There are several jobs at stake with the Detroit Lions and not all have to do with the coaches. With just one win on the season, the Lions either need to blow their roster up completely or simply wait for the No.1 draft pick in the spring. The changes at the coordinator position proved to not be effective as the Lions suffered an ugly loss to the Kansas City Chiefs. With Matthew Stafford safe, is a trade of Calvin Johnson next?
The first concern for the Lions is the health of Johnson. The wide receiver tweaked his ankle against the Chiefs and was forced to leave the game. After putting up five catches for 85 yards, Johnson left the matchup in the fourth quarterback while the Lions were trailing 38-3. According to Kyle Meinke of MLive.com, the injury is not expected to be serious for the receiver and he likely did not return because of how ugly the score was. So where does that leave Johnson in the next 24 hours?
There are several NFL analysts calling for the Lions to simply dismantle the roster. Johnson would be first on the board to go. Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk breaks down the idea of trading the wide receiver saying that he is the best asset for the Lions if they want to get a good amount of draft picks for the spring. The issue is Johnson's contract who has a base salary of merely $16 million in 2016 with a cap hit of $24 million. That is going to be a hard sell for anyone.
However, if the Lions were to really make Johnson available there would be a team willing to overspend for him. While the receiver has not looked like Megatron much this year he could be a huge grab for any contending team. The New England Patriots, Denver Broncos or Green Bay Packers would welcome Johnson to the team for the short-term and long-term outlook. According to general manager Martin Mayhew, he does not see it happening.
"Obviously, we need to win more football games. That's where the primary focus is," Mayhew said, via the Detroit Free Press. "But when you have a franchise quarterback like Matthew Stafford, you keep that guy. If we had 22 Matthew Staffords, we'd win a championship every single year. And same thing with Calvin Johnson. Both of those guys are very important to what we're doing as a franchise, great people off the field, great teammates."
The best thing the Lions had going for them was the real return of Joique Bell who outplayed rookie Ameer Abdullah. Bell could continue as the starter moving forward for the Lions.
