Lions General Manager Bob Quinn said last weekend that he’s confident that the Lions will be able to reach agreement on a contract extension with quarterback Matthew Stafford.
Given the going rate for quarterbacks, there’s a chance that the deal will make Stafford the highest-paid player in the league and he’ll certainly be somewhere right near the top if that’s not the case. Lions president Rod Wood was asked Tuesday if he’s comfortable with that.
“I’m comfortable in getting a deal done with him, and we’ll see where that ends up,” Wood said, via Michael Rothstein of ESPN.com. “It’s going to be whatever it takes, I think, to make it happen from both sides and whether he becomes the highest-paid or not, it’ll be a short-lived designation because, as Bob said, and I think it’s true, if you’re in the top whatever of quarterbacks, when your time comes up, your time comes up and then somebody else’s time comes up, and they become the highest-[paid player]. It’s a premium position, and you need to have a very, very good player at that position to be credible and be competitive, and I think we do have that, and we’re working on getting a deal done.”
If the Lions are comfortable going to the top of the pay scale to keep Stafford in Detroit for several more years, there’s little reason to think that Quinn’s confidence in an eventual deal will wind up being misplaced.