Does Megatron Want Plaxico?
By: Tom Millikan and Mike Feld
Detroit Lions wide receiver Calvin Johnson joined Stoney, Bill & Sara for his weekly chat on Wednesday. He was asked about Plaxico Burress possibly replacing Nate Burleson, who suffered a season-ending injury in Monday night's loss to the Bears.
"That would be nice. Plaxico has a ton of game experience," Johnson said. "When he gets down there, he's a touchdown machine as well. That's two big targets you'd have down there. Not even two when you think about what we have on offense. We could have like, four or five big people running down the field. It's tough matchups."
Stoney asked Johnson if he would go to the front office to campaign for Burress.
"It's funny, because I was talking with my coach the other day and his name came up. So, you never know."
Megatron did not want to dismiss the loss of Burleson though.
"It hurts. I told someone earlier we're losing a lot of energy; losing a lot of leadership on and off the field from practice to the game. He's a captain on this team. It hurts to lose him, but we've got to keep playing and play for him as well."
Before looking ahead to the Seahawks game this week, Johnson addressed his dropped pass on the opening series of the game in Chicago.
"Saw the open field, turned my head before I caught the ball. It's as simple as that. You got to go back to the basics and see the ball into my hand."
Did he think he could have scored on the play?
"Possibly. Definitely. I had in my mind what I was going to do before I even caught the ball. We watched it on film today and same thing. I just turned my head before I even tried to secure the ball."
Johnson moved on from the drop and addressed the offense as a whole and why the Lions continue to fall behind early in games.
"Teams aren't going to let us do what we did last year. It's as simple as that. We've got to scheme around it and come up with some adjustments to what they're trying to do to us."
"We're going to figure that out sooner than later. We know we got a heck of a defense that's playing their butts off. They're not letting people score in the red zone. We just have to be able to put up points."
Finally, Johnson was asked whether the Seahawks game on Sunday is a must win.
"Put it like this: We want to be at [.500] by the middle of the season, and 3-4 is a heck of a lot better than 2-5.
