On Monday, Detroit Lions interim head coach Darrell Bevell explained why the team made a somewhat surprising move to cut veteran safety Jayron Kearse, who had been one of their better players in the secondary this year.
“We’re at the end of the season here,” Bevell said. “There’s some younger guys on the roster that we want to be able to take a look at.”
While that made some sense on the surface—Will Harris and Tracy Walker could certainly use more experience given their struggles this year—that still didn’t fully explain the move. Why not just play Kearse less against the Vikings, and give the team a shot to re-sign the veteran safety next year?