Good and bad news for the Detroit Lions new regime

Detroit Lions free-agent good news-bad news

Also on the table are two young free agents who would be very helpful to keep around, edge defender Romeo Okwara, whose brother is also a Detroit Lion, and wideout Kenny Golladay.

Okwara is 25 and Golladay is 27 and both are looking at big paydays on the free-agent market. Okwara could command $10-million plus per-year and Golladay is likely to fetch above the $16 million dollar salary offered to him by the former general manager, Bob Quinn.

To franchise tag or transition tag either, limiting their ability to explore the free-agent market,  would activate an automatic one-year salary minimum based upon position. Okwara, listed as a defensive end, would likely receive the transition tag while Golladay could find himself being franchise tagged.

The salaries would be $14.81 million for Okwara and $16.43 million for Golladay, assuming those tags were how they were both treated, tag amounts from the Over The Cap website, which also tracks pro sports transactions.

Losing two young playmakers would be bad news but there is a possibility of retaining at least one. Obviously, the Lions couldn’t afford both, even with cap cuts, unless they got one or both to agree to less short-term money as part of a long-term deal. That would be great news.