The Detroit Lions' offseason has been so off-putting, it's easy to forget that their 2011 accomplishments were steeped in significance – and that their near future holds so much promise. With six arrests involving four players over the past six months, along with the sucker punch wide receiver Titus Young gave teammate Louis Delmas during OTAs, the afterglow of the team's first playoff appearance since 1999 has been replaced by the harsh glare of national scrutiny.

As the Lions prepare to report to training camp at their Allen Park, Mich., facility, with veterans due in July 26, one of the team's most accomplished and controversial players believes a healthy dose of maturity is in order, himself included.

"Everybody has to be accountable for themselves, and obviously we as teammates need to hold each other to a higher standard," Ndamukong Suh said last week at a Subway-sponsored training event near Los Angeles. "And that's being addressed, and some of our teammates will

The deals came down in dizzying succession, a three-and-a-half-hour rush of deadline-skirting, tax-bracket-busting drama.

A pair of star running backs, the Chicago Bears' Matt Forte and the Baltimore Ravens' Ray Rice, got the lucrative long-term contracts many predicted they wouldn't, highlighting a Monday afternoon that marked the final day for players who'd been franchised to strike multi-year deals until the completion of the 2012 season.

Sometime in between those two relatively meaty developments, a kicker, Josh Scobee, scored a four-year, $13.8 million contract from the Jacksonville Jaguars, continuing a curious offseason in which dudes with the skimpy facemasks get their portfolios fattened beyond reason – and, quite possibly, prompting Scobee and his wife, Melissa, to reenact the iconic Demi Moore/Woody Harrelson love scene from "Indecent Proposal."

[More NFL: Pats reportedly tell Rob Gronkowski to tone it down]

Though it can be argued that Forte and Rice

LOS ANGELES – When Robert Griffin III flashes back to his first college game, he remembers each toxic moment in vivid detail. As loathsome as it was for the young quarterback to be part of Baylor's 41-13 home defeat to Wake Forest in the 2008 season opener, the way some of his teammates behaved afterward brought RG3 even more misery.

Robert Griffin III celebrates with a youngster during a youth camp last month. (AP)Griffin, then a true freshman, looked forward to sparking a turnaround at a program that was about to experience its 13th consecutive losing season. On that hot August night in Waco four years ago, the eventual Heisman Trophy winner and No. 2 overall pick of the 2012 NFL draft realized the endeavor would be tougher than he'd imagined.

"We got blasted," Griffin recalled Tuesday night in Hollywood, after attending the Gatorade High School Athlete of the Year Awards. "I didn't start the game, but I came in during the second quarter and played the rest of the way, and we got beat really bad. And there was nobody in the stands by the last whistle.

Roman Harper (L) and Jo-Lonn Dunbar surround Lions WR Calvin Johnson in the playoffs. (AP)When documentary filmmaker Sean Pamphilon visited NFL headquarters three weeks ago to play a much-publicized Gregg Williams audiotape, league security officials were particularly interested in a sequence in which the former New Orleans Saints defensive coordinator announced $200 rewards for "whack" hits by cornerback Roman Harper and linebacker Jo-Lonn Dunbar in last January's playoff victory over the Detroit Lions, Yahoo! Sports has learned.

While a league source said Dunbar, who has since signed with the St. Louis Rams, and Harper are unlikely to be subjected to disciplinary measures, the revelation was considered significant because the league viewed it as additional evidence of a bounty system that was the focus of a three-year investigation.

However, two NFL Players Association sources strongly disputed that characterization, defining a "whack" hit as a forceful yet clean and legal play by a defender, and thus a "pay-for-performance" issue that is a far less severe

The New Orleans Saints' bounty saga – aka the Scandal That Keeps On Giving – has officially veered into reality-show territory, with Friday's revelation by Y! Sports' Jason Cole of a pay-for-injury "ledger" providing a titillating encore to the previous day's scorched-earth essay by documentary filmmaker Sean Pamphilon.

LB Jonathan Vilma was suspended by the NFL for the 2012 season. (AP)

From the NFL's initial announcement of the investigation, to the unprecedented punishments doled out to Saints coach Sean Payton and other team officials, to the provocative audio of former defensive coordinator Gregg Williams' pregame speech, to linebacker Jonathan Vilma's defamation suit against NFL commissioner Roger Goodell, there has been no shortage of salacious storylines.

In the process, many of the main characters have been turned into caricatures by some of those analyzing the situation: Goodell the Dictator, Payton the Reckless Rogue, Vilma the Villain, Williams the Morally Reprehensible Renegade, Pamphilon the Backstabbing Opportunist, former

Less than three weeks removed from the shocking suicide of former NFL great Junior Seau, and as the football community copes with what can legitimately be characterized as a concussion crisis, many concerned Americans are asking themselves a simple but question:

Would you let your son play football?

The answers, complex and quite personal, can provoke charged responses. Such was the case with former NFL great Kurt Warner, whose recent admission that he would prefer his sons not play the sport that made him rich and famous was met with rebuke by ex-New York Giants receiver Amani Toomer and former Pittsburgh Steelers running back and ESPN analyst Merril Hoge, not to mention numerous fans.

[Around the NFL: Buccaneers trade tight end Kellen Winslow to Seahawks, sign Dallas Clark instead]

Shortly thereafter, I got a call from a father who spoke passionately in Warner's defense.

It turned out this football dad had prohibited his only son from playing the sport until

Jonathan Vilma will miss the entire 2012 season if his suspension stands. (Getty)Jonathan Vilma may not see a penny from the defamation lawsuit he filed against NFL commissioner Roger Goodell on Thursday. But whatever the outcome, the suspended New Orleans Saints linebacker's political capital among his peers is the equivalent of a blank check.

By taking on the powerful chief executive derisively known as "God-dell" to some NFL players, Vilma not only issued a challenge to the commissioner to produce some concrete evidence against the four players disciplined in the Saints' bounty case, but he also took a symbolic shot at Goodell's omnipotence.

[Jason Cole: Recent NFL draft picks get shortchanged on contracts]

As viewed in NFL circles, a 30-year-old linebacker with creaky knees and little to lose just served God – and a lot of players are celebrating as though Ronnie Lott had just smacked Ickey Woods into last Tuesday.

"What a badass," an offensive player for an NFC team said of Vilma on Thursday afternoon. "He's the man. I think it's nuts, but I love

STANFORD, Calif. – As the 21st century poster child for staying in school, rather than cashing in and bolting for the pros, Andrew Luck is supposed to be eternally comfortable in what he calls "The Bubble."

Andrew Luck (R), with fellow former Cardinal Coby Fleener, during the Colts' rookie camp. (US Presswire)Two Sunday nights ago, however, Luck returned to Stanford University's campus with all the enthusiasm of a kid being forced to repeat the sixth grade. Having just flown back from Indianapolis, where the Colts' presumptive franchise quarterback made a strong first impression at his initial NFL minicamp, Luck couldn't quite bring himself to show up on time for a study group for his studio-project class.

"Coming back from minicamp was tough," Luck said as he laughed. "You get a little taste of it and then come back, and I was lacking the motivation to do homework. We had something due Tuesday and we were supposed to meet up, and I was like, 'Uuuuuhhhhh.' I didn't blow it off – completely."

Call it a harmonic convergence of senioritis, spring fever and the pressure that