Allen Park — If it sounds like wishful thinking, it probably is. Any suggestion that a future Hall of Famer’s retirement makes things easier for the Lions — and particularly for quarterback Matthew Stafford — falls woefully incomplete.
But this should clear things up a bit now, at the very least. No more passing the buck or deflecting the blame. And fewer guessing games, too, because when Calvin Johnson’s on your team, what you see isn’t always what you get.
Stafford understood that as well as anyone. He became one of Johnson’s closest friends in the locker room in recent years, in addition to being his biggest fan.