Detroit Lions are making waves in self-service. Will it pay?

Jesse James will not be confused for Tony Gonzalez anytime soon, but he too is responding to a huge need at the end of the race. He has a 40-catch season in his career, has improved every year as a blocker and, at age 24, was one of the most coveted products on the market.

These two players, plus slot machine receiver Danny Amendola and cornerback Justin Coleman, represent the league's first league game.

It is an impressive group, which checks a lot of boxes. And although it is premature to say that the measures taken on Monday will significantly improve the Lions in 2019 – free will is, after all, the biggest chaos of the year, after the Project – CEO Bob Quinn should be commended for his aggressive approach in obtaining contracts. completed.

Too often, teams are afraid of bidding because they are afraid of paying too much for mediocre players, even if the salary cap increases each year.

The defensive wing of New England, Trey Flowers, would be on the radar of the Bills. (Photo: Jason Getz-USA TODAY Sports)

The Lions, in one way or another, are probably overpaid for the four free agents they signed or who accepted the conditions with Monday. The flowers would bring in $ 17 million a year, which is a lot for a pass smuggler who does not produce a lot of bags. Coleman is now the NFL's highest paid cornerback with approximately $ 9 million a year; Some teams thought that its value would represent about 75% of this figure. And Danny Amendola's one-year contract (base salary of $ 4.25 million) seemed particularly high for the people I interviewed in the league.

But at the end of the day, the Lions landed four players that they really coveted with a risk that was worth taking.

Flowers, Coleman and James will all be 26 years old or younger at the start of the season, an age when NFL players are just starting to reach their peak. And Flowers, Amendola and Coleman all played for the Patriots, while Patricia was the defense coordinator and Quinn was at the team's office.

Yes, it's a bit of a common joke here. The Lions became the Midwest version of the Patriots, without a win.

But as Quinn explained last month, there is enough security to spend a lot of money on an independent agency.

"It really depends on what guys are available to you, guys who you think are suited to the system and what you know, you might have a personal experience with which you feel better about giving a big contract ", did he declare. .

Obviously, the Lions were happy to give long-term contracts to Flowers, Coleman and James, and Flowers' signature, in particular, is one of the things Quinn needed to have.

An NFL executive estimated that at least eight teams were on Flowers, whose market exploded after players like Jadeveon Clowney, Frank Clark, DeMarcus Lawrence and Dee Ford were awarded the franchise label. The Lions had a colossal need to defend and lose Flowers, even against a team like the Miami Dolphins, where head coach Brian Flores is the former coach, would not have been a good idea for a desperate team. things around after a 6-10 season.

Yes, the Lions are a desperate team and they did so on Monday, but nothing prevents that from trying to break a six-decade-old championship drought.

The rest of NFC North largely missed the first day of free agency Monday, as did many other teams. The Patriots, the original organization of Quinn and Patricia, have lost their two biggest free agents (Flowers and left tackle Trent Brown) without much arguing. Still, there is no doubt that they will win their division next year.

The Lions? It is far too early to say what Monday's spending spree means.
We've seen dream teams built independently and died in the fall, and Lions still have a myriad of holes to fill. They need a backup, a new guard on the right and another half corner, to name three positions of beginners yet to win.

But the poster positions are not filling up in the NFL, at least not with a replacement, and that's why Quinn and the Lions launched the attack on Monday.

That these movements relate to autumn, only time will tell. But for the moment at least, it's a good start.