2010 Lions (Speculated) Starting Roster: Fun Facts

Published April 28, 2010 at 9:03 p.m.

Hey gang - hope you all enjoyed the draft as much as I did. Having seen both of these guys live for a few years, I'm stoked to see Jahvid Best joining back up with the Pain Train Zack Follett in Detroit. Maybe my favorite moment with those two players was the 2008 Emerald Bowl (check out at 3:39 of that video for some good vibes).

With the draft over, there have been a couple of articles (Detroit News, Free Press) that have begun to speculate about the Lions' starting roster for 2010. Looking at those lineups got me thinking.

The two papers have slight differences in the starting lineups, but I went ahead and went with the Freep's for this exercise since I agreed with that one a bit more. For the purpose of generating some fun facts (tm) I added some extra info: the GM involved in bringing that player to the Lions, the year he joined the team, how he was acquired, his original draft round, and when the player entered the league.

	GM	Year	Aquired	Original...Round	Entered...League
Offense
QB...Matthew Stafford	Mayhew	2009	Draft	1	2009
RB...Jahvid Best	Mayhew	2010	Draft	1	2010
WR...Calvin Johnson	Millen	2007	Draft	1	2007
WR / PR...Nate Burleson	Mayhew	2010	Trade	3	2003
TE...Brandon Pettigrew	Mayhew	2009	Draft	1	2009
TE Tony...Scheffler	Mayhew	2010	Trade	2	2006
LT Jeff...Backus	Millen	2001	Draft	1	2001
LG Rob...Sims	Mayhew	2010	Trade	4	2006
C...Dominic Raiola	Millen	2001	Draft	2	2001
RG...Stephen Peterman	Millen	2006	Waiver	3	2004
RT...Gosder Cherilus	Millen	2008	Draft	1	2008
Defense
DE...Cliff Avril	Millen	2008	Draft	3	2008
DT...Ndamukong Suh	Mayhew	2010	Draft	1	2010
DT...Corey Williams	Mayhew	2010	Trade	6	2004
DE Kyle...Vanden Bosch	Mayhew	2010	FA	2	2001
OLB...Zack Follett	Mayhew	2009	Draft	7	2009
MLB...DeAndre Levy	Mayhew	2009	Draft	3	2009
OLB...Julian Peterson	Mayhew	2009	Trade	1	2000
CB...Chris Houston	Mayhew	2010	Trade	2	2007
S Louis...Delmas	Mayhew	2009	Draft	2	2009
S Ko...Simpson	Mayhew	2009	Trade	4	2006
CB...Amari Spievey	Mayhew	2010	Draft	3	2010
Specialists
K Jason...Hanson	Schmidt	1992	Draft	2	1992
P Nick...Harris	Millen	2003	Waiver	4	2001
LS Don...Muhlbach	Millen	2004	FA	undrafted	2004
KR...Aaron Brown	Mayhew	2009	Draft	6	2009

 

If this holds up, did you know:

• On offense, we have five players acquired by Millen and six by Mayhew.
• On defense, we have one Millen player (Avril) and ten Mayhew players.
• 65% (17 of 26 players) of the starting roster has been acquired by Mayhew, in the last two years.
• 91% of the starting defense has been acquired by Mayhew.
• One starting player (Hanson) was acquired by Chuck Schmidt back in 1992.
• 35% (9 of 26 players) of the starting roster was acquired in 2010.
• 31% (8 of 26 players) of the starting roster was acquired in 2009.
• 58% (15 of 26 players) of the starting roster were drafted by the Lions.
• Only five players drafted by Millen are starting for the Lions, compared to ten drafted by Mayhew.
• 23% (6 of 26 players) of the starting roster were acquired by trade, all by Mayhew, and all in 2010 except two (Peterson, Simpson) in 2009.
• Ko is short for Yukota.
• The Lions have eight former 1st round picks starting (31% of the starting roster).
  
• Only three of the eight starting former 1st round picks were made by Millen (Calvin, Cherilus, Backus).
• No player on the offense was drafted later than the 4th round (Sims).
• Our kicker was a 2nd round pick and our punter was a 4th round pick.
• The Lions have a starter from every round in the draft except the 5th round.
• 50% (13 of 26 players) have been in the league three years or less going into the 2010 season.

Things will surely change between now and the start of the season, but thought you all might enjoy in the meanwhile.

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