Matt Stafford is the suckiest suck to ever suck

[DetroitRockCity]

This thread still sux

[Panoptes]

This thread still sux

This thread, despite the attempt of the OP to diffuse the very real limitations of #9 by being overtly facetious, has, as expected, become prophetic.

Even I will admit that #9 is not the suckiest ever but it was quite evident long ago he was nothing more than an ownership P.R. wet dream with his golly geeze, good ol boy, garbage time stat hording.

Us fans must all, figuratively pay the price, of having to wait until he becomes financially expendable and it didn't have to be like this but it is the Lions way (being way behind in making the correct moves).

You know where I've stood for a long time, SHOW me, don't TELL me.

People in the business of discussing these types of situations have finally caught up with the facts and put aside the never real, unjustified hype.

[Marko69]

Aw YES! FINALLY! At long last everyone can stop having people on ignore. It was true all along. Are we allowed to quote now? Or is that still an ass kicking offence?!

[dwt1]

Well they are on their second teams and cousins may see 3 or 4 teams before he's done, same with Smith if injury doesn't end his career.

I don't see how that injury doesn't end his career - that was horrific.

[dwt1]

Come on man I'm trying to have a respectful conversation here. No one said anything about a QB solving all of this. We are talking about how to best move on from Stafford - Teez Tabor has nothing to do with that. Oh and btw regarding Teez Tabor ...

I hate being right all time.

As far as the term franchise QB being meaningless - wow you really are on a semantic nick-picking roll tonight. Not sure if you are being purposefully obtuse or sincere, but let me google the meaning for you just in case its sincere ...

"In professional sports, a franchise player is an athlete who is not simply the best player on their team, but one that the team can build their "franchise" around for the foreseeable future. The term may be used alongside a particular position name to describe a player, such as a "franchise quarterback" in American football."

So now it should be perfectly clear what I mean when I say to stop treating Stafford as a franchise QB.

It's a good thing you don't like being right all the time - By the definition you posted for what a franchise player is, Mediocre Matty meets that definition. HE IS THE PLAYER DETROIT HAS BUILT ITS FRANCHISE AROUND. There's nothing in that definition that says it has to be a winning team.

[dwt1]

There's no good answer at this point. Because he can look like a world beater one day and a dumpster fire the next, would they cut bait?

The team has huge needs all over the board. Especially defensively. Do they blow off those needs to get a player that won't play for them for at least 2 years?

The problem is a lot easier to define then the answer.

Uhm.....fuck yes. Have you not been watching football for...oh....about the last 20 years? Have you not noticed that if you truly have an great QB you "huge needs all over the board" drastically go down. And if you don't have a gfreat QB, you will always have "huge needs all over the board" In other word, without an elite QB, they'll draft for those "huge needs all over the board" this year and they'll have to do it again two years from now.

Dude, go to NFL.com - check out the current power rankings. The top 6 teams all have elite QBs (or at least QBs having elite QB seasons - I'm not certain I would place Rivers in the elite QB catagory)

[froot loops]

Once you decide he is no longer the QB, you drop him the next day. If the franchise has decided that he must be gone by March. There is no need to be gooogling abstract definitions. Until then you try to win with him and that means putting more talent on the team, something they have continually failed to do. This offseason was a total disaster. As long as they continually fail to get talented players and good coaches, it doesn't matter who the quarterback is.

[Futureshock]

I think the term franchise qb is silly and meaningless. If he's the quarterback, he is the quarterback. Once you decided you can't win with him you cut him loose. I think your designation that he is no longer a franchise quarterback is silly.

The Lions still have the same problem as always, a lack of fucking talent. They spent a second round pick on Teez Tabor when everyone said he was too slow, the smartest man in the room said he was a playmaker. He was a healthy scratch on Thursday.

The Lions struggled to have a 9-7 season last year, they had an awful off season and they had a downgrade at coach from Caldwell, expecting any QB to be some sorcerer to solve this shit is foolish.

Their problem is that they aren't consistently good at anything good at all. From the Owner to the players, they have never consistently did anything where you go in saying, "No matter what happens today, I know we are going to ____." The closest to that was in 2014 when we had that D. I would be more nervous when the Offense had the ball then when the opposing team did.

But we haven't consistently

1. Filled FO vacancies with the right people.
2. Traded for the right players
3. Signed the right FAs
4. *Drafted the right players
5. Used the players acquired properly
6. Developed talent (Then subsequently, we blame the player for being a bust when they really weren't used/developed. I.E. Ebron)
7. Etc...

It's like that one neighbor that doesn't cut their grass as often as need be. But, when he does he doesn't tend to his bushes. Then he does his bushes to only allow the grass to get too high again. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Stafford is part of that and systematic also.

First, let me say that my belief is that you should never have to totally depend on anyone. Even IF MS was a Championship caliber QB.

{To me a Franchise QB is like MS, Cousins, etc... When you line him up you have someone that can operate your offense and be 50-75% successful if everything around him doesn't fall apart. A Championship caliber QB is someone like Brady, Rodgers, Brees, Roethlesburger, etc... When you line him up he's gonna win over 75% of the time unless everything falls apart.}

With that being said, it is/was stupid to not have a capable backup QB that could run the offense and not be NFL caliber enough to replace MS. At the very least until you can find THAT guy. They should have been cycling guys through here until they found their Garapolo.

My thing was that I was willing to deal with this as long as he continued to ascend in terms of things like, reading defenses, calling the proper audibles when it's obvious what the other team is doing, being secure with the ball, running when necessary, etc... He improved every year, until now. I've seen enough to know what he is. A better then average "guy." If everything is going right he will look amazing. If everything is going bad, he will also.

But digression is so bad this year that if they are playing equal, he loses it. He has had no consistency. He has shown he is either a lot dumber then we know, or slow to process what happens in front of him.

There is no good solution and I'm not so sure they wouldn't get someone worse, but they need to get a plan of succession together quick.

Now, this...

Lions QB Matthew Stafford, once considered the master of the fourth-quarter comeback, is 0-7 this season when the Lions trail in the fourth quarter.

[dwt1]

Improved every year until now? You were doing good but then lost credibility when you made that statement. There is nothing about his career, stats, results, leadership that supports that claim.

[Futureshock]

Once you decide he is no longer the QB, you drop him the next day. If the franchise has decided that he must be gone by March. There is no need to be gooogling abstract definitions. Until then you try to win with him and that means putting more talent on the team, something they have continually failed to do. This offseason was a total disaster. As long as they continually fail to get talented players and good coaches, it doesn't matter who the quarterback is.

I can't agree with that. The draft was actually a success. Every player drafted, except Crosby and the FB, have looked really good and seem to be part of the solution and not the problem. And that's going into your 6th and 7th round picks. That's actually pretty good.

One thing I'm starting to understand about Quinn is he is very conservative to a fault. Before last year's draft, he mostly sat back and waited. Hoping the right guy fell to him. This year he was aggressive and went after HIS guy. I think that is a big turn towards better.

I'm still not sure about his FA acquisitions, but his trades are better this year too. Getting Snacks and a third for renting out Tate for 7 games (IF they want him back) is 2 really good trades. But he needs to do more. And he needs to understand that MS is a long fricking way from Brady. Stop with the offensive tooling crap. Defense, defense, defense. Get us some monsters in here, ASAP!

He kept Lombardi too long. He kept Caldwell too long. He's kept Cooter too long. It seems he can only function to address one part of the puzzle at a time. Tooooooooo slow. The perfect time to have got rid of JBC was when he got rid of Caldwell. UNLESS, JBC is going to be their fall guy for when he knew this team would struggle to change over to MP.

[froot loops]

You always need to get offense, people act like its 1980 and you just build a defense. Look at the best teams in football, they are all offense all the time.

They had a few decent draft picks, but the offseason was a total disaster. I would be cautious about lauding the 2018 draft, the 2016 draft looked really good in its initial year with 5 producers, now three years in you only have 3 below average starters.

[Futureshock]

Yeah you need offense. But, the defense has been neglected so much that they critically need to address it. Lining up Lawson as your 2nd CB is never gonna not lead to loses. They need another LB that can read , make tough tackles and cover. And QBs just have all-day to throw the ball. That's a bad combination.

Offensively, they need a starting G, 2nd RB and 3rd WR. The best change for that unit would be at the Coordinator. We've already come to the conclusion that the QB isn't going to be replaced.

[froot loops]

They did draft Teez Tabor to replace Lawson, the problem is a lot of the defensive players drafted haven't done shit. It certainly isn't because they failed to draft defense. It hasn't been neglected at all. They have drafted a decent amount of defensive backs. The problem with the Lions isn't focusing on defense or offense, its getting players who produce and continue to produce after their initial rookie contract. Going back to 2010, the Lions have drafted more defensive players than offensive players. If you don't count purely special teams players(Nate Freese, Jimmy Landis, Sam Martin) the Lions have drafted 31 offensive players and 34 defensive players.

[froot loops]

One other thing, getting aggressive and going after the guy he wants was a hallmark of Martin Mayhew. He made a lot of draft day trades to move up and get his guy.

[Futureshock]

They did draft Teez Tabor to replace Lawson, the problem is a lot of the defensive players drafted haven't done shit. It certainly isn't because they failed to draft defense. It hasn't been neglected at all. They have drafted a decent amount of defensive backs. The problem with the Lions isn't focusing on defense or offense, its getting players who produce and continue to produce after their initial rookie contract. Going back to 2010, the Lions have drafted more defensive players than offensive players. If you don't count purely special teams players(Nate Freese, Jimmy Landis, Sam Martin) the Lions have drafted 31 offensive players and 34 defensive players.

In what round were they taken? Most of those were only as high as the second round. Anything prior to Quinn makes no sense to try and evaluate because it was under a bad GM (Quinn may too be exposed as a bad GM, but the jury isn't totally out on that yet). The highest D players were Robinson and Tabor. Respectively, average and bust. But if you can't tell the difference in the quality of players selected this year and how he went about it, I don't know what to say.

Drafting Greedy Williams in the first round or Mook Reynolds in the sixth round is a big difference.