Calvin Johnson Joins Raiders As Special Guest For OTAs
By: Will Burchfield
@burchie_kid
The Oakland Raiders announced on Tuesday that Calvin Johnson will join the team as a special guest for its first week of OTAs.
Johnson will watch the team practice as a guest of offensive coordinator Todd Downing. Downing was the Lions' head quarterbacks coach from 2011 to 2014.
The Raiders offense features some dynamic wide receivers, led by third-year pro Amari Cooper. The 22-year-old, who has drawn comparisons to Megatron in the past, said he grew up watching Johnson and called him a "beast" in 2015.
Certainly, he and his comrades could learn a thing or two from one of the greatest wide receivers of all time.
Megatron's visit to the Raiders comes just days after he aired some grievances with how he was treated by the Lions after retiring in 2016.
Johnson told the Free Press on Saturday that although he holds no animosity toward the Lions, he's disappointed with how things ended.
"I don't even like to talk Lions too much just because the way our relationship ended," he said when asked about the possibility of his No. 81 being retired. "If they see me around here, we'll see. But hey, I don't know.
"I just didn't feel like I was treated the way I should have been treated on the way out. That's all. I mean, it's all good. I'm not tripping. I don't feel any kind of way, just hey, that's what they did. Hey, it is what is."
Johnson declined to elaborate when pressed for more details.
"I mean, it's simple," he said. "It's simple. It's easy when you think about it."
The Lions forced Johnson to pay back ten percent of his prorated $16 million signing bonus after his retirement.
"They told me they wouldn't trade me if I came back and stuff like that, but it wasn't about that," Johnson said. "It was about how I felt."
