Yeah, Martin Mayhew thinks the Detroit Lions should be buyers at the deadline and that Matthew Stafford is a future hall of famer… Mayhew dropped this juicy quotes when speaking with the media in England earlier today as the team prepares for their showdown with the Kansas City Chiefs at Wembley Stadium on Sunday morning.
Buyers at the Deadline?!?!
Despite being 1-6 and needing to win out to even have a shot to make the playoffs, Martin Mayhew is convinced that the best course of action is to try and acquire players at the deadline instead of selling off expiring assets to acquire salary cap relief or draft picks.
“We’re going to be probably more buyers than sellers and we’ve had some dialogue already about some guys around the league, so we’re actively looking at those situations.”
This is the NFL, you don’t buy at the trade deadline for next year. With the injury risk associated with the sport, you cannot buy for a year ahead of time like you can in the MLB, NBA, or NHL. You can certainty sell at the deadline to help your team in the future, but buying, not so much.
Stafford to the Hall?
He called quarterback Matthew Stafford and wide receiver Calvin Johnson both future hall of famers:
“Obviously we need to win more football games. That’s where the primary focus is, 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.”
I’ll give you Calvin Johnson as a future hall of famer. He likely still has some good, not great seasons left. They may not all be in a Detroit Lions uniform, but he should be pushing for some all-time NFL records before he hangs it up. But Matt Stafford? I mean, really?
Believe it or not, Matthew Stafford ranks 33rd all time in career passer rating (min. 1500 pass att.) and is ahead of 20 hall of fame quarterbacks. But what do all those guys who rank behind him have in common? They all have championships and Matthew Stafford doesn’t. He doesn’t even have a playoff victory on his resume.
Not to mention, he’s currently ranked 19th in the league for this season, behind bums like Brian Hoyer, Josh McCown, and Brandon Weeden. For a guy who’s supposedly in his prime, those are not respectable rankings.
Trading Stafford and/or Megatron
When asked whether he would consider trading the Detroit Lions two biggest salary cap hits and arguably most important offensive pieces, Mayhew responded with:
“Both of those guys are very important to what we’re doing as a franchise, great people off the field, great teammates. And both of those guys have Hall-of-Fame potential. So to say that we should move those guys doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.”
These two players will make up $46.5 million dollars of your salary cap next season. That’s for two above average players. If you could free up half of that, do you know how many above average players you could acquire via free agency? You could get three or above average players for just by eliminating the cap hit from either Matthew Stafford or Calvin Johnson. Not only would you get a draft pick that you can turn into another cheap and productive player, but you will allow yourself to get the cap space to go and acquire three or four more. It’s what a smart general manager would consider if his team were in this position, but apparently Martin Mayhew isn’t so smart.
Martin Mayhew doesn’t talk to the media much and maybe this is why. Every time he talks, something dumb comes out of his mouth. Whether it’s calling his very average quarterback a future hall of famer or saying a 1-6 football team should buy at the trade deadline, it seems clear to me that he needs to update his resume because he will be job hunting not long from now.