Detroit Lions Weblog

Week 12 preview: New England Vs. Detroit Lions Thanksgiving

After two terrible, embarrassing road losses, the Lions return to their home, Ford Field, to play a game which constitutes their Super Bowl, against a team who has been perennially the best the league has to offer.

The Lions are in a unique position. All hope has been lost, after some early optimism. During the first eight games, an argument could be made that they were in fact better than their won-loss record would indicate. In the two road games hence, they have looked like an undermanned team who will be lucky to even keep games close down the stretch, let alone grab a win or two as the season reaches its finale.

It's Been a Long Time Since the Lions Have Given a Turducken Toast!

In today’s game, the Lions should play with the complete abandon and desperation of a team who has absolutely nothing left to lose. Not one person among their fan base believes they will win today. After six consecutive horrifyingly bad blow out losses on Thanksgiving, the consensus is that the Lions will get rickrolled by the Patriots, in a spectacularly embarrassing fashion.

The Patriots are not without flaw. Their “bend, but don’t break” pass defense will be vulnerable to the Lions pass first offense, as long as the Lions can run just well enough to keep the Patriots defensive from pinning their ears back and coming after Shaun Hill.

Tom Brady Has Made Argument For His Being Mentioned Among the Top Five All-Time NFL QB's

The Lions will likely have a very limited version of Jahvid Best and Maurice Morris to attempt to shape a ground game, which will keep the Patriots honest defensively. Luckily, each Best and Morris are adept pass catchers, which might constitute an extension of the Lions ground attack, if the Lions can get them onto the perimeter of the Patriots defense.

If the Lions can establish successful runs, and utilize a ball control, time of possession-eating style of offense, they could limit the number of possessions that the incredibly potent Patriots offense will be to capitalize upon.

Defensively, the Lions are going to be put to the test. The Patriots are a pass first team who utilize a full accoutrement of offensive weapons to their advantage.

As always, the Lions defensive line will dictate any success that the Lions may eventually enjoy defensively. If they are unable to pressure Brady, they will get absolutely skewered by Wes Welker and the Patriots tight ends, Aaron Hernandez and Dan Gronkowski.

In the end, I believe that the Patriots will make the Lions out to be the turkeys that they are.

Same Ol' Lions

Patriots 37 Lions 17

Lions Penalties, Offensive Line Performance Are Instrumental in Lions Poor Play

As the Lions season begins to wear on, as Lions fans grow increasingly bloodthirsty, and the losses continue to pile up, the fact the Lions continue to lead the league in penalties only grows as a point of contention.

If anything exhibits a lack of discipline and reveals a serious flaw in concentration and preparation, it is the Lions persisting to draw nearly ten penalties per game, usually at the least opportune of times.

Seemingly, It is Rare to See a Play Where the Lions Haven't Drawn a Penalty Flag

The Lions are tied for the league lead in penalties (with the Raiders) with 98. They have committed double digit penalties in six of their last seven games. The Lions penalties have occurred at maddening frequency for Lions fans, as the season marches on.

One reporter asked Lions Head Coach Jim Schwartz Monday about the Lions penalties, and whether they were an indication of a overall lack of team discipline, and less explicitly, a sign of the head coach’s failure in managing the team. Schwartz was understandably defensive, but if the shoe fits:

“Pittsburgh had six personal fouls. Is that a lack of discipline or is that them playing hard?”Schwartz shot back.

I understand Schwartz’s bristling at the reporters line of questioning, but as players like LB Julian Peterson and OG Stephen Peterman continue to commit costly penalty after costly penalty, accountability becomes an underlying issue.

“If your object is to go out and get no penalties in a game, you’re never going to play aggressively enough to win,” Schwartz said. “That’s like going up to the plate and saying ‘I’m trying not to strike out, try not to strike out, try not to strike out.’

“You’re never going to get a hit (with that strategy), and you’re never going to hit a home run.”

I don’t think Lions fans are unreasonable enough to be concerned with the penalties which comes as a result of aggressiveness, I, for one, think that the frequency of pre-snap penalties is the most infuriating.

I realize that the Lions may have no better option to play instead of Peterson and Peterman upon their current roster, but their propensity towards drawing penalty flags should factor into that determination process, in my opinion.

It’s been our Achilles heel as a team the whole season,” defensive end Kyle Vanden Bosch said. “Guys think about it everyday at practice and made it a point of emphasis. It’s just something that’s continued to plague us.”

Schwartz later discussed which penalties he believed to be most costly, since they were clearly avoidable:

“If they’re before the snap and after the whistle,” Schwartz said, “those are the ones that are going to drive coaches crazy, and those are the ones that have the potential to hurt the team the most.”

Seemingly, most of the penalties which the Lions draw are of this variety and a clear indication of the Lions discipline problems persisting, and one of the primary variables chiseling away at the Schwartz’s credibility as Lions head coach.

Jim Schwartz Has Become a Lions Head Coach

Schwartz cried a loser’s lament, pointing out that the Lions have been victims to poor and inconsistently officiated games during the 2010 season.

(Stephen) Peterman got called on a block that was very, very similar to a block that (Dallas) made on us in the fourth quarter,” Schwartz said. “Same play, a wide receiver screen. Same block, ours got called and there’s didn’t.

“The consistency is troubling. Just like in baseball, if you’re going to get an outside strike called, let it be that way the whole game.”

As much as the proliferation of penalty flags have been ugly, the continued poor play of the Lions offensive line, partially due to penalties, have continued to impact the Lions offensive performance.

The Lions lack of ground attack, besides injuries to RB’s Jahvid Best and Kevin Smith, is largely due to the failures of the Lions offensive line. Among the Lions fan base, there has been a desire for upgrades in this playing group for years, but the Lions have allowed their poor performance to continue to persist by not addressing their personnel.

The Lions did add Rob Sims this off-season, and subsequently have extended him a long term contract, otherwise, since they were drafted, Jeff Backus, Dominic Raiola and Gosder Cherilus have been the Lions constants.

The Worst Moment of the Lions 2010 Season

Jeff Backus is the most polarizing factor on the team, who despite his consistency by never missing a start during his career, has been routinely defeated by speed rushers throughout his career, most noticeably the Julius Peppers sack which has effectively eliminated Matthew Stafford from being a factor in the 2010 season.

The Lions have had ample opportunity to upgrade their offensive line during recent seasons, passing on a number of players who could protect a potential franchise Qb and improve a ground game that has languished for years now.

Jim Schwartz realizes that the Lions have an increasingly smaller margin for error, as the season presses on.

“We’re at the point as a team where we can’t afford to make it harder on ourselves,” Schwartz said.

As the Lions season continues to go off the rails, their future will be of more immediate concern. Addressing their offensive line and devoting some organizational fine tuning to eliminating the rash of costly penalties might be enough to extend Jim Schwartz’s coaching career and help him to rise above the level of just “being another Lions head coach”

The Lions Brutal Performance in Loss to Cowboys is Clear Sign of Regression

For the Lions, amid a 26-game (and counting, 8-70 since 2001, by the way) road losing streak, the different manners in which they continue to find the means to lose are near infinite. Since starting the 2007 season 6-2, the Lions are 5-44 in the following 49 games. It goes without question that this is currently the worst franchise in all of professional sports history.

The Lions Performance Sunday, in Pictures

On Sunday, it was John Wendling making an excellent play to save a Nick Harris punt from being a touchback, but not only were his teammates nowhere to be found to down the ball and end the play, but his extraordinary effort was all for naught because the football gods intervened, yet again. How often does a ball fortuitously bounce off of the stadium turf and literally bound into the waiting hands of a kick returner, who subsequently takes the ball 99 yards for a score–untouched? Seemingly, this happens only to the Lions(I don’t want to hear that McCann stepped out of bounds on the play, it was not reviewed)…

How many teams make a good stop on a running play in the red zone, with a ferocious tackle, on a crucial third down, which would have forced the Cowboys to kick a field goal, and effectively would have kept the game close, only to have a phantom penalty assessed? Only the Lions…

Ndamukong Suh’s tackle by the dreadlocks, on Marian Barber III, was clearly not a horse collar tackle, but this is the type of thing that continually dogs the Lions, on their way to losing each and every week.

For the Lions, There is Always Another Clown
Waiting to Emerge, From Their “Rolling Circus”

Here is why this keeps happening. The Lions are an undisciplined team who are much farther from becoming a viable NFL franchise than many of us would like to admit. After the last two games, and likely lambasting by the Patriots Thursday, the Lions are now regressing back to their Matt Millen-mean, right before our very eyes.

Yes, the Lions do possess some talent, but their continued lack of discipline, inability to develop a running game, and poor offensive line play, two variables which are obviously inextricably linked, will confine them to the NFL basement perennially, until further notice.

The Stench of This Doomed Union Still Hangs Heavy in the Arid Ford Field Air

For many Lions fans, we are now entering our collective short week of national embarassment, in a game which used to be a source of pride. The Lions have no legitimate argument for retaining their high profile annual Thanksgiving Day game, except for the justification that they have hosted the game for 76 seasons.

During recent games, the Lions have exhibited little pride in defending their rights to this game, either. This game, the one and only that the organization can boast is nationally broadcast, should be an annual highlight.

Joyful Days, From So Damn Long Ago

Instead, the Lions annual Thanksgiving Game has a dark pall hovering over it, because the Lions play most resembles the fetid stench of a Turkey farm, once the Butterball trucks have arrived.

The Lions have won two (2000, 2003) of their last 10 Thanksgiving Day games, with a scoring differential of 285-169, or a -116 pts. They have lost by an average of 14.9 points per game, in each of their losses.

At this point, I can see the valid argument that the NFL should intervene and penalize this franchise, since the league has been consciously designed to feature parity among teams, which the Lions continue to defy improbably.

In order to understand why the Lions retain their annual Thanksgiving game, follow the money. The Ford’s are major contributor to the league coffers, since they are major advertisers during NFL broadcasts.

At any rate, Jim Schwartz is rapidly joining the doomed pantheon of Lions coaches, as his inauspicious 4-22 start as a Lions coach is increasingly indiscernible from the failed tenures of his many predecessors.

We accept them! We accept them! One of us! One of us! Gooble gobble, gooble gobble!

For Lions fans, who are intimate with coaching tenures going down in flames, all that remains is the “how’s” and “why’s” which will inevitably mark the decline and end of Schwartz’s tenure, not “when”.

Week 11 Preview: Lions Vs. Cowboys

After last week’s penalty and mistake-filled loss to the previously winless Buffalo Bills, it is safe to say that any of the momentum or good feeling that the Lions had garnered from their fan base has been pretty much decimated.

As a result, future expectations for the 2010-1 Lions season is dubious at best, or a job for the patron saint of lost causes, St. Jude, at worst.

The Lions Have Constituted a Lost Cause For Awhile Now

With the recent announcement that there will be a prayer vigil held for the team on Thanksgiving, the desire for divine intervention seems to be weighing upon Lions fans minds.

Enter Jon Kitna, a former Lions QB and a player noted for his strong faith and commitment to a number of religious avocations.

The Lions Front Four Needs to Give Kitna This Type of Familiar Treatment

The Cowboys, who are currently winless at home, after a hype-filled pre-season which had the Cowboys franchise preparing to be the first team to play in the Super Bowl at their home field, are 2-7 overall.

The Cowboys, due to a shoulder injury to QB Tony Romo, are being lead by backup QB Jon Kitna. The Lions defense needs to play much better run defense than they did against the Buffalo Bills last week, in an attempt to put the game squarely upon Kitna’s shoulders, especially in 3rd and long distance situations.

If the Lions can limit the Cowboys RB’s Felix Jones and Marion Barber III, and put the Cowboys into continual third and long distance situations, even with all of the many Cowboys pass catching playmakers (WR’s Miles Austin, Dez Bryant, TE Jason Witten), they stand a chance of keeping the game close, and potentially capitalizing upon any Kitna mistakes.

Quick, Name the NFL Player Who Most Rapidly Descended Into Being a Mere Caricature of Himself?

The Lions fatalist in me, fully expects that the Lions will head to Dallas and lay another egg. They will have a long, penalty-filled game, in which former Lions Jon Kitna and Roy Williams hook up for two TD’s, with Kitna throwing for 325 yards. It is very difficult for me to be objective.

That being said, with the Cowboys struggling to a 2-7 record, despite prior expectations, there is no reason not to believe that they will in fact be the team who shoots itself in the foot and allows the game to sputter from out of their hands.

As America’s team, they are a perfectly serviceable analogue for the decline of the American way of life, and it’s often bankrupt intentions.

The Cowboys possess more eye-popping, glitz and glamour than the rest of the NFL’s franchises combined. They have the league’s most visible owner, Jerry Jones, and an absolute megalomaniacal monument to American hubris, in the outlandish style of pre-financial collapse America (both audacious and embarrassing at the same time), with their everything-bigger-is-better home field, Cowboys Stadium.

And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter. And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.

The Cowboys could return to their early season form and languish Sunday. In order for that to happen, the Lions need to balance their passing and rushing offense.

The Lions aren’t going to become a quality running team overnight, and hobbled Jahvid Best is clearly impaired by his ailments. That being said, the Lions have to be able run competently enough to take some of the pressure from of Shaun Hill’s shoulders, and prevent the Cowboys from utilizing blitzes in their 3-4 defense to pressure the Lions from out of their game plan.

Who am I kidding!? After last week’s dismal performance, I have no expectations. This team, who has fought hard all season, to no avail, has another opportunity to remove the organization’s most clinging albatross, the 25-game road losing streak.

The Lions Albatross Around Their Neck, Road Games

Until the road losing streak ends, it is hard to not to regress into writing a “Same Ol’ Lions” entry, with an equally predictable outcome:

Cowboys 27 Lions 20

Kevin Smith is Placed on IR, LB Campbell Activated From The Practice Squad

After taking the wind out of the sails of the entire Lions fan base last weekend, with a deflating performance against the previously winless Buffalo Bills, the Lions are starting to look snake-bitten for the remainder of the 2010-1 season too.

The Lions put RB Kevin Smith on the injured reserve list this week, after a thumb surgery which would make him unavailable for (at least) the next several weeks. As poor as the Lions running game had been overall, Smith had still shown glimpses of promise and signs that he may have been returning to full health after last season’s knee injury.

It Has Grown Difficult to Promise Kevin Smith That There Will Be Better Days Ahead

The Lions promoted LB Caleb Campbell from the practice squad, who is best known as the player who the United States Army didn’t allow to waive his service commitment, in order to play with the Lions.

I expect that Campbell will be a special teams contributor whose playing time will hinge upon his production in that area. That being said, there is a certain segment of the Lions fan base who have supported and taken interest in his improbable career and would like to see him get a chance and eventually thrive.

Even though the Lions and Cowboys each play today, each fan base has begun to look forward to their respective annual Thanksgiving Day games, which represent high points of each organization’s season, especially since both teams are mired in 2-7 seasons.

The Lions, Turkey’s For 76 Seasons
and Counting…

The Lions announced that they would be wearing their “throwback” jerseys on Thanksgiving, which has been a highlight for me each time they elect to wear them, since I believe that they should be the Lions OFFICIAL uniform, rather the team’s alternate jersey.

The bad news was that, purported “American Bad Ass”, and future fairground and casino attraction, Kid Rock, a resident of the Detroit area, will be the Thanksgiving game’s half-time performer. Thank the heavens for mute buttons!

Coming to a 4-H Barn Near You?

Or better yet, since the Lions are likely to be down 14-21 points to the Patriots at the half, it may be best to grab a second plate of food, kick my feet back, and take a long, luxuriating nap, waking up just in time to watch Benjarvus Green-Ellis or Aaron Hernandez hoist up the Gobbler trophy and a drumstick.

An Award No Lions Player is Likely to Win

Once concerned Detroit-area reverend, Rev. Horace Sheffield is holding a prayer vigil at Eastern Market for the Lions on Thanksgiving. Advocacy for the Lions is normally a job for St. Jude, but Sheffield shed a little light upon his decision to pray in support of the Lions that day.

Nov. 17, Fox 2: “We’ve had Barry. We’ve had new management. We’ve had new coaches. We have a new field. Maybe it’s time to get God to help,” said the Reverend Horace Sheffield III.

Without Kevin Smith, and given the general incompetence in their running game, the Lions chances in their remaining games appear increasingly dubious, as each week passes.

My Love Affair With Eddie Kirkland’s “It’s the Blues Man!” album

Everybody has a “go-to” album in their collection, one that helps them to get their juvenile, unrestrained party started. One that makes you want to turn over the coffee table and throw your beer cans against the wall in a kind of exulted, jubilant celebration of life, shortcomings be damned!

For me, this album, at least for the last 10 years or so, has been Eddie Kirkland’s “It’s the Blues Man!”. From the silly grammar of the album’s title (is it “It’s the Blues, Man” or is it really, “It’s the “Blues Man”", in a reference to Eddie?) to the deliciously raw, but hip and urbane performances of Kirkland’s band, this album has enjoyed an incredible staying power in my collection, despite my fickle moods and fancies.

This album belongs in the blues pantheon with Otis Rush, Guitar Slim, et al

One of the more alluring aspects of Kirkland’s best and most famous recording is the complete mystery which seemingly surrounds him and his career. Kirkland’s career has always brushed up against fame and widespread notoriety, but in keeping with his itinerant nom de guerre, as the “Gypsy of the Blues”, there are inexplicable gaps which have never been successfully filled in his incredibly long career.

Starting with his Caribbean descent (being born in Kingston, Jamaica) and being raised in Alabama (where he ran off with the Silas Green show, playing “hambone”, festooned with a harp in his mouth and probably ending up in Greil Marcus’s “Old, Weird America” along the way) and eventually settling in Detroit, where he recorded for the infamous Fortune label and served as John Lee Hooker’s performing partner and confidant, Kirkland’s life has always been on the move.

Lu Pine Records Was An Appropriate Home For Kirkland's Feral Howl

In Tom Wilson’s work notes for the album, he seizes upon the Kirkland’s intrepid career, denoting that this represents a new beginning, which in the end, was the first of many for Kirkland:

As an accomplished guitarist with an unusually clear and singing instrumental sound, “Bluesman” (there it is again…) has appeared as an accompanist with the great blues songman, John Lee Hooker. from 1949 to 1953, before deciding to go out on his own. This album marks the beginning of a whole new career for Eddie as a “single” act with ten years of hard luck, meager pleasures, illness, and sporadic employment behind him.

In the end, I wonder if the by-the-seat-of-his-pants nature of Kirkland’s career, is fundamentally what makes this brilliant album so lasting and genuinely inspired. Kirkland never enjoyed the creature comforts of life and was never able to get complacent. He was scuffling and hustling along, trying to seize each and every opportunity as if it could possibly be his last.

The “It’s the Blues Man!” album is one that occurs completely in the moment and is nearly desperate in it’s supplication to love and it’s travails. It rocks unrelentingly and straddles near perfectly the back country rawness of a Mississippi juke with the urbane, refinery of Ray Charles (and the soon to be beloved, inspired pleading of soul music).

The fact that Kirkland emerged from the south and moved to the city of Detroit, like thousands of others, to work in the auto factories, is likely reflected in the explosive din of his music, which serves as an analogue of the contrast of wide open country living to working in the martial, interminably dull setting of the assembly line.

Tru-Sound, Indeed!

By enlisting the likes of jazzman Oliver Nelson and saxophonist extraordinaire King Curtis, it is really quite amazing that this album comes across as one that was recorded, with everyone’s sleeves collectively rolled up, tipping back jugs of ’shine, and throwing down one “take”, two to three minute songs of viscerally raw and unrefined perfection, while partying ’til the break of dawn.

Of course that assumption is made without acknowledging the brilliance of King Curtis and his band, who also backed the mighty Sam Cooke, in the gutbucket style of the chitlin circuit, (effectively taking Cooke away from his RCA-imposed imprisonment of supper clubs and teen pop music) on the sweaty and raw “Live at the Harlem Square Club” album.

At 87, Kirkland’s career doesn’t entirely connect with his past, as I found out several years ago (2000) while seeing him perform in Sacramento, CA. While watching his set hungover and bleary-eyed at a music festival, I saw first hand that Kirkland was still vital, even if his current songs had little in common with those recorded in 1962.

I was even blessed with an opportunity to briefly talk with him, after his set (and having him graciously autograph my unbeknownst to me, puke-stained Tower Record’s managers convention name tag. Bleech!). When I asked him about this album, it seemed as if he didn’t even recall it. True to his itinerant nature, Eddie’s train done gone!

See Eddie Kirkland perform at LeRoy's in Lansing, MI, Friday Nov. 19th

see also The HoundBlog and Rich Tupica’s City Pulse article for more info on Eddie Kirkland.

QB Shaun Hill Enjoys His “Orlovsky” Moment In Horrific Bills Loss

Just like every Lions coach has their own moment that marks (mars?) their career as a Lions coach, seemingly every Lions Qb also has a similar event which occurs, that places them squarely into the sad lexicon of failure which circumscribes the entire Lions organization.

The ball slipped,” Hill said. “I was sick when the ball left my hand. I wanted to put one on him — up, where he could go get it. That thing just (slipped) out of my hand and I was hoping it hadn’t carried too far.”

Epic Failure, Lions Style

Much like former Lions QB Dan Orlovsky giving up a safety by running along the boundary line of his own end zone several seasons ago, Hill’s hanging, wounded duck of a pass to Brandon “Butterfingers” Pettigrew, lofting and flitting it’s way out of the field of play, will likely represent a lasting image for a doomed 2010 Lions season, moving foward.

Hill is not lacking in grit or determination. As awful as the Lions offense was yesterday, his late game heroics, despite all of the Lions many struggles, are squarely emblematic of this failed Lions season.

The 2-7 Lions, who have been dogged by sloppy play and inability to finish games and achieve victory, have illusorily provided fans with the optimism to believe that a couple of the Lions losses could have easily been victories, if only the fates had been on their side. It was easy to fall into the trap of believing that the Lions were better than their record would indicate on the surface.

Hill’s “Thousand Yard Stare” Speaks Volumes
About His Short Time With the Lions

Yesterday’s performance cleared that up. The Lions are a 2-7 team because they deserve to be. Shaun Hill is the backup on a 2-7 team because he does not possess the talent necessary to lead a team to 7-2 record in nine games.

Shaun Hill on the 25-game road losing streak:
“I’ve got to be honest with you, I don’t think about the road losing streak,” Hill said. “I don’t think anybody does. I’ve only been here a half of a season, so the road losing streak that I know about is the one we’ve got going on this year. Plus, that’s something I feel like people want to write about. That’s not part of the game to us.”

Except for the fact being, that until the Lions remove the albatross of a 25-game road losing streak from around their necks, they will always be cellar dwellers, of course.

As Lions fans, we know how this story is likely to play out. Matthew Stafford will miss the remainder of the 2010 season. Hill will keep scrabbling for elusive victories, as the Lions season comes off of the rails.

Need We Say Any More?

We will all flash back to that moment yesterday, in a game which they clearly had no business being in contention to win, where if Hill could have at least placed the ball within the field of play, at least our disappointment about the Lions failures would have a basis in reality (rather than being in awe of their sur-reality). Instead, bitterness over the Lions incompetence reigns supreme.

Embarrassment Ensues, Welcome Back, Same Ol’ Lions!

Penalties, sloppy tackling and a general malaise, which are likely to be considered as associated with playing outdoors in the rain (away from the comfy confines of Ford Field, I might add), all contributed to an ugly, embarrassing, and deflating road loss for the Lions today.

What Was I Thinking, Dee-troit?!

The Lions achieved some measure of history, by losing their 25th straight road game, after previously setting that mark with a 24-game road losing streak (twice).

The Lions are now 4-37 in their last 41 games. Jim Schwartz is also now 4-21 in his 25-game coaching tenure, which is a much less then auspicious beginning, in my book.

In my eyes, the Lions should absolutely be ashamed of their lack of effort and numerous mental errors. They played much more like an 0-8 team, than a team who had a solid argument to suggest that should be 4-4 at the season’s midpoint.

Monte Clark, Darryl Rogers, Wayne Fontes, Bobby Ross, Marty Mornihnweg, Steve Mariucci, Dick Jauron, Rod Marinelli...and Now, Jim Schwartz. All Definitively Lions Head Coaches.

At this point, any perceived gains that the Lions have made are now completely washed away. As much as their 2-6 start once seemed positive, they have now firmly established themselves as a team deserving of yet another top ten draft pick, in the 2011 draft.

Speaking of which, it is now safe to say, for Lions fans, the season is now done, and draft speculation can begin to take the center stage. I am thinking a complete overhaul of the Lions offensive line may be in order.

Which makes me think, after the Lions continued struggles in their rushing attack, why didn’t the Lions address their offensive line during recent drafts and the free agency period.

Raiders OT Jared Veldheer (or Michael Oher, or Ryan Clady, Or Joe Thomas, or...) Would Look Awfully Good in Honolulu Blue

Each of the Lions starting QB’s, Matthew Stafford and Shaun Hill, have experienced injuries which are attributable to poor offensive line play. Adding a sputtering and ineffective rushing attack, and it becomes obvious that this team NEEDS to address this playing group.

You Can Start the Official “Clock”
on Schwartz’s Coaching Tenure

For Jim Schwartz, today’s effort was a severe setback. Lions fans have embraced him and the numerous changes that he has made, but there has been no substantial payoff. An embarrassing, ugly road loss, to a winless team is an unpardonable offense from which his career may never recover.

Schwartz and his coaching staff need to re-group this team and make it eminently clear, efforts like Sunday’s are completely unacceptable. Salvaging what remaining scraps of respectability that they can garner from this season is the order of the day.

Welcome Back, Same Ol’ Lions! I almost missed you.

Week 10 Preview: Lions Vs. Bills

One way or another, either the Bills or the Lions, will march toward infamy, as a result of today’s game outcome. The Lions will either continue on with a 25-game road losing streak, or the Bills the will be 0-9, with a reasonably good chance of improbably matching the 2008 Lions 0-16 season.

After a hard fought loss to the Jets at home last week, the Lions are likely staring at life without QB Matthew Stafford for the remaining duration of the 2010 season and are absolutely ripe for a letdown game, after playing much better than their 2-6 record would indicate.

Jim Schwartz, Infamy Awaits?

Job one for the Lions, with the return from injury of QB Shaun Hill, is allowing for Hill to get comfortable. They will likely do that by attempting to establish their dual rushing attack of RB’s Jahvid Best and Kevin Smith. If the Lions can run with the ball, establishing their passing attack for Shaun Hill, in lieu of any potential rustiness, will likely be much less challenging.

The Bills 3-4 defense is the league’s worst rushing defense, allowing 178.2 yards per game. If the Lions can get Best and Smith involved, it will also ease the additional safety coverage that the Bills are likely to devote to Calvin Johnson, in an attempt to limit his impact upon the game.

Nate Burleson's Emergence Opens Up The Lions Offense

After last week’s big game by Nate Burleson, the Lions offense puts a significant amount of pressure upon opposing defenses, even if their backup receivers are generally mediocre (Bryant Johnson) to terrible (Derrick Williams).

Defensively, the Lions are going to attempt to utilize their front four to pressure and disrupt Ivy Leaguer Ryan Fitzpatrick, whose confidence and dependability has only increased with each passing week.

Fitzpatrick is more if a dink-and-dunk, ball control type of Qb, which will make it difficult for the Lions front four to disrupt and sack him, even against a really porous Bills offensive line.

The Bills rushing attack is not particularly deadly, but the combo of Bills RB’s Fred Jackson and C.J. Spiller will likely factor heavily into the Bills game plan. The Lions aren’t particularly stout against the run, and it will open up the Bills passing attack.

If Spiller and Jackson are able to be productive, the Lions defense will be put on their heels, and the Bills offense will control the ball, wearing down the Lions defense.

In this particular case, the Bills likely stand their best chance by keeping the Lions offense off of the field. The Lions road difficulties will only be exacerbated if it comes down to their defense having to win the game for them.

The Lions Most Senior Member, Jason Douglas Hanson, Will Be a Spectator Today

The Lions special teams will factor heavily in today’s game. The Bills have a dynamic kick returner in C.J. Spiller. After the Lions struggles a couple of weeks ago against Brandon Banks, and a number of injuries sustained to key special teams performers (Isiah Ekijiuba and Zack Follett), the Lions are especially vulnerable to being burnt by Spiller.

As much as I want to believe that the Lions are now better than they have been during recent seasons, and aren’t going to have the same kind of breakdowns than they have been normally prone to, I can’t help but think that the Lions are especially vulnerable this week. Oh the pain…

This Miserable Lions Fan Can Hardly Bear the Thought of a 25-Game Road Losing Streak.

Bills 24 Lions 17

A Pall Hangs Over the Lions Organization, As Prospects of A Road Game Against the Bills Looms

Neil from Armchair Linebacker, sums up the current feelings of nearly the entire Lions fan base here, with a brutal blow by blow breakdown:

on Drew Stanton’s decision to pass on third down:So, watching Ol’ Plucky roll out, get chased by a blitzer and then toss a big bag of grit at Jerome Felton’s feet was a special kind of torture, wasn’t it? All the Lions needed to do in that situation was run another play, let 35 seconds roll off of the clock and then punt the fucking ball. The Jets would have likely run out of time before they could get into position to attempt the field goal that tied the game.

On Schwartz’s taking the bulllet for Stanton:Ultimately, it’s on him and he knows that. He probably should have known better than to trust Stanton not to fuck up.

The final summation of Stanton’s failed Lions career:But still, that leaves Ol’ Plucky. That moment basically was the final nail in his deplorable coffin, the moment that took him from being the lovable underdog to most of the fanbase to the embodiment of failure. No one wants to see Stanton again. That was his pathetic Waterloo, the moment where the whole tragically stupid narrative of his career coalesced into a giant ball of failure and exploded in an ugly storm of incompetence. That moment is a moment that will live with us forever. It’s an ugly moment, a scarring moment, the sort of moment that breaks like an ugly wave made of acid and hate upon the cliffs of our fandom and causes them to erode and crumble into dust, and it is a moment that is his and will be his until the Earth races into the sun.

The acrid, bitter taste of last Sunday’s, late game meltdown loss to the Jets isn’t going away and is only being made worse by the ridiculous game of charades being played out by the Lions and the local media, as scribal scrutiny grows over Matthew Stafford’s injury and the potential for his return to the Lions in 2010, or not.

It's Stanton Rolling Out to...Tuck It and Run. If That Had Happened, This Week Could Have Had a Much Different Appearance to Fans

The Lions have exercised their due diligence by adding QB Zac Robinson and K Dave Rayner, since each Matthew Stafford and Jason Hanson are expected to miss (at least) a few games.

The addition of Robinson is a speculative move, in hopes that his future with the team could eventually supersede that of the final nail of the coffin that was driven into Drew Stanton’s miserable career as a Lion.

The difficult thing about all of this is that the Lions have to somehow re-group and attempt to overcome a 24-game road losing streak, against an 0-8 Bills team, who appear very close to finding an victory, after several recent close losses.

Matt Millen and Lions Fans Think a Road Loss to the Bills Will Somehow Be Fitting

That is where the pain resides. Eventually, a hard-fighting 2-6 Lions team, who deserve a better record, are going to go out and play like the 2-6 team that they are. They have been up to the challenge each week and provided some cause for some hopeful optimism.

As far as games go in which a Lions fatalist would predict a horribly disappointing letdown, that eventually leads to a loss, and completely deflates any positivity surrounding this moribund franchise, this week absolutely resounds as the one in which Lions fans are finally broken, and begin discussing whom the Lions will select with their 2011 top ten draft pick.

With Their 2011 First Round Pick, The Lions Select Adrian Clayborn

As much as losing Matthew Stafford for the season has set this franchise back, one has to wonder, after this week’s mea culpa, does the clock begin to run on Jim Schwartz’s career as Lions head coach? The undeniably growing number of coaching snafu’s, betraying his education at Georgetown, are quickly tarnishing Schwartz’s credibility.

The Lions fans and media will not allow any free passes for Schwartz, if this season goes down in flames, like I am afraid it might. The time has passed for patience with this franchise.

Obviously, there are noticeable and appreciated improvements being made to the team. It is not difficult to empiricize that. That being said, the Lions are currently hanging over an organizational precipice, which as fans, we are all too aware of.

The Lions 2010 Season?

The Lions front office and coaching staff might actually be secretly thankful for Matthew Stafford’s brittle AC joint in his shoulder, at this point. Nothing can do more to buy them time and patience, than to have Stafford miss the remainder of the season. His absence is a ready-made excuse for a poor second half of the 2010 season.

Many would posit that the favored Bills should regard this as their Super Bowl, since this might be their best remaining chance to find a victory in 2010. Conversely, I would argue that this game, on a number of fronts, now constitutes the Lions own Super Bowl.

With a victory, ending the infamy of a 24-game road losing streak, and living up to reasonable expectations, the Lions may be able to keep their crumbling grip upon the edge of the cliff, and willfullly improve their lot in 2010.

Should they find a way to lose to the Bills Sunday, well, “LOOK OUT BELOW!!”