Lions fans hoping to see Drew Stanton under center this year might be out of luck. Offensive coordinator Jim Colletto said Thursday, in no uncertain terms, that he doesn't think Stanton is ready for game action right now.

"He's not ready to do that yet," Colletto said. "I'm not going to embarrass the kid just to prove a point to somebody else."

Embarrass? That's a strong word.

"The fans want a lot of things. So do we," Colletto said. "But I'm not going to put a youngster in there and embarrass him in a live NFL game where those guys on the other side don't care who the quarterback is until he's real comfortable with what he's doing. And he's getting closer and closer to doing that. And so I'm saying we'll give him more and more turns and get him a little more comfortable at doing that. But the big point when we did this change, Dan was first and foremost. That was most important. And now we can work the other way a little bit."

Stanton did take a couple first-team reps at the end of each practice period Thursday, the first No. 1 reps he's taken since Dan Orlovsky replaced Jon Kitna as starter two weeks ago. Colletto said Stanton will continue to take first-team snaps in practice but may "need another preseason" before he he's fully comfortable in the offense.

"The experiment to throw him in there right now wouldn't be fair to him, at this point," Colletto said.