Why the Vikings will pillage the Lions...

Before I get to another diatribe on the Devil who wears #4, the unholy fruit of the blasphemous union of Beelzebub and Wrangler Jeans, let me first say some things about C. C. Brown.

I thought his name was Can't Cover Brown, but Sunday showed it's actually Can't Catch Brown. Whatever his name really stands for, he is a huge liability. He takes horrible angles, rarely covers anybody well and tackles for crap on most plays. He is a typical "big hit over solid tackle" guy and the worst part is when he's trying to lower the boom on a receiver, he's just as apt to miss or hit his teammate as he is to hit an opponent.

Brown should be taken out behind the huge practice facility and beaten senseless by six guys with pillowcases full of bars of soap.

The Lions secondary is awful in general, but C. C. is abysmal and needs to be sacrificed to the football gods for his inept play. Let Randy Phillips play, he's a rookie, at least he has a built in excuse.

The Devil Rises Again...

It doesn't matter that Sidney Rice and Percy Harvin are out and highly doubtful respectively. The Devil doesn't need receivers when he plays the Lions. It doesn't matter anyway, because the Lions don't have anybody that could cover them anyway...

When playing the Lions, a team he owns like a pimp owns prostitutes, Farve could throw the ball to shadows and still manage completions. I half expect the actual numbers painted on the grass to peel themselves off the turf and catch his passes and then struggle for at least an extra ten yards on every completion.

The Lions only hope against this abomination is The Kong. Or maybe Kyle VandenBosch. The demon must be slain. His ridiculous string of games played must be broken and desecrated. The defensive line must bury him and burn his foul bones.

Adrian Petersen.

In actuality, the Lions have always done a very respectable job of stopping Petersen, but with the missing wide outs issue currently happening in Viking land, the Vikings will be forced to lean even more heavily than normal on "All Day."

Petersen is a danger to score on any play and with the amount of rushes he is destined to get on Sunday, it'll only take two or three mental or physical breakdowns by the defensive line to provide a significant margin of victory for the purple ones.

The Williams Wall.

Sure Jahvid Best managed 78 yards on the ground last week, but more than half of that came on two runs. The Lions have not shown a consistent ability to make yardage on the ground and facing arguably the best defensive tackle pair in the game won't make it any easier.

The Kansas Kid.

Shaun Hill showed how poor his accuracy can be this last weekend. Until Stafford gets back, the quarterback play is a crapshoot.

Why the Lions can beat the Eagles...

Shaun Hill

Upon the pedastals of honor in my own personal hallowed halls of the Lions Hall of Fame, there is a high place of honor for a quarterback that was fondly known by both his teammates and his fans as "Brass."

I remember reading in the back pages of the Detroit Free Press sports section one early Summer morning in 1991--in those days, that was pretty much the only time you got Lions news was in the tiny "transactions" blurb buried in the back of the paper-- that the Lions had signed a quarterback named Erik Kramer. Personally, I never thought about it again until training camp, afterall the Lions had just drafted Andre Ware and had gotten the depressingly injury prone Rodney Peete just two years before. Kramer was camp fodder in my mind.

But Erik Kramer turned out to be special.

He beat out the #1 draft bust, Andre Ware, for the backup job that summer and then...as was per usual, Peete got injured, Kramer had to step in.

1991 was an incredible year and Kramer's role in it cannot go unheralded...

Which brings me to Shaun Hill. Kramer was an unheralded, undrafted nobody QB out of an ACC school (North Carolina St.). Hill is an unheralded, undrafted nobody QB out of an ACC School (Maryland).

Hill managed to beat out Alex Smith, another highly touted draft bust in San Francisco building a 10-6 starting record while with the Niners.

In other words, he has found ways to win, despite otherworldly talents. He doesn't possess a massive "throw it through the moon" arm. He doesn't run like a gazelle. He isn't "strong like moose." He's just a quarterback...a football player...who has found ways to win despite his shortcomings.

Jahvid Best will not be so excited this week...

Word on the street, after days of film review, is that Best played like a rookie against the Bears last Sunday. The going theory is that he was too excited and too eager, not letting running plays develop like he could have. He left yards on the field, by not allowing an extra beat or two before plunging head first into the holes provided.

I don't know how much I buy that, but I'm not a professional football coach and I don't have game film to watch...so, if Schwartz says so...

This should not be the case come Sunday. This week the Lions will need Best to break a few and return to the promising young running back stud everybody thought he was in training camp.

We're due...

Calvin Johnson made that catch against Chicago and the Lions were robbed of a victory. I'm looking for a slue of "make up calls" this week. If there is any justice there will be more than a couple "questionable" calls that will amazingly be called for Detroit...perhaps a few holding calls that the refs will miss, an offensive pass interference that is blatantly ignored.

I think it is very possible the Lions win this week, because for every reason on Earth but a faulty, vague and despicable rule the Lions DID win last week.

Items of note for Sunday and beyond...

Jahvid Best, Savior?

Jahvid Best is not now nor will every be Barry Sanders. The comparisons are starting to come out before the poor kid has even taken his first hand off in a real NFL game. Right now, Best is a rookie speed back with good hands and very questionable durability issues.

He hasn't run for 2000 yards in a season, not even 200 yet. But he has potential, boat loads of potential.

Let's let him score his first touchdown, finish his first big breakaway run in the endzone...lets let him do that for a few seasons, before we start anointing him the next great back.

Nathan Vasher, Savior?

The Lions worked out six year pro cornerback Nathan Vasher yesterday as a possible addition to the weakest area of the team. Vasher has a very good pedigree, but seems to have lost a lot of his luster. Vasher has 19 career interceptions in his six years while playing for the Bears and the Chargers.

Will he be an upgrade? Who knows? Many say that he's lost the aggressiveness which made him such a ball hawk early in his career and that's led to his recent journeyman status.

Fact of the matter is, he will not be signed before the Bears game because of rules in current Collective Bargaining agreement. These rules state that if a player is signed and plays in the first game of the season, his entire yearly contract becomes guaranteed. In signing Vasher after the first game, the Lions can then pay him on a game to game basis and if it doesn't work out, there isn't much of a financial hit to the organization.

Who's going to win on Sunday?

Well, technically, I will. Why? Because I've picked both the Bears and the Lions, unless a meteorite hits the stadium in the third quarter, somebody's going to win. Here's my firm belief, I really like the Lions to win, but I will not jinx them.

I simply have too many questions about the Lions secondary. I don't think they can cover anybody and that means that eventually, when the DL starts to get tired, Cutler will be able to get some time and score a lot of points.

And afterall, this is the Lions--on the road, where they've lost 20 straight--which definitely gives me the fear.

Bears 38, Lions 21.

Roster cut surprises...

OK, I know the average fan thinks that the Lions would be just as well off saving the money and letting all of the cornerbacks go, because, afterall, they don't actually cover any receivers. Or in other words they could be replaced by air or ghosts and it would take 3 and a half games for anybody to notice...but, I never thought Martin Mayhew was listening.

When I read the final roster cuts the other day, I was shocked at how many cornerbacks, including Dre Bly and Paul Pratt --the only DB's to actually intercept passes this summer, were shown the door.

There are now only four cornerbacks on the roster, most teams keep at least five or six. Not only that, the Mayhew traded for one of them right before cuts...so the new guy has never even seen the Lions playbook.

What about those guys I talked about last week?

On Wednesday last week I wrote about three players the Lions might be interested in.

Cincinnati CB Dave Jones was traded to Jacksonville for Safety Reggie Nelson. He would have been a very good addition to the Lions secondary.

Kansas City LB Derrick Johnson worked himself out of Todd Haley's doghouse and avoided being cut.

Denver CB Alphonso Smith is now Detroit CB Alphonso Smith.

So what does it all mean?

First of all, it means the Lions have one of the, if not the, youngest secondary in the league. The entire second string has a grand total of one NFL season--and that season was so bad, Denver shipped Alphonso Smith to us. S Randy Phillips, S Amari Spievey and CB Aaron Berry are all rookies--Spievey was the only one even drafted.

In a way, this is the right way to build a team. No longer are the Lions running out and getting old nobodies to act as pylons for opposing receivers. Instead, they are finding young talent and trying to develop them.

In the past, the Lions were awful, horrible, bad and old. There was no real hope for the future. Now, the Lions are awful, horrible, bad and young! There is hope for improvement...

Don't get too excited...

Impressions from the Lions 25-20 victory over the Denver Broncos.

On HBO's series, Hard Knocks: Training camp with the New York Jets, the Jets' first preseason game was covered. During the game, the Sanchize threw an interception which was returned for a touchdown. After the play, Sanchez came over to the sideline and stood by wily old veteran QB Mark Brunell.

"That's a hell of a way to start the season," the second year QB grumbled.

"Don't worry, this isn't the season," Brunell answered.

And truer words were never spoken--even though I paraphrased the whole thing.

This is the preseason, the players that are too injured to play in preseason games are most likely not too injured to play when the games finally mean something. Most coaches are doing everything in their power to show less than nothing of the types of offenses and defenses they will be running once the first kickoffs boom into the air.

Being who I am, which is probably a crazy person, I want to point out two things about the victory Saturday night.

1. On November 4th, 2007, the Detroit Lions thoroughly dominated the Denver Broncos in a 44-7 victory, which improved the team record to 6-2...the Lions have only won three games since. That's 3-39 since the Leos last beat the Broncos. What does that mean? I don't have a clue.
2. In 2008, the Lions looked great in the preseason, going 4-0 with a fast defense and a rising star in Megatron...That's right, that was the 0-16 season.

The preseason is pretty much less than meaningless.

But what did it all mean?

Most of the starters for both Detroit and Denver played the entire first half. The Lion defensive line was very impressive in the first quarter...but looked to get tired and slowed down in the second quarter. This is a little scary and I'm not sure if it can be attributed to playing at Mile High, poor conditioning or Denver adjustments.

I'm pretty sure I saw The Kong get held on a half dozen plays with pretty much no calls. We better get used to it.

I don't want to jinx anything, but Jahvid Best is a stud. The kid has jets in his feet and an array of moves to get him out into the open field. Depending on which story you read, Best finished with eight rushes for either 49 or 50 yards. That's 6.25 yards per carry...(again, not to jinx anyone) but I can only think of one other guy in my lifetime that had an average yards per carry that high.

Randy Phillips still looks very solid in the secondary, but may get beat out by veteran C.C. Brown--due to experience alone, because he certainly hasn't outplayed the undrafted free agent.

Steve Hauschka, the Lions substitute kicker while Jason Hanson recovers from minor knee surgery, looks like a keeper. Not sure how much of it had to do with the extremely light air of Mile High, but he didn't miss a field goal and every one of his kickoffs resulted in touchbacks. That's the kind of stuff Jason used to do...ten years ago.

DeAndre Levy, Brandon Pettigrew and Kevin Smith all returned from injuries and played.

The bad news...

Kevin Smith played and he still looks slow. The idea of there being a running back competition in Detroit is a farce. It looks like Best will be the feature back, most likely spelled by Maurice Morris or Aaron Brown. If Smith makes the team, it will most likely be on sentiment alone.

The rest of the secondary still looks awful. Eric King couldn't cover a receiver with a blanket. That guy looked awful. And Chris Houston, our supposed #1 CB, didn't look a whole lot better. The defensive line will have to apply as much pressure as possible for the whole game, with no let downs, because if they ever take their foots off the throttle, the secondary will be eaten alive.

Conclusion...

The Lions are no longer an 0-16 team. They're not even a 2-14 team. But I don't think they're an 8-8 team either. They have some very nice pieces...in fact, the collection on offense may just rival the early '90 Barry teams. Maybe Best is no Barry, but Rodney Peete/Andre Ware/Erik Kramer were no Matt Stafford. David Sloan was no Pettigrew or Scheffler. And, as much as I loved him, Herman Moore was never anything like Megatron.

Too bad the Lions don't have anybody comparable with Bennie Blades, William White, or Ray Crockett.

And the Broncos have some fine cheerleaders, even though the broadcast in Detroit refused to show them.

Lions loss is "encouraging," but scary as hell too

There were some good signs in the midst of the tsunami that drenched the Lions at Heinz Field on Saturday night.

Matt Stafford, Calvin Johnson, Nate Burleson, and Jahvid Best all looked more than adequate. The offense can be very good. However, they still showed a Lions moment when the Franchize dropped a pass on a hot read down to Best who let it bounce off his hands directly into the Steeler's safety's eagerly waiting paws.

However, even though that play happened inside the Leo's own twenty yardline, the defense didn't give up a single yard, holding the Steelers to only a field goal.

The Lions also were unable to convert a 3rd and 1 when they were stuffed on a run up the middle. Now 3rd and 3 or less is a stat that I keep all regular season long. It's a pet peeve of mine and at least the Leos were smart enough to run in that situation, but if the offensive line can't move the pile a measly three feet...that's a bad sign.

However, Best finished with 29 yards on six carries, including an impressive 15-yarder around the left end. Of course that means that without that run, he had 5 rushes for fourteen yards...not nearly as promising.

All in all, what jumps out at you from this game is that when the Lions and Steelers had their first teamers out there, the Lions more than held their own. Leaving the game after three series, the Lions first teamers held the lead 7-3.

Now, that's promising, but in the end doesn't necessarily mean a whole hell of a lot. I recall several games where the Lions went into half time with 17-0 and 13-0 leads only to crap the bed in the second half. Three series is nice, but we won't know if they can pull out a whole game performance until the regular season starts.

"The thing we've got to do is get everybody going, we've got to keep that consistency throughout the game,'' Lions new DE Kyle Vanden Bosch echoed this sentiment. Vanden Bosch put real pressure on the QB and Cliff Avril managed a sack as the Pittsburgh offensive line concentrated on doubling the Lions interior line with constant double teams on The Kong. All very good signs, but can they keep it up for a full 60 minutes? We can only hope.

The Problem

The issue with the game came after the first three series, when the second stringers started to play...which of course gives the final score merit...the Lions lost 23-7 or in other words the Lions backups lost 20-0 to the Steelers backups.

So while the Lions can hold their own with their starters, they cannot afford any injuries. The drop off to the backups is atrocious.

Return of the Fade Stop!
Detroit's only touchdown came on a slick play that somebody, I won't name names, has been calling for for two years. To me, this was the greatest revelation of the game. The Lions are actually going to run a play this year that is pretty damn near impossible to stop. On first down, the Lions tried to throw a fade pass to CJ in the back of the endzone. The Steelers inexplicably played one on one coverage on CJ, so Stafford tried to hit him, but sadly underthrew the ball. The Steelers then refused to change coverages on the next down.

"That was impressive," Schwartz said. "He came right back and noticed they were playing the same technique so he threw him a fade-stop. It shows what kind of command he's starting to have."

I think this is a direct result of an entire off season of CJ and the Franchize working and practicing together and developing real chemistry.

Possibly rectifying the Mike Williams draft pick?

While, I've already said that the Lions cannot afford any injuries, backup linebacker Jordan Dizon suffered a season ending knee injury.

In 2005, the Lions held the 10th pick in the draft and as many of you probably already know, Matt Millen chose to piss on all of his scouts' advice and take Mike Williams, when LB DeMarcus Ware, LB Shawn Merriman, and OT Jammal Brown (all probowlers) were all still staring the Lions in the face.

Now, this shows that I am not much of a scout, but let me say that the guy I really wanted the Lions to take was LB Derrick Johnson out of the University of Texas. He went five picks later to the Kansas City Chiefs and while he hasn't been in any pro bowls yet, he has so far had a solid career.

With the injury to Dizon and the lackluster play (massive understatement) of the Lions backup linebackers, the Leos are going to be looking to bring in somebody to shore up the position. For some reason, I haven't found out yet, Johnson is now running with the third team in Kansas City. His play did fall off last year as he registered only 37 tackles, while averaging 90+ the prior three years on typically bad defenses. Chances are Johnson could be camp casualty or trade bait and the guy the Lions probably should have picked five years ago will finally be in the fold.

The Steelers do not feature a cheerleading squad. Please write the Rooneys...

What to watch for on Saturday night

The Leos open their preseason schedule Saturday night at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh, home of the NFL's favorite date rapist.

So what do we, as fans, have to look forward to? What should we be on the edge of our proverbial seats ready to get excited about?

Well, I'm already on record as saying that for the most part the preseason is a completely useless tool for gauging the season, but there are some players I'm very anxious to see play. Although many of them will not play for very long.

For instance, it'll be nice to see Matt Stafford throw a ball for the first time since last November. I'll especially like to see how this whole two tight end base set formation looks and is used. However, I am not at all interested in seeing Calvin Johnson play more than a few snaps--we know what we've got there.

I can't wait to see Jahvid Best bust a few runs and short passes for long gains or touchdowns...that'd be very encouraging.

On defense, I am very anxious to see if The Kong can play anywhere near as good as advertised. If he does, I fully expect him to pull out one of the goal posts and beat to death anybody waving a terrible towel.

In fact, I'm pretty sure that 80% of what I'm interested in with this team Saturday is on the defensive side of the ball. I want to see the whole newly designed D-line play a few series and see how they do against the Steelers and their powerful run game.

I can't wait to see Zach Follet and see if he can actually play. How is Chris Houston going to do against Hines Ward? Dre Bly? Will Amari Spievey see the field? Is Jonathon Wade any good at all?

How is Caleb Campbell, the 7th round pick out of Army drafted two years ago on a whim by Rod Marinelli, going to do after two years away?

One of the players I am most interested in seeing, because every player that has lined up next to Delmas at safety has been worse than atrocious, is undrafted free agent Randy Phillips out of the University of Miami. Two years ago many thought he would be a first round draft pick, but after two years of injuries, this may be his best shot at making a team in the NFL. Damn, I hope he's good.

One thing I am not hopeful of seeing is cheerleaders. The Steelers are one of the six teams that are "too classy" to have professional dance teams. I guess that's ok for them, it gives Ben Roethlisberger fewer opportunities...

The lure of fantasy football...my trail of tears...

In 1996, a friend of mine, who I like to call "Mr. Rocket Scientist", was rather exuberant in insisting that I, a super football fan, simply had to try this fantasy football thing. He insisted that because we were both Lions fans, the Detroit Lions were ruining the game of football for us and that fantasy football provided a reason to get excited and watch other games besides the weekly Lions trouncing.

I believe that I should now refer to my friend no longer as "Mr. Rocket Scientist," but more correctly as "The Devil."

First of all, I'd like to make it clear that same stated friend has not played a season with yours truly in the last thirteen years...he's just left me to my own maniacal obsessions, while he has gone on to PhD's and world travel. He's like my genius crack dealing friend....

So now, here I am fifteen years later and still trying to stop this stupid obsession with rushing touchdowns and the next great "sleeper."

Fantasy football is degrading on many levels. Besides showing everyone that their belief that they know a little about football is completely false, it also is kind enough to tell you that you don't really have any friends.

Every year somebody asks me to start a league and then I have to start a long hard struggle to fill the league with enough players to make it viable. And then all of a sudden, nobody is interested in playing.

I can not tell you how many "Just join the league please" emails I've had to send. "Seriously dude, just join up and forget about it, I need to get the last slot filled..."

And god forbid you end up with an odd number of players...

Or CNNSI or Yahoo or whoever you're doing the free service through won't allow somebody into your league or you can't find the the League or three people who have apparently been in a drunken coma for the three weeks you've been recruiting show up on the day of the draft and want to get in. Three people...never four...Anything to get you back to an odd number.

And then there are all of the fantasy football sites that want to "fill you in" on the latest news and theories. How you have to draft a RB in the first round, how Peyton Manning is due to have a down year, this is the year Brett Favre finally gets hurt, running backs typically fall off when they hit the age of 30, Barry Sanders doesn't score enough touchdowns...It's a huge cacophony of noise and besides you know that your opinion is just as good as those talking bobbleheads, right?

This is how I once talked somebody into drafting the Arizona defense with the third overall pick one year.

So every year I say this is the year....this is the year I'm done with it.

Who wants to play?

The Legion of Doom

I think Matt Moore could be a sleeper this year...What round do you think I should draft Jahvid Best? I'm not sure...What are they saying on ESPN?

The Devil who wears #4's favorite cheerleader.