- The Lions are going to release cornerback Leigh Bodden, who has only been with the team for one season. Bodden is set to receive an $8.6-million roster bonus in March, so this appears to be the main reason why he is going to be released. The Lions don't want to pay that much money to Bodden simply because it is a lot of money and Bodden underperformed in 2008. He was traded to the Lions in exchange for Shaun Rogers and a third-round pick but never lived up to the hype. That's not completely Bodden's fault, but this move really isn't all that surprising.
- The Lions promoted Cedric Saunders to Vice President of Football Operations, according to FOXSports.com. Saunders came to Detroit with Rod Marinelli in 2006 as the team's Assistant to the Head Coach/Football Operations. In 2007, Saunders was promoted to Director of Football Operations, which was the position he held before being promoted again.
I am definitely underwhelmed by this move since it means another person that contributed to an 0-16 season is getting rewarded for his work. The fact that Saunders will now have more involvement in personnel evaluation worries me. He was close to Marinelli, and I'm sure he had some say in bringing in so many ex-Buccaneers. Those moves proved to be pretty dumb in hindsight, but let's hope he can prove me wrong and show that my assessment is way off.
(By the way, this promotion doesn't appear to have any effect on the hiring of James "Shack" Harris, as the FOXSports.com article mentions that Harris is expected to be hired later this week.) - Apparently Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon got their panties in a bunch over what WDIV put in its scroller while Matt Millen was on the air during Super Bowl coverage. I can't even believe people are making such a big deal out of it. It's not like WDIV wrote that Millen was a low life piece of trash. They simply pointed out that he was an awful GM and asked for viewers' reaction to him being an analyst. (To answer their question, yes, his time in Detroit hurts his credibility as an analyst. I will never take anything he says about football seriously.)
- There has been quite a bit discussion recently about the possibility of the Lions changing their logo/uniforms by 2010, and that prompted Matt Zelley of zellydesigns.com to come up with a new look of his own for the team. Below is the image he posted in a FanPost about the possibility of a new logo (click to enlarge).
Although I am not necessarily in favor of the Lions making any drastic changes to their logo, I would be 100% in favor of a change if it was to the above logo. Matt Zelley's design takes elements from the current logo and basically modernizes it. I'm not sold on the uniform (I still would rather have Honolulu Blue), but the logo is a great start for sure.
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