Grant. Grant is more of a consistent potential of about 4 YPC, whereas Slaton has more chance to hit the bigtime plus there's no certainty that Grant can even give us the 4. Grant would be lucky to be on any team and the fact that he refused offers apparently because he thinks he should have more is ridiculous. I would have liked Khalil Bell more than Grant, or I would take a flier on a complete unknown over Grant, maybe even a really outside of the box Tristan Davis who still deserves at least some shot to play considering no team has ever tested him out fairly and he didn't make the final cuts. Doesn't really matter though since we still have a ton of bodies there and need to make trades to develop some efficiency in order to open up our options at that position. And by the time a 3rd RB would ever see the field we would be best off looking at the low round or UDFA RBs of next year's draft. So not really seeing any logic to signing Grant.

If the FA running back race is even, i say we go with the guy with the most upside. i really think ML is going to be the back we need and Smith a good backup. At worst , he's 4th down back behind Bell, at best he's better than Bell and provides us better production.

Alphonso Smith, YAY?!!??!?!

Stanford Routt was released. He has 2 INTs and 1 FF on the season, along with 21 tackles and 4 PDs. The Chiefs are in the process of giving up on their season so releasing him probably saves a few bucks and gives them a better chance of losing more games, so no surprise there. We should have room to add him into the mix and should cut Brian Robiskie to make room for him.

Yeah I read that Routt got cut. Supposedly Arizona and Detroit are the teams interested in him. Miami was, but isn't anymore. Lions should absolutely sign him.

Routt is supposedly visiting an NFC team tonight and an AFC team on Monday.

Also I saw a rumor that Jon Gruden could be the next coach of the Eagles, wow that would be annoying I wouldn't want to see him to go to a team like that. I'm hoping he goes to an AFC team, I don't want him lurking around in this conference and possibly kicking our team's ass or trying to steal our potential future thunder when we finally decide to have it.

Lions claimed Pat Lee off waivers from the Raiders. Stanford Routt is still available. Which is possibly a telling sign.