Cory Redding never has to work another day in his life.

Cory Redding never has to work another day in his life.

"Fans, you may think I got a bad break getting drafted by the Lions. Yet today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth."

It's really confusing being a Lions fan during the off-season. One day, their quarterback is talking about how, due to a favorable schedule, they will win more than ten games this season. Then days like yesterday come along that make you think that the Lions might actually still be a bad football team. Cory Redding is a good player. He put up good numbers last year as a defensive tackle on a defense that certainly, well, offered a defensive player an opportunity to make many, many tackles. Yesterday the Lions made Cory Redding the highest paid defensive tackle in the NFL--wait, no, the world. 7 years. $49 million, $16 million guaranteed. That's a hefty amount of money for, as the Battleship pointed out, someone that has never sniffed the Pro Bowl. It's a lot for a guy that had a total of four sacks in the previous three years. Is this the kind of contract a good team, an 11+ win team, offers a player after just one very good year?

A few contracts from the late 90's came to mind after hearing about the Redding signing:

- Damian Easley's five year, $30 million contract with the Tigers
- Dean Palmer's five year, $36 million contract with the Tigers
- Bobby Higgenson's four year, $35 million contract with the Tigers

Tigers GM Randy Smith made all of these deals, giving fat contracts at the height of the steroid era to at best upwardly average players following a good couple of seasons. All ended in disaster. In 2002 the Tigers were paying 55% of their payroll to these players and Jose Lima, who was making $7.25 million after having a couple of good seasons in the late nineties.

With the problems that Shaun Rogers has with strippers and Tank Johnson has with guns (Hey Tank, you might want to consider changing your name. You don't see many pedophiles named "Touch" or coke heads named "Sniff" do you?), the Lions are probably relieved to have a good DT that seems to stay out of trouble.

Is it good that the Lions have Cory Redding signed? Yes. He and Shaun Rogers should make for a very strong pair of defensive tackles, assuming Rogers keeps his hands off strippers in their dressing rooms (Shaun, my man: don't go back there. They're probably going to notice a 6'4" 350 man with a holstered gun walking into their coke den, and it's not going to end well. Just find the manager, hand over a few Benjamins, have a seat in the Champagne room, and remember to tuck those hands under your thighs like a gentleman).