Can Detroit Lions Afford to Part Ways with Matthew Stafford?

Breakups are hard, and they can lead to devastation or growth—perhaps even both—but you never know which way it's going to go until the tough decisions have been made.

The Detroit Lions and Matthew Stafford are currently standing at that crossroads.

Of course, both are stuck with each other through the remainder of the season like a dispirited couple with a mutual friend's wedding three weeks away. Things will start to get interesting for the star-crossed lovers in 2016, no matter how much they'd love to go back to the start.

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Golden Tate said Joe Lombardi told team they had to hit the reset button like in a video game

— Kyle Meinke (@kmeinke) October 12, 2015"

Where It All Went Wrong

The first week—at least—after a breakup is spent agonizing about where the relationship went sour. There are a lot of texts to increasingly agitated friends about how "we never fought" and recalling those come-from-behind wins.

It's only natural. No relationship is completely bad or it wouldn't have moved that far down the road.

Year	Comp. Per.	Yards	TDs	INTs	Passer Rating
2011	63.5	5,038	41	16	97.2
2012	59.8	4,967	20	17	79.8
2013	58.5	4,650	29	19	84.2
2014	60.3	4,257	22	12	85.7
2015	64.6	1,205	6	8	74.8

But there's only so long the Lions and Stafford can live on the memories of 2011. He never came within 10 touchdowns of that type of production again, making him more Matt Ryan than Drew Brees, which is a problem considering the offense Stafford finds himself in.

The cause won't be found in the above table, however. Grantland's Bill Barnwell took a deeper dive into the numbers and noticed a trend that he explained well here:

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The famously big-armed passer always has the ability to make plays downfield, but the Lions have typically capitalized on that by exploiting teams’ fear of getting beat for those big plays with steady doses of dig routes and back-shoulder throws. Last year, Stafford was effective on those passes, producing an 85.7 QBR while throwing five picks on 138 tries. In 2015, Stafford has been awful in that same range, posting a lowly 31.7 QBR, good for 32nd in the NFL. He’s already thrown five interceptions in that range on just 42 attempts.

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Those are the throws that made wide receiver Golden Tate such a dangerous weapon last year. He'd run a 13-yard drag, make a guy miss and pick up an extra 10 or so.

Remember, that was for an offense which produced a measly 20 points per game, meaning there was no margin for error. Pinpoint accuracy is king in offensive coordinator Joe Lombardi's offense.

The Financial Ramifications

The calls for Stafford's job didn't start this season, but they've grown with substantial fervor. However, like a bad marriage where one spouse is still finishing grad school, can the Lions afford to cut ties this offseason?

Tony Gutierrez/Associated Press

After this season, Stafford will still have two years left on a three-year, $53 million extension signed in 2013, per Spotrac. He will carry cap hits of $22.5 and $22 million in 2016 and 2017, respectively, with his dead money dropping to $11 million next season and $5.5 million the year after.

That means any trade or release of Stafford would carry those cap hits as determined by the dead money. Yes, the team would save $11.5 million in 2016, but it would also have $11 million tied up in a quarterback presumably playing somewhere else.

As you can see, the amount of money involved elevates this from a simple breakup to an all-out divorce, with only one party truly being free of the other.

The Unfortunate Fallout

A separation would be good for Stafford. He could theoretically find a team that runs an offense that suits his talents while holding on to all of his guaranteed money if released.

As Josh Katzenstein of the Detroit News pointed out, his career could follow a similar arc to Carson Palmer's. In fact, pairing Stafford with Arizona Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians' air-it-out offense would give the former the scheme he needs to succeed while giving the latter his successor to Palmer.

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My bottom line on Stafford: this is so fundamentally a coaching problem you can't look beyond that. Whole offense a mess, not just Stafford

— Scott Warheit (@swarheit) October 12, 2015"

But this isn't about what's good for Stafford. The Lions need to truly assess whether their current quarterback is the problem when he's somehow still only 27 years old and stuck in an offense designed for a different style of passer.

His accuracy percentage is in the meaty part of the bell curve alongside other strong-armed stalwarts like Cam Newton (72.6) and Joe Flacco (72.5), per Pro Football Focus. His 72.1 percent mark is actually just a few ticks shy of Palmer's, and the latter is a legitimate MVP candidate at this point.

The naked truth is these two are stuck together for likely another year. Much like waiting until the kids are out of the house, Detroit didn't absorb all of its dead money last offseason to anchor itself down again. Unless, of course, the Lions are in love with one of the top quarterbacks in this year's draft.

Perhaps these two can reconcile with the extra time and a new marriage counselor calling the plays. Or maybe both parties are waiting too long to end a doomed union.

That's the problem with immature relationships: You never know it's time to move on until it's over.

Brandon Alisoglu is a Detroit Lions Featured Columnist. He also co-hosts a Lions-centric podcast, Lions Central Radio. Yell at him on Twitter@BrandonAlisoglu.