{"id":830879,"date":"2026-03-24T11:30:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T11:30:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/830879\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T11:30:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T11:30:17","slug":"discussion-what-was-the-detroit-lions-worst-value-signing-in-free-agency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/830879\/","title":{"rendered":"Discussion: What was the Detroit Lions\u2019 worst value signing in free agency?"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Sunday, we discussed the Detroit Lions\u2019 best value signings in free agency<\/a>. With most contract details out now, there were a lot of bargain bin buys from general manager Brad Holmes, leading to a pretty big list of potential good value plays by the Lions.<\/p>\n

However, not every Lions signing is going to work out. That\u2019s just the nature of football. Whether it\u2019s schematic fit, injury, or just a player who fails to reach their full potential, the Lions are going to overpay for someone. It happens every year.<\/p>\n

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So today\u2019s Question of the Day is:<\/p>\n

Which Lions free agent signing has the worst value?<\/p>\n

My answer: This is a bit of a tough question, because the Lions didn\u2019t really hand out any super expensive deals. The biggest criticism the Lions have gotten this offseason is that they didn\u2019t shell out any big deals for big talents.<\/p>\n

Because there are so many low-risk deals, there are only a couple of contracts that I believe could be looked back on as reckless spending:<\/p>\n

As Erik Schlitt pointed out in the Borom article linked above, $5 million a year is about the going rate for a high-end OT3. I have questions whether you could call Borom a good OT3, but it feels nitpicky to complain too much about this. I understand seeing Rasheed Walker\u2019s incredible $4 million deal<\/a> (worth up to $10 million) and thinking that\u2019s a much better use of cap space, but that contract feels like an outlier. It feels like something else is going on there considering how much his projected worth was off.<\/p>\n

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If I had to pick out of the two, I think Mays\u2019 deal is the bigger risk. His deal is basically a two-year, $16 million contract with a third-year team option. At $8 million per year, Mays\u2019 contract ranks ninth among centers. Is Mays a top-10 center in the league? No, of course not. And the Lions aren\u2019t paying him that much because they think he is. They\u2019re paying him that much because it always costs a little more in free agency, and contract terms are constantly on the rise with a growing salary cap.<\/p>\n

Still, paying $8 million a year and $14 million guaranteed to a player who is still relatively new to the center position, hasn\u2019t ever entered an NFL season as a starter, and has some serious limitations in the run game is a pretty big risk. Detroit likely also paid a little more because they were a little desperate to fill the center position with limited free agent options on the table.<\/p>\n

I understand why the Lions made both of these moves\u2014fixing the offensive line was a high priority this offseason\u2014but if there are any deals that could seriously backfire this offseason, it\u2019s probably these two.<\/p>\n

Which Lions free agency contracts are you most concerned about? Share your thoughts in the comment section.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Sunday, we discussed the Detroit Lions\u2019 best value signings in free agency. With most contract details out…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":830880,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[10418,260,257,146,113,2506,7,4609,12036,147,6,3993],"class_list":["post-830879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-detroit-lions","tag-cade-mays","tag-carolina-panthers","tag-dallas-cowboys","tag-detroit","tag-detroit-lions","tag-detroitlions","tag-football","tag-free-agency","tag-line-of-scrimmage","tag-lions","tag-nfl","tag-rasheed-walker"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116283930304289558","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830879","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=830879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/830879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/830880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=830879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=830879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=830879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}