Detroit Lions Weblog

Accountability

When Steve Mariucci was hired, performances like we saw Sunday in Chicago were supposed to be eradicated. The Lions brought Mariucci/weg into the fold so that they could eliminate the stupid penalties, the outbreak of mind-numbing turnovers, and an overall lack of toughness and skill in the team’s personnel. With all honesty, Marty Mariucci/weg has done absolutely little to improve the team’s performance that we have long suffered through as Lions fans.

I remember during the Wayne Fontes era, how many Lion fans had regarded Fontes as the huge punchline to a not-so-funny joke. Their was a general consensus among Lions fans calling for Fontes dismissal as head coach. Hindsight being 20/20, in the past 25 years of this organization, this was comparatively a “golden era” for the team.

What is most troubling about performances like Sunday or the pre-season loss to the Rams, is how relatively ineffectual Steve Mariucci/weg appears in response to the team’s meltdowns. The second week of the season is not a time when a head coach starts addressing things that need to be fixed or attempts to “coach up” underperforming talent. The Lions are not the first team to get blown out in an important game, but they are among the relatively few in the NFL who carry around the organizational baggage that make games like Sunday’s loss so difficult to overcome.

Their is dissension bubbling in the ranks, outbursts like those that were witnessed by Mssr.’s Harrington, Jones, Johnson and Williams will become commonplace if things continue to unravel. Already, Charles Rogers has voiced his displeasure over not being more involved in the offense. With all honesty, a team who is supposed to be a playoff contender (or least a contender for a 8-8 record!) should not have games like what we have seen thus far in the season. The entire philosophy of the coaching staff and the front office will again need to be re-evaluated, in the very near future. Game 3 is not the time to scrap an offensive or defensive philosophy, but anything short of that type of upheaval before the next game will lead to major disappointments for Lion fans. As dismal as this offense has been, if the Lions defense is not more physical and aggressive the team will have difficulty finding it a possibility to win 5 or 6 games.

That what brings me to final point, accountability. The Lions ownership rewarded a team president with a contract extension before the season whose teams have recorded an awful 15 and 40-something record during his tenure. In turn, how can anybody hold Steve Mariucci/weg and his coaching staff to any comparable standards of performance, if the team president’s lackluster performance has been rewarded, encouraged, and must be by proxy considered up to acceptable standards by receiving the aforementioned contract extension. In all likelihood, this WILL be Steve Mariucci’s last season as a Lions head coach. Honestly, games like Sunday will continue to linger and spill over into future performances. Their will be alot of hard feelings and disappointment to go around within an organization who claims that they expect so much more. Where EXACTLY do Steve Mariucci and his staff begin attempting to fix things? What problems that the team encountered Sunday will be the easiest to fix?

The biggest losers in the entire pathetic equation remains to be all of the die- hard Lions fans who are sooooo hungry for a respectable team and have weathered the organization’s pitfalls through thick and thin. When has enough become enough?