What's going on, everybody? This is your GM,
Kale, your bad girl, Dom, is here to bring you
episode two of the Stack and Shed series. Now,
in this series, we're going to do a deep dive
on a few different areas for every single team.
And those areas are, what went wrong? What do
they need? Stack or Shed? Their draft picks?
One move I would do if I was their GM. and their
cap space okay now originally i was going to
just group everybody in but i was like you know
what that's going to take way too much time and
i may allocate too much time for this team instead
of that team so what we're going to do is we're
going to break everything up moving forward okay
so let's start with the lions so what went wrong
in their season now eventually say it was predictable
play calling on key downs and hiring the wrong
oc so let's start with predictable play calling
I understand that Dan Campbell's identity is
aggressiveness. And I understand that it works
sometimes and fails. But the problem that we're
seeing recently is it's starting to fail the
Lions more than actually succeed. And the reason
why I'm bringing this up is as long as Dan Campbell
continues to be aggressive on key downs, the
Lions are going to lose those key down matchups
and possibly lose key games that they need to
win. Let's be honest here. The Lions are in their
window. And the only way that you can maximize
your window is playing smart. There's a time
and place to be aggressive. The only time I should
see your coach being really aggressive is in
the third and fourth quarter. Outside of that,
there's no need for you to be aggressive. If
it's fourth down, but you're in field goal range,
kick the field goal, get the three points, who
cares? But if it's third and eight, well then
guess what? You may have to do something a little
bit different. But what you don't do is just
be super aggressive all the time because defenses
are going to pick it up and then they're going
to have a counter for it. And we see it all the
time. It was cool when it was the first two or
three years of Dan Campbell's tenure with the
Lions, but everybody knows what to do against
Dan Campbell. I don't care if you have Amon Ross
St. Brown. I don't care if you had Randy Moss.
I don't care if you had T .O. It's not going
to solve anything. You don't believe me? I got
some stats to back it up. According to Sumer
Sports. The third down conversion rate without
Ben Johnson is 213 attempts for 87 conversions,
which is 40 .8%. Their fourth down conversions
without Ben Johnson is 117 attempts for 20 conversions,
which is 17 .1%. I'm not saying these things
just to say these things. I know what I'm talking
about. The Lions have to do a better job on key
downs. If you do that, I guarantee you you'll
have a better result than what you have right
now. Now on to the offensive coordinator spot.
I understand that at some point Ben Johnson was
going to lead the Lions and he was going to take
a lot of people with him. Now you would have
thought the Lions would have been proactive instead
of reactive. But clearly that's not what happened
and now they're in the situation that they're
in where they're currently looking for an offensive
coordinator. Now I don't hate them for making
the move that they did, but... I just feel like
they didn't do enough. And the reason why I say
that is because name me one offensive coordinator
that wouldn't want to work with this offense.
An offense that has Panay Sewell, Jameer Gibbs,
David Montgomery, Sam Laporta, Jamison Williams,
Amon Ross St. Brown, Isaac Tisla. Now I'll give
you some slack because I know sometimes if you
make an external hire, they have to bring in
their own staff and they may use the players
that you have in a different way. Okay, fine.
But you mean to tell me you couldn't have at
least done a little bit of homework on some potential
candidates? If you brought in two or maybe three
people just to poke their brains just to see
how they would use this person and that person,
okay, fine. That shows me that you're open to
new ideas. But what you don't do is make an internal
promotion and think, okay, we solved the problem.
No, you didn't. All you did was just put a band
-aid over the situation and say, you know what?
We're going to deal with that in the future.
And see, I wouldn't have a problem with this
if the offense didn't have a lot of weapons.
But this offense has a lot of firepower on it.
So you need to bring in somebody that knows how
to maximize multiple positions to the fullest
of their extent. And we saw that there were points
in the season where the offense wasn't playing
their best. There was a point in time where Dan
Cable took the play calling from John Morton.
Anytime that happens, your play calling was trash.
Now with that being said, what do the Lions need?
And that is a new offensive coordinator and a
right tackle. Now with the offensive coordinator
spot, that's a little bit tricky. I know they
brought in a couple people. Mike McDaniel, they're
supposed to be bringing in Arthur Smith fairly
soon. I think they also brought in Cliff Kingsbury
as well. Now out of the people that they're probably
going to bring in, I would say Mike McDaniel
is the best choice. And the reason why I say
that is because... Although the Dolphins had
a bad year, I think honestly he's a better offensive
coordinator than head coach. His run schemes,
phenomenal. And with you having Jameer Gibbs
and possibly David Montgomery, I think this is
great for you. Although the personality stuff
might be a little bit weird because like he's
a little bit quirky and nerdy and Dan Campbell
is like alpha male. We're going to run through
this wall. We're going to enforce our will on
everybody. Like it's going to be a weird combination,
but when they get on the field, they're going
to be great. Okay, now when it comes to the right
tackle spot, hear me out because this goes in
with the one move that I would do if I was the
Lions GM and that is draft the right tackle.
Let's be honest here. Parts of their offensive
line are getting old. And we know that both Dan
Skipper and Taylor Decker have said that this
might be their last year. So with that being
said, the best thing for you to do is to move
Panay Sewell at left tackle, then draft you a
right tackle. Now, originally I was thinking
the Lions should go after a pass rusher, but
once Taylor Decker has said that he's most likely
going to retire, I was like, you know what? Right
tackle. They need to get a right tackle right
now, get this over with, and you don't have to
worry about it for the next few years. Now they
could go on a free agency and spend a boatload
of money on Braden Smith, but I don't think that's
the best idea. I think it's just best that you
draft one. But when we talk about pass rusher
for just a brief moment, I think you can get
a really good pass rusher in the second or third
round because there's going to be a lot of pass
rushers and not all of them are going to be drafted
in the first round. So if you get a high quality
one in the second round, who's really complaining?
Or you could trade for one. Or you could pay
Al -Quddeen Muhammad. Because technically speaking,
according to Spoltrak, his market value is only
$8 .2 million, which translates to a two -year
$16 .4 million deal. That's not bad. So I think
you have a lot of options with pass rusher compared
to right tackle. Right tackle is something that
you're going to have to draft high. Now, with
that being said, the question that we all need
to ask ourselves is stack or shed? And I would
venture to say stack. And the reason why I say
that is because... The infrastructure is there.
All they have to do is just move some pieces
around. Once they move those pieces around, they're
going to be right back to playing productive
football. Yes, it was expected for them to have
a down year once Ben Johnson and Aaron Glenn
left, but they have a chance to get back on straight
street. Now, I'll be honest, your division is
going to be a lot more competitive now. The Bears
look like serious contenders. The Packers are
no slouches. If Michael Parsons didn't get hurt
this year, they probably would have beaten the
Bears and would still be in the playoffs right
now. So I understand that there's a lot of frustrations
within the Lions fan base, and rightfully so.
But you guys have to be patient because let's
be honest here. You still have the pieces. All
of your top players are in their prime. All you
have to do is just address the few holes on your
team. Once you do that, you're going to be fine.
And as long as everybody stays healthy, which...
I have a theory about why their secondary can't
stay healthy, but I can't prove it, so I'm not
going to talk about it in this episode. But if
there's more information that comes out about
it, I definitely will. But all you have to do
is just maintain the course. If you maintain
the course, everything is going to be fine. As
long as you don't do anything stupid in the draft
or in free agency, everything is going to be
fine. Now, with that being said, you're going
to have seven draft picks. You're going to have
your first, your second. You're not going to
have a third. You're going to have your fourth.
You're going to have your fifth. You're going
to have two sixth round picks and a seventh round
pick. That's not bad at all. Honestly speaking,
you can use some of those picks to move up in
the draft or down in the draft depending on how
the board falls. Who's really complaining? Not
to mention, you're going to have $71 .6 million
in cap space, which technically speaking, you
could create more if you move some money around.
So you're in a really good spot. All you have
to do is just have an honest conversation this
offseason and really ask yourself, what do we
need to get over the hump? How can we get over
the hump? And what decisions can we do to get
over the hump? Now, some people will say those
are easy questions to answer, but in actuality,
it isn't. Because honestly speaking, you're going
to need to have some uncomfortable conversations.
And some people may not like them, but they need
to be had. Because guess what? The same conversations
that you're having, the Ravens need to have,
the Bills need to have, the Eagles need to have,
everybody else that are Super Bowl contenders,
they have to have those same conversations. Now,
I know this might sound weird, but if I was the
GM for the Lions, I would have a theme board.
And every single offseason, we would choose a
word to describe it. So for this offseason, it
would be uncomfortable. Because we need to have
uncomfortable conversations about the entire
landscape of the roster. I don't care who's your
favorites. I don't care who you're close with.
It doesn't matter. Because at the end of the
day, we are all here for one thing and one thing
only. And what is that? To win a championship.
And the only way that you can do that is if you
have uncomfortable conversations. Conversations
that are going to have you think twice, maybe
three times about every decision that you make.
So instead of you saying, oh we need to go after
this big free agent pass rusher, you need to
think twice about it. You need to ask yourself,
is this pass rusher going to get us closer to
winning a Super Bowl? If we draft this prospect,
is he going to get us closer to the Super Bowl?
If we hire this person to our staff, will they
be able to unlock something in either the offense
or the defense that can get us closer to winning
a championship? Those are the things that need
to be asked every single day by everyone. And
until that happens, they will not be able to
get over the hump. They will not be able to win
a championship. But I'm going to end this episode
here. If you guys like what you are listening,
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K -A -I -L -E, all right? As always, I hope I
gave you guys the fix that you guys need. I love
you guys. I appreciate you guys so much. Thank
you guys so much for listening to another episode
of the Football Junkies podcast, the best podcast
that you can listen to on a week -to -week, day
-to -day basis, as well as the second episode
of the Stack and Shed series. So as always, this
is your GM Kale signing out. Peace and love.
Later, guys.