Detroit Lions Weblog

Impressions of the Upcoming Fan Protest, Personnel Issues

Lions fans plan on walking out of Sunday’s game with eight minutes remaining in the second quarter.   As much as I want to support an organized expression of fan discontent over the Lions, I have to wonder, why bother even going?

The Lions are an abysmal franchise who are clearly brushing up against professional sports infamy and are residing on a short list of the worst professional sports franchises in history.   Why would anyone, attending a holiday game of their own free will, decide to walk out?  Will it make a difference?  Other than a few brief moments of attention on national television, I believe that any fan protest that doesn’t include not spending money on the marketing umbrella of Lions brands (concessions, merchandise, tickets, etc) will, in essence, change nothing. 

The Ford’s have shown that previous fan protests will not alter the course of this sad organization.  In fact, they appear completely immune to the apathy and anger that they have generated by consistently fielding such a poor team.  The charade is over, the Ford’s want your money and don’t care whether their paying customers are happy with the product they are receiving or not.

The Lions have placed 14 players on their injured reserve list.   The most damage has occurred on their offensive and defensive lines.  This is a continued indictment of the poor performance of the Lions front office in scouting and personnel evaluation.   The Lions need to to make it a priority to build a solid, quality offensive and defensive line through the draft, rather than assembling a mismatched, patchwork representation of what stands as quality line play.  A certain amount of these injuries are attributable to bad luck, yet, entering into agreements with Rex Tucker, Ross Verba and Barry Stokes came with a certain amount of risk involved.

Matt Millen should issue passes out of town for G Damien Woody and DT Shaun Rogers, by any means necessary.  Their disappointing performances provide a stark realization for the Lions, these are not the type of players that can be allowed to stunt the organizational growth necessary in the rebuilding process.

 Millen’s pre-eminent concern should become re-signing versatile DE/DT Cory Redding who has thrived in his new role as the team’s DT.   He has exhibited a great deal of untapped potential.  If the Lions lose Redding, they will be beginning completely from scratch along their defensive line.

Matt Millen also needs to start angling to move from the Lions current draft slot, be it 1, 2, or 3, and find a way to package players like DT Shaun Rogers and CB Dre Bly into trades for draft picks.   The Lions need to have their most successful draft in team history, if they plan on ever changing their current course.  As time passes, they are further and further away from possessing the necessary pieces to build a respectable franchise.   If they intend on changing their current direction, no stone should be unturned, no methodology should prove too unorthodox, in their efforts to rebuild their franchise.

The Detroit News’ Mike O’Hara made an interesting point during today’s appearance on the Tim Staudt show.   O’Hara says that the Lions should consider bringing in a consultant for Matt Millen (like former Packers GM Ron Wolf) to assist in the process of rebuilding the team.   The Texans attempted the same type of procedure by hiring Dan Reeves, which obviously hasn’t panned out for them, yet.   That being said, an outside influence can only help, when you are in the dire situation that the Lions are currently in.