It’s quite shocking today as it was a few years ago when Calvin Johnson suddenly retired from a sport he had played all his life because he just couldn’t take the losing culture of the Detroit Lions any longer.
The two sides have been at odds for various reasons ever since, but the Lions franchise want to make amends.
So, does that mean Calvin Johnson just might come out of retirement to play again? He just might, but he needs something to appear in his bank account first to make things right with the franchise.
When Johnson retired in 2015, the franchise forced him to repay a seven-figure portion of the $16 million signing bonus he received four years earlier.
“They already know what they got to do,” Johnson told the Free Press at the annual camp he runs for local high school students Saturday in metro Detroit. “The only way they’re going to get me back is they put that money back in my pocket. Nah, you don’t do that. I don’t care what they say. They can put it back, then they can have me back. That’s the bottom line.”
This is the same thing the Lions did to Barry Sanders back in 1999 when they forced him to repay a seven-figure portion of his signing bonus when he retired abruptly.
Much like Johnson right now, the Lions and Sanders also had a strained relationship for years before they ultimately made amends with each other.
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Pay the man his money and things can get back to normal. We just might get another season out of him. Do the right things, Lions.
