The Detroit Lions are taking from their past free agent failures to pay for this year’s class.
Romeo Okwara agreed to a massive pay cut to stay with the Lions in 2023, reducing his base salary from $11 million to $2 million next season in a move that creates nearly $9 million in cap space.
Okwara signed a three-year, $39 million deal with the Lions in 2021, coming off a career-high 10-sack season, but has played just nine games since. Okwara ruptured his Achilles tendon early in the 2022 season and did not return until mid-December last year, when he had two sacks among eight tackles in the final five games while playing as a rotational pass rusher behind Aidan Hutchinson, James Houston, John Cominsky and Josh Paschal.