Notes: Detroit Lions DE Romeo Okwara is one cool cat

More than three years ago, our adequate host Chris Perfett got to talk to Golden Tate about a variety of things, and one of them was style. Tate surprised us by saying punt god Sam Martin was one of the sharper dressers on the squad. The other guys Tate mentioned are no longer with the team (Tahir Whitehead, Eric Ebron, Glover Quin), but a new contender for the master of taste on the Detroit Lions has appeared: Romeo Okwara.

Remember Romeo Okwara’s Under the Helmet feature where he talked about how he loves typewriters and old school film cameras? It turns out that the young (just 24 years old!) defensive end has a good eye for art and aesthetics pretty much across the board. Carlos Monarrez of the Detroit Free Press wrote a fine article about Okwara with a focus on the photography. There is some great background on Okwara’s gallery exhibition with Leica’s New York Soho store, a photo essay featuring New York firefighters.

It’s not just the New York and Detroit areas that have noticed; about two weeks ago, GQ called him the “low-key most stylish man in sports” and took readers on a wild ride to find out where his style comes from. The GQ interview delves into Okwara meeting John Mayer (yes, THAT John Mayer) during his time with the Giants, how he came to be a hard core Grateful Dead fan in college, and the way that being a Deadhead somehow makes the John Mayer connection logical. The quiet giant setting the edge might just be the most interesting man on the defensive line.

And now, on to the rest of today’s Notes:

• Week 9’s Xs and Os with Dan Orlovsky and Mike O’Hara went up, and as always gets our recommendation:

• Speaking of Mr. Orlovsky, he asked about Matthew Stafford’s tight window throws and good grief just look at this:

• Matt Schoch from the Detroit News wrote about Marvin Hall’s propensity to haul in deep throws this season for the Lions.

• Kris Kocurek on the San Francisco coaching staff is getting some hype:

• Thanks in part to Tony Gonzalez, the linking of basketball power forwards and football tight ends will pretty much forever be a thing in the NFL. Dave Birkett with the Detroit Free Press asked a number of Lions players who they would want as a teammate to play two-on-two basketball. Every one of them wanted a power forward.

• The official Lions account’s Throwback Thursday post featured vintage footage from the early 1980s: