The Lions’ Gate: Detroit Lions D-Line Death Cult

Last night, as Detroit’s time to pick approached, Spencer Hall a.k.a. Orson Swindle, of Every Day Should Be Saturday, Tweeted:

Following the Lions’ pick, he followed it up with:

From there, things kind of got out of hand:

With Nick Fairley, the Lions have added the player many thought was the best available talent in the draft—especially in that limbo between the college bowl season and the Combine. In Mel Kiper’s first mock (and many other early mocks, Fairley went #1 overall, to the Panthers. Instead of the “reach” that I was worried about yesterday, the Lions had an incredible player fall right into their lap—mostly thanks to four quarterbacks being taken in front of them, pushing a Top 5 talent all the way down to 13. The problem is, he plays the same position as Ndamukong Suh—doesn’t he?

Well, yes and no. First, Fairley spelling Suh would hardly be a bad thing: according to Pro Football Focus, Suh led all NFL defensive tackles with 997 reps. He barely came off the field at all! With Suh and Fairley, Williams and Hill, the Lions will always have two fresh impact tackles on the field. Beyond that, the Lions are extremely creative with their defensive line; they use weird sets, they stunt and loop, they shuffle guys around. Adding this weapon to Kocurek and Cunningham’s arsenal is dangerous, indeed.

Ultimately, it was a question of value. When the Vikings were on the clock, Adam Schefter reported that the Lions wanted, “badly,” to trade out of their subsequent pick. Apparently, the Lions feared Minnesota replacing the aging Pat Williams with Fairley, rather than roll the dice on a quarterback (as they did). This tells us what we need to know about the Lions’ draft board.

Yesterday, I wrote that the Lions, at 1.13, would be sitting on a pile of good-but-not-great prospects. At that point, the Lions would be loathe to stand pat—if they could find a partner, I’d thought, the Lions would try desperately to slide back. Faced with the possibility that Fairley wouldn’t be there, that’s exactly what they did. Clearly, for them, Prince Amukamara fell into that class of “a whole bunch of guys we’d gladly take at 20 but not so much at 13”—and considering he went 19th, that valuation must have been in line with the rest of the NFL’s.

For the Lions to have passed on Amukamara speaks volumes—not just about their thoughts on Fairley, but their thoughts on Amukamara. Obviously, cornerback is an area of pressing concern. Obviously, Amukamara was widely thought of as a Top 10 talent. Ndamukong Suh would be more than willing to tell the Lions everything they need to know about Prince. For them to not only pass on him, but be panicked at the thought of reaching for him at 13—well, as I said, it speaks volumes. It’s not that I think Prince will be terrible now, or something, but that if you woke up today thinking the Lions passed on the guy who’d immediately solve all their problems at corner . . . apparently, they didn’t.

It’s not all air guitars and pryotechnics, however, as not everyone is sold on Fairley and Suh becoming the Lions’ answer to the Mighty Ducks’ Bash Brothers. Pro Football Focus just posted an article called The Fairley Verdict, and the verdict was mixed, indeed:

It wouldn’t be the most ridiculous statement to say the Lions walked into the draft with the best combination of defensive tackles in the league.

So they didn’t need another one. Let alone a guy who on paper looks to suffer from the same weaknesses as Ndamukong Suh, as well as some pretty big character issues that caused him to drop in the first place. Presuming he plays up to his one good year in college, the Lions got themselves a guy who will likely be very good at penetrating, but perhaps lack a little in run defense. Just think how the combo of Suh and Fairley would leave them susceptible to draw plays and trap blocks? To say they don’t have the linebackers to deal with that level of linemen coming at them would be an understatement.

Eep. They even invoke "same old Lions," a phrase that sends a chill down my spine, and should induce shudders in anyone reading this. Yet, it’s important to note, Suh and Fairley will likely be rotating together in the same spot, not always playing side-by side—and, they are, Suh may be playing defensive end. Don’t forget, Suh has always had a little inside-outside to him, and rumors the Lions might play Suh more on the outside compelled Schwartz to publicly denounce them a few weeks ago. I’m not saying Suh is going to switch positions, but that he’ll be able to join the DE rotation for a number of different looks. Think about:

Avril * Suh * Williams * KVB

Jackson * Suh * Fairley * Avril

Suh * Williams * Hill * Jackson

These are just to wet your whistle. My calculator tells me there are 81 possible combinations with Avril, Lo-Jack and Suh rotating at left end, Suh, Fairley, and Williams at 3-tech, Williams, Hill, and Fairley at 1-tech, and KVB, Avril, and Lo-Jack at right end. As Jim Schwartz said:

"Well, we play 130 defensive tackle snaps in a game. So, if we're rotating three guys through and they're playing 45 snaps apiece ... No. 1, there'll be a little bit of pressure. We can keep rolling waves and waves."

Ultimately, this was simply a Mayhew Pick. The Lions have a defensive philosophy: build the most dominant defensive line in the NFL and let them handle it. Mayhew took the best player available—to some, Nick Fairley was the best player available to anyone in this draft—that fit in with their approach.

Now pass me that Honolulu Blue Kool-Aid.

Technorati Tags: nfl,detroit lions,nfl draft,nick fairley,ndamukong suh,jim schwartz,martin mayhew

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Rock Music, and the Millionization of Sports Blogs

One of the many poorly-fitting hats I wear in my eclectic life is “Musician.” As a teenager, I played bass in a high school rock band that tried to evolve into a college rock band. Ever the information addict, I read books and magazines for pro musicians, talked to local pro musicians, and participated in musician Usenet groups and email listservs [youngsters, I’ll explain later], all with an eye on pocketing beer and ramen money by rocking through college with my closest friends.

Of course, there was no shortage of how-to info available; the record label-FM radio complex had been in place and unchanged for decades. Countless bands had played in bars, recorded demos, tried to get signed, gone on tour, and so on. Countless musicians had been chewed up and spit out by the system, with nothing to show for it but memories. The music business, I learned, was horribly corrupt, unfair, and exploitative. This article, “The Problem With Music” by producer Steve Albini was typed in, linked to, and emailed around countless times by older musicians trying to put The Fear into starry-eyed kids like me.

Yet, there was a sense of resigned understanding about it all. The system is horribly unfair, yes, and many talented acts never see a dime, even if they’re one of the 1% of the 1% of the 1% who cuts a hit record—but it’s unfair in ways everyone understands. If you play a bar gig, and you make people feel like dancing and drinking, you get more if gigs. You don’t, you don’t. Your recordings sell, you get to record more music. They don’t, you don’t. The correlation between what pulls in money and what’s artistically great is shaky at best, but for every dozen Ke$has, there’s a case like The Arcade Fire winning the Grammy for the Record Of The Year.

The upshot is that it’s practically impossible to set yourself up for life as a pop/rock musician. Getting lucky like that is more about being in the right place at the right time, and being what the market’s ready to consume, than it is about artistic or creative merit. In order to be a professional musician, you have to start on the bottom rung, look up the miles-high ladder with your eyes wide open, and choose to step on anyway. TOOL drummer Danny Carey gave the most honest, worthwhile advice about this I’ve ever read:

Q: How did tool get signed? Any ideas? How would you recommend getting signed?

A: If you are playing music to get signed, please do me, yourself, and the whole world a favor and quit right now. The last thing this world needs is more shit to filter through when we are looking for sincerity and inspiration in art forms. If you are playing in a band in your local scene and not developing a following, then you don't have a voice or a message that needs to be heard. That's not to say you should quit. You should just quit trying to please other people and play for yourself. Tool only played 7 gigs before the sharks were circling, looking for fresh meat to rob and exploit. The reason for this was every time we played, our friends went home and told their friends about the next gig, who told their friends about the next gig etc. until by the time we had done 5 shows, the clubs we were playing in were packed. You either have a chemistry that taps into the current or you don't. There is nothing wrong with playing heart felt music that is not trendy or popular but there is nothing worse than someone bastardizing or compromising their art for the sake of popularity and money.

This week, three of the biggest names in the sports blog world are stepping away from their primary projects. Dan Levy’s On the DL Podcast is sunsetting at show #555, Josh Zerkle won’t be running With Leather anymore, and Bethlehem Shoals is not just leaving seminal basketball blog/Socratic sports philosophy collective FreeDarko—he’s shutting the whole thing down. Yesterday’s On the DL Podcast featured both Zerkle and Shoals, and the discussions they have with Levy on the future of the industry is an hour’s worth of must-listen (if you care about that kind of stuff).

The sports blog world is in the midst of a huge transition. Just a few years ago, demand for online sports content was growing like crazy. Readers of the local paper’s sports section were going online, and finding a new world of opinion, analysis, and advanced statistics. Eyeballs swarmed around anything worth reading; the communities of popular blogs and forums served as a powerful social search engine for cool new blogs and forums. The result was something close to a meritocracy; the best writers kept the best blogs, and the best blogs drew the most traffic, and bloggers pretty much got paid by the traffic.

I started this blog right at the end of that happy, fertile period. I’ve written before about the “billionization” of the NFL, well, the millionization of sports blogs started shortly after I did. Blog networks started consolidating from the grass roots up; I joined what is now Big Lead Sports about six months in. Existing media powerhouses started acquiring from the top down. Recently, they started meeting in the middle, as when Fox Sports acquired Yardbarker. It’s no longer “media” and “online media,” it’s all the same thing—and, just as in music, creatives pulling the biggest total audience numbers are the creatives getting paid. As Spencer Hall said in FreeDarko’s goodbye post, “every successful revolution has to make the transition to governance,” and that’s exactly what’s happening here.

Levy and Shoals both cited their need to provide for their families as a primary factor for stepping away. They couldn’t continue to blog full-time unless it was providing a full-time income—and neither was attracting enough raw traffic to make that a reality. Unfortunately, people looking for awesome sports content are the ones who lose, just as music listeners everywhere lose when that cool indie bands’ members turn thirty-two and realize they’d like to have kids and own cars someday.

Even if none of these folks ever write or speak about sports again, there’s no doubt their current body of work will be remembered fondly for a long time, and their influences will continue to show in the way sports is written and talked about online. Having said that, each is already in the process of reinventing themselves, and I’m sure they’ll find a new, more sustainable role—either one that brings home the bacon, or one that can be played in free time and stolen moments.

As for me, don’t worry. This blog began when I already had a day job, a wife, and three kids. I explicitly set out to convert the time I always spent uselessly checking out football stuff on the Internet into creatively and productively checking out football stuff on the Internet. For that reason, I’ll never write as well or as frequently as I (or you) would like, and the site may never pull in big-money numbers. But I’ve been handsomely paid in new friends, great discussions, and incredible opportunities. It’s powerfully rewarding, and I don’t see it ending any time soon.

What happened to the musician thing? Well, our little band played a few open houses and talent shows, but after we moved out of our parents’ houses, we never found a rehearsal space. We’re all still incredibly close friends (the lead singer was even kind enough to marry me), but we stopped playing together . . . for the most part, stopped playing completely.

Then, a few years ago, our church’s praise band had need of a bass player. My old bass was just gathering dust, so why not? One thing led to another, and now I lead that band. Every week I get to play for the friendliest, most supportive audience any musician could ask for—and my kids think I’m the greatest bass player alive. Fame? No. Fortune? Definitely not. But satisfying? Absolutely.

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