Chuck Darby, Adam Jennings Signings Take Detroit Lions Back in Time

Chuck Darby is once again a Detroit Lion.

Is it 2008 again? No, can’t be, the Lions have a tally in the win column, and Rod Marinelli will be coaching on the opposite sideline this Sunday.

So if Marinelli is over there, what is Chuck Darby doing over here?

And I distinctly recall Adam Jennings getting cut a few weeks ago. Why is he back in Detroit?

Furthermore, why is Aveion Cason getting a workout, after the team finally rid itself of him? I mean, Cason spent the entire preseason with the Lions. What exactly is the point of a workout?

What is this, the Lions Twilight Zone?

No. The short answer is that Sammie Lee Hill and Kevin Smith are banged up after last week’s victory over the Redskins, and familiar faces are coming in to fill some spots. And while they were shuffling the roster, Jennings snuck in to replace Yamon Figurs, who has been irrelevant on the bench.

Still, two of these faces I could have dealt with not seeing again. In fact, the news that they had been cut after training camp caused me to perform a euphoric dance.

Jennings is okay by me. He’s young and had a fairly solid preseason. He’s not being called in to play a major role, but he is an upgrade over Figurs, who is averaging one reception per season.

Besides, he only sends the Lions back as far as training camp, which is better than where the other two send them.

Cason and Darby send them back a whole season.

Darby was the more likable of the two. A veteran tackle who specialized in shooting gaps in the line and getting penetration (or trying to), Darby is the type of player who would have been great to have about five years earlier, when his small stature would have been offset by youthful quickness.

Darby doesn’t fit into head coach Jim Schwartz’s “stronger, bigger, meaner” philosophy. He barely tips the scale over 300 pounds, but tends to play more like he weighs 260.

Still, after the roster was cut down to 53, the defensive tackle corps was paper-thin, with both Darby and Shaun Smith getting cut. An injury to Hill, who had bull-rushed his way into a starting role, meant Schwartz had to sign someone.

And when you’re talking about stop-gap players, who better than the familiar? Even if they’re bad players, at least they don’t need extra time to learn the playbook. Bad players are better than confused players.

That being said, I’ll make no such excuse for Cason. To his credit (and this is the ONLY thing I’ll credit him for), he hasn’t signed with the team, only been called in to work out. But presumably, that indicates that he’s first in line should Smith miss extended time.

That means more lackluster rushing and 15-yard kick returns.

That is one more reason to wish Smith a speedy recovery, in case there weren’t enough to begin with.

Because it seems that promising young players are giving way to remnants of 2008, and the only people who remember the Lions’ 2008 season fondly are the ones who had a job at the time.

Like Darby and Cason.