Tatum Bell Rescinds Trade Demand, More Millen Failure
October 16, 2007 on 12:49 pm | In Uncategorized |Tatum Bell “uhhh….I was just kidding guys”, admittedly I am paraphrasing here, but what a wuss. You can’t half-heartedly engineer a trade demand. At any rate, for better or for worse, Bell will remain a Lion throughout the season and likely will leave as a free agent in ‘08.
Bell has averaged 4.1 yards per carry, not terrible, but realistically sees that his role is likely to diminish in an already undernourished, run-deprived Lions backfield. With the imminent returns of T. J. Duckett and Kevin Jones, Bell will certainly have to fight to get the ball with any frequency. Hopefully, Mike Martz will find a way to utilize some packages with both Bell and Jones, which may provide the Lions with some tantalizing play options.
In the beating a dead horse department, Matt Millen is a terrible GM/Team President. The Free Press’ Michael Rosenberg succinctly summarizes just how badly Millen continues to the hurt the Lions with his lunkheaded maneuvers:
The Dre Bly trade for Bell, George Foster, and a fifth-round draft pick, or LB Johnny Baldwin, who was released and picked up by the Chiefs before the Lions could place him upon the practice squad. This trade certainly doesn’t look too good from this perspective (especially considering Foster’s innumerable false-starts and 6 1/4 sacks allowed in 5 games).
The Lions received a 4th rounder, or CB A.J. Davis, for WR Mike Williams and QB Josh McCown, neither who would have been likely to have been major contributors in ‘07, yet both are of significantly higher value to the organization than the released Davis. Meanwhile, New England traded a 4th rounder for Randy Moss, admittedly a head case, and were able to provide themselves with the most prodigious scoring threat at wide receiver in the league.
To me, this assessment hurts the most. I really like WR Calvin Johnson as a player, and admittedly his injury limited him against Washington two weeks ago. That being said, he has not become the integral part of the Lions offense that he should have been by this point.
The Minnesota Vikings selected a franchise running back in Adrian Peterson who is absolutely exploding onto the NFL scene. Wide receivers are valuable, but most NFL teams are built around their QB’s and RB’s, not their WR’s, who are only complimentary, not primary building blocks to NFL success.
The Lions offense with Jon Kitna, Roy Williams (and Mike Furrey and Shaun McDonald), along with Peterson would be solid contenders for the NFC North crown, in spite of all of Mike Martz’s efforts to ignore the running game.
Considering Peterson’s injury history, I realize why Millen made the decision he did. However, if you were willing to risk trading your best defensive playmaker in the offseason, a move that has failed to pay any sort of dividend, why not stick your neck out and draft the missing piece the Lions so despearately needed. Hindsight is 20/20 in these matters, however, these are the decisions that the Lions front office are paid to make correctly.
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