No Win Situation

TLoGL is very fond of the NFL Draft. It is our favorite time of the NFL season. As not very huge fans of the NFL game itself, we find ourselves watching the combine with great enthusiasm and fervor, while preparing to see what our favorite team, the Detroit Lions, will do with their opportunities on what is known around here as "Super Bowl Saturday." This year, Martin Mayhew and Tom Lewand have orchestrated a couple tremendous moves in absolutely fleecing Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys. First is the trade of locker room cancer and over-rated wide-out Roy Williams. Then came the dump of over-the-hill-and-was-never-really-any-good-anyway QB Jon Kitna, who the Lions were going to release as a cap casualty anyway two days after the deal. Instead, they get a starting CB for a guy who by all accounts didn't want to be in Detroit anyway. Good show. Our confidence in the Lions front office is growing. That may not be saying much, but it's the little victories that keep us going right now.

But the Lions, by virtue of going 0-16 last season, have the first pick overall. Nothing good can come from this. The #1 pick demands big money, and the problem is not that the Lions don't have the cap room to accomodate, it's that there is nobody out there worthy of that money this year. There is no Tom Brady (what round did he go in again?) in this year's draft, so the Lions are in a no-win situation. No matter what they do, it will be wrong. The position most worth #1 money is the QB position. But the top two contenders are a guy with an arm but no decision making ability, and a guy with decision making ability and accuracy, but no arm. What about offensive line? Yeah, maybe, and this would be the smart thing to do, but Mayhew and Lewand will get torched in Detroit for not bringing in a guy to sell tickets right away.

What about trading down? Who wants it? Everybody else knows the value of this pick, and that it is nil, so nobody wants it. The only possibility we have heard is maybe giving it to Denver so they can take Stafford or Sanchez and get Cutler in return. This would be a tremendous move by the Lions, and a terrible move by Denver, which is why we don't see it happening. It is just too far-fetched.

What we will see on April 25 around 4:15pm, is who is running the show in Allen Park. If it is the Fords, we will see Matt Stafford. If it is Mayhew and Lewand, and they are smart about the pick and not afraid of being torched by the less than stellar fanbase, they will go another route.