Weighing in on Titus

The Lions will be without receiver Titus Young today. He has been deactivated for disciplinary reasons.

Thought I would share NFL Network analyst Willie McGinnist’s take on it:

“It’s a good move,” he said. “It has to be painful for the receivers coach Shawn Jefferson and offensive coordinate Scott Linehan. They’re trying to implement a system, they’re trying to be productive on offense and when you have a player that is not buying into the system or being a team player, or going outside of what they are telling him, it makes it hard to teach and coach and do all of the things you want to do.

“You have a player that is calling his own plays in the huddle; he’s doing what he wants to do. In the locker room he’s a distraction; when you have distractions on a team from a talented player, it’s hard to sit him because you need that player, but he’s not buying into the system. This has been an ongoing problem, from getting penalties that hurt them in football games, sucker punching players on his own team in voluntary workouts. These are some of the things that you can’t have as a team.

“I’ve been in locker rooms with players like this and some of the coaches just cut their losses. I’m glad that Jim Schwartz made a move [to send him home] because no one is bigger than the team. When you’re trying to move forward and you have distractions like this holding you back, it’s tough.”