The Lions want Calvin Johnson back in the fold, and Johnson is open to returning -- just not on the terms the Lions offered this spring.
Asked about the organization's reconciliation efforts, Johnson told Graham Bensinger this week, "Not really an effort."
"I mean, they sent us some stuff, but there hasn't been really an effort to resolve it," he added.
The Hall of Fame receiver remains estranged from the Lions after they forced him to repay $1.6 million in bonus money following his early retirement. In a proposal submitted to Johnson this spring, the organization offered to pay him $500,000 per year for the next three years in exchange for 28 hours of work at various team events, according to the Free Press. It also offered to make a donation of $100,000 to a charity of Johnson's choice to fully "return" his $1.6 million.
"Come work for it," Johnson told Bensinger. "That's a joke."
Johnson said he's not demanding his money "all up front, but they need to figure out a way to do it and not have me work for it, because I already did the work for it."
One of the greatest players in franchise history, Megatron is the Lions' all-time leader in receptions (731), receiving yards (11,619) and touchdowns (83). He played for Detroit for nine years and walked away at the age of 30 with his body beat-up and with the team going nowhere. He said he's just now getting to know ownership.
Johnson said it "would be nice" to mend fences with the only team he ever played for, "but I’m not going to bend over backwards to try to do anything, because I didn’t do anything. I did my job."
Problem is, the Lions can't repay Johnson's bonus money without incurring a salary cap hit if he's not officially employed by the team. So Johnson wants what the Lions, in their minds, can't give him in good conscience.
As far as he's concerned, that's their problem to solve.
"Put it like this," he said. "Imagine you had a friend, or maybe not even a friend, just somebody who gave you something and then they take it back. Are y’all gonna still really hang out? Are y’all still cool? And imagine you did a whole bunch of work. It’s the principle."
Johnson added, "I probably shouldn’t have said friend because it wasn’t a friend. With a friend that would hurt a little bit more and I’d probably try to figure out a way to work it out. There was no friendship there. It was just a work relationship."
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Johnson has done some guest coaching for NFL teams since his retirement, and he's even worked with Lions receivers on the side. He said he's more than willing to work in a formal capacity for the Lions, just so long as "you put that money back in my pocket."
"I don’t mind coming in and doing work for the organization because I love football and I love pouring back into the team," he said. "But there ain’t no way I’m coming back over there to do anything unless that’s coming back and I see how it’s coming back."
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