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"&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt; The Lions and quarterback Matthew Stafford have reportedly started contract extension talks. (Gregory Shamus/Getty Images)&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The Detroit Lions want to make sure their franchise quarterback is in a blue and silver\u00A0uniform for years to come.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;The team and Matthew Stafford\u00A0have reportedly started talks\u00A0on a contract extension. The talks are said to be in the preliminary stages and both sides are not pressing the issue.\u00A0Stafford is due a base salary of $12 million next season, although his salary cap number is at $20.3 million.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;\"Matthew Stafford\u00A0is our quarterback, and we hope is our quarterback for a long time,\" Lions\u00A0president Tom\u00A0Lewand said,\u00A0via MLive.com. \"The reason to explore a contract extension with Matthew is to fulfill that goal of having him be our quarterback for a long time. It's not a short-term look at the salary cap.\u00A0That's the wrong way to look at that. When you look at extending somebody like Matthew, he's not going to take less money to extend. That's a very short-term focus to look at.\"Stafford threw for 4,967 yards with 20 touchdowns and 17 interceptions for the 4-12 Lions last season.&lt;/p&gt;"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.si.com/si-wire/2013/02/28/lions-stafford-talk-extension>