Birkett: Darius Slay’s time with Detroit Lions will soon be coming to an end

UPDATE: The deadline has passed and Darius Slay is still a Detroit Lion.

Whether or not the Detroit Lions trade cornerback Darius Slay before today’s trade deadline, Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press believes Slay’s time as a Lion will soon come to an end.

Do you agree?

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From Detroit Free Press:

Whether the Detroit Lions move Darius Slay at today’s NFL trade deadline or not– and increasingly it looks like Slay is staying put in Detroit – one thing is clear from the team’s deadline dalliance with dealing its best cornerback: Slay’s time with the Lions will soon be coming to an end.

Slay’s exit from Detroit has been brewing for months, ever since he reported to training camp after a spring sabbatical and watched the Lions massage Damon Harrison’s contract but leave his unchanged.

Slay, who stayed away from the Lions all offseason in a contract dispute, has mostly been a good soldier about that decision. He said he was underpaid and deserved a new deal, but he hasn’t approached the distraction level of others in a similar position.

In Slay’s case, the Lions have clearly taken the he-can-be-had-for-the-right-price approach, and that means in the spring as well, when he’d surely be one of the best cornerbacks on a market that’s already been thinned by the Ramsey trade and the extension handed out by the Miami Dolphins to Xavien Howard earlier this year – and when the Lions would have ample opportunity to find his replacement in free agency or the draft.