The Detroit Lions still need a lot of help at wide receiver, even after re-signing Josh Reynolds prior to free agency. Alas, the market for premium wideouts is quickly drying up before free agency begins.
Franchise tags took care of a couple of candidates. Green Bay used the tag on Davante Adams and the Buccaneers did the same with Chris Godwin. The Los Angeles Chargers locked up Mike Williams for three years and $60 million instead of the big veteran hitting the market, too.
On Saturday, another top-shelf target got poured down the drain when the Cowboys traded Amari Cooper to the Cleveland Browns. The Browns are absorbing the final three years of Cooper’s 5-year, $100 million contract, the same basic market value that Williams will draw from the Chargers.
One of the reasons Cooper is now heading to Cleveland is because the Cowboys moved him so they could lock up free agent WR Michael Gallup and perhaps Cedrick Wilson as well. That’s at least one more name off the list of potential Lions targets, though the Cowboys have not done anything official with either pending free agent wideout.
A lower-level potential target, Arizona’s Christian Kirk, is being talked about as a $15 million-per-year candidate by reputable sources. Kirk had 77 receptions for 982 yards in 2021, both career-highs. That’s a very high price tag for a player who hasn’t ever been a top target.
So who’s left in the shrinking free agency pool at WR? The top names are Allen Robinson, D.J. Chark, Juju Smith-Schuster and Odell Beckham Jr., who almost certainly won’t be ready for the start of the season after tearing knee ligaments in the Super Bowl. All of the bigger names (throw Will Fuller and Antonio Brown in there too) have some very real potential drawbacks; Smith-Schuster played just five games in 2021, Chark was healthy for only four, while Robinson caught a mere 38 passes in 11 games.
There is another tier of receivers where Detroit’s Reynolds would have slotted in, a group that includes Byron Pringle (Chiefs), Russell Gage (Falcons), Marquez Valdes-Scantling (Packers), Keelan Cole (Jaguars) and Braxton Berrios (Jets). That might be where the Lions are forced to do their free-agency shopping at wideout with the demand far outweighing the supply for the top names.
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