Lions Kool-Aid? Make Mine A Double

Lately, I’ve been catching some flak in the comments (and on Twitter) for drinking the Lions Kool-Aid. Baking the Lions cornbread. Being trapped in a bizarre delusion that the Lions are going to make the playoffs. Insisting all the injuries the Lions have suffered won’t affect the bottom line. Calling Matthew Stafford a top five quarterback. At some point, I have to face reality, right? If I’m not pulling my punches, I must be punch drunk—right?

At this point, Jim Schwartz’s tenure is cosmetically identical to Rod Marinelli’s. Both took over a listless team with no real identity, both made strong moves to radically change the scheme and roster; both guided their Lions to impressive winning tears in their second year. In Marinelli’s third year, though, the Lions went 0-16. How can I be certain—as I am—the Lions will be better this year than last?

Marinelli’s third offseason was full of turmoil and turnover. Offensive coordinator Mike Martz left, and the Lions did not replace him. Instead they let the OL coach and WR coach—neither with NFL coordinator experience—call the plays in “I’ll steer, you work the pedals” manner. The Lions traded disgruntled DT Shaun Rogers for soon-to-be-disgruntled CB Leigh Bodden, and found out Rogers was their entire run defense. The Lions were counting on “projects” like Kalimba Edwards to make great leaps forward. Altogether, there were more signs pointing toward the Lions taking a step back than improving.

Under Schwartz, the Lions have retained both coordinators for two second consecutive seasons. No Lion coach/coordinator triumvirate had all retained their jobs even once in the prior thirteen years! The entire starting offensive line has—presuming health—returned intact. The last time that happened was in 1990, when Lomas Brown, Eric Andolsek, Kevin Glover, Ken Dallafior, and Harvey Salem returned from the 1989 squad. If we count Amari Spievey as a holdover, this will be the first time the Lions haven’t brought in at least two new starters in the secondary since 2000, when Bryant Westbrook and Kurt Schultz got hurt.

The Lions have built a real team; the permanent foundation to a perennial winner. They’re building and building and building and nothing is falling down. In the ruthlessly entropic NFL, very few teams have any kind of staying power. Life in the NFL is dog eat dog, and many of the 32 dogs never get their day. That the Lions have built something this solid, this lasting, already puts them ahead of most teams in the NFL, especially with this crazy lockout-shortened offseason. Teams with significant turnover—like the Bengals—are going to be miles behind the Lions, purely on continuity. Consider the massive stock of talent the Lions boast (8/11 offensive starters are first- or second-round picks), and it’s easy to see why I’m certain the Lions will win more games than they lose.

Look, I'm the Flamekeeper. I'm the guy who chops the wood and brews the cider. If I weren’t inclined to look ahead to better days, this blog would be grim work. But I don’t just blow hot air—I work hard to keep the fire burning with real fuel.  Last season, when the Lions were 2-9, I didn’t ladle out weaksauce excuses. I examined statistical models of winning, losing, and variance in the NFL—and found out that the Lions were, objectively, a lot better than their record implied. Moreover, the numbers pointed toward a strong regression to the mean by the end of the season; sure enough the Lions closed out the year on a 4-game win streak.

Even at 6-10, the Lions won two fewer games than their scoring margin and strength of schedule would predict—and that’s without Matthew Stafford. For that matter, it’s without Nick Fairley, or Titus Young, or Eric Wright or Stephen Tulloch or Kevin Justin Durant, the lot of whom will be in position to make major impacts in roles of need.

If you call that Kool-Aid, fine. Make mine a double.

Technorati Tags: nfl,detroit lions,matthew stafford

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Shaun Rogers: Once and Future Lion?

This is how I like to remember Shaun Rogers. Likely, it’s how you like to remember him too: an impossible combination of size and athleticism. A relentless, disruptive force that demanded—and overwhelmed—double-teams. A goofy, lumbering country boy, simultaneously awkward and balletic, gamboling and galloping, groan-inducing and breathtaking.

Shaun Rogers had some incredible highlights in his seven years as a Lion—and more than a few lowlights, too. For the most part, when the Lions dealt him to Cleveland, fans knew it was simply time to part ways. Of course, it stung when he immediately made an impact there—especially as the 0-16 Lions’ defense was manhandled by opposing offensive lines. As opposing running backs averaged 5.1 yards per carry against the helpless, hapless Lions, we looked south to Cleveland and got all nostalgic. As the Dawg Pound swooned over Rogers’ ability, many of us were bitterly jealous.

But the honeymoon didn’t last long. Thanks to a perceived slight by new coach Eric Mangini, Rogers asked the team to not pay his option bonus, presumably to finagle a quicker trade or release. Eventually, the ice between Rogers and Mangini thawed, or at least partially so. From that Akron Beacon-Journal come successive paragraphs that sum up everything you need to know about Shaun Rogers:

Rogers insists he can still dunk. ''All day,'' he said. Two hands? ''Two hands. All day. Vertical? 360? What you want?'' Rogers said. Two-time Pro Bowl left tackle Joe Thomas said dunking is probably the least of what Rogers can do. ''He tests better than any player on the team when we do testing in the spring,'' Thomas said. ''He's faster than any lineman, offense and defense. He can jump higher. He's got incredible speed. He's probably a 4.6, 4.7 guy.'' Anderson doesn't think a healthy Rogers can be blocked. ''Not when he's going and he's healthy and rested, there's not a human being who can stop him one-on-one,'' Anderson said. ''I've seen him take double-teams with his body and one arm and get through guys. He spins . . . he's a freak.''

. . . and then the flip side:

Former Detroit Lions coach Rod Marinelli told former Tampa Bay Bucs and Oakland Raiders defensive tackle Warren Sapp that Rogers didn't want to be featured in Detroit. ''Rod Marinelli went to Detroit (in 2006), showed Shaun Rogers my tape and said, 'I'm going to get you one on one,' '' Sapp, now on Showtime's Inside the NFL, said last month in New York. ''Shaun Rogers looked at Marinelli and said, 'What if I don't want to be one on one?' ''Gilligan wanted off that island, too, right? That island is a lonely place. Either you want it or you don't. The great ones do.''

Shaun Rogers’ talent, his potential, his upside—it’s intoxicating. It’s addictive. But, to borrow a phrase, he’s a grown-ass man. He’s 31. He’s—if visual evidence is any indication—way over his listed 350, possibly over 400. He’s been unable to stay healthy, getting just 12 starts and 26 games played in the last two seasons—and when he’s played, he’s been less effective; he has just 41 tackles and 4 sacks in that time.

Now, he’s been released--and unlike other free-agents-to-be, he can actually be signed right now. Should the Lions bring him back to Detroit? As a commenter on the Browns blog Dawgs by Nature said:

Shaun had become a part-time part-timer. At his age and given his shape/condition it’s better to get rid of him, rather than overpay him. He’ll sign for a fraction of that amount somewhere. I’d be happy if it were Cleveland, but not at $5mill.

He’s a rotational player who’s struggling to stay healthy. As a 400-pound two-gap tackle, he doesn’t have a clear role in this defense, either. He’d essentially take up Sammie Hill’s role, but Hill is a very young, very raw, developing player whose best football is all in front of him. As amazing as it still is to daydream about a 400-pound man who can run a 4.6 40 and dunk from a standstill, Shaun Rogers is a ten-year veteran. He was Matt Millen’s third-ever draft pick. He is what he is. He’s not going to realize that incredible potential any sooner than Dominic Raiola is grow two inches and add thirty pounds of muscle.

Those of you who say, “But what if he really is motivated to play? What if a change of scenery does him good?” Well, then are a dozen wannabe 3-4 teams out there who need a nose tackle more than the Lions need a fifth DT to rotate—and they’ll certainly be willing to pay more than the Lions will. The case is stronger, and the role is clearer, for Albert Haynesworth—and I’m not all that anxious to get him on the Lions’ roster, either. The Lions’ defensive line, both starters and depth, was the strength of the team in 2010. Players like Sammie Hill and Andre Fluellen made major contributions late in the year, and both of those players haven’t yet hit their primes.

I’d rather the Lions continue to try to win like the Packers, always thinking about the future, than try in vain to recapture the recent—godawful—past.

Technorati Tags: nfl,detroit lions,cleveland browns,shaun rogers

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With Great Potential, Great Expectations

My car, nominally a Pontiac Vibe but functionally a garbage scow, needed to be cleaned out.  I drove to a car wash and began the process, in traditional “open up all the doors and crank the radio” fashion.  Only, instead of 80s metal or 00s hip hop, I cranked Ryan Ermanni on WDFN.  The host was setting the bar for the Lions—but did it in an interesting way.  He not only set a minimum number of wins, seven, he specified when they must win their games: at the beginning of the year.

I flashed back to my last post about expectations for the Lions' 2010 season:

The Detroit Lions are facing a similar crossroads. After the incredible burden of 0-16, the glorious celebration when that burden was cast off, and two straight offseasons of talent addition, the Lions cannot go into this season hoping to win a single game, or even win a game or two more than last. No, the Lions have assembled a talented roster, with legitimate talent on both sides of the ball. The veterans will be expected to play as they have, and the youngsters will be expected to produce up to their potential. A 3-13 season will be a disappointment, not a thrilling sign of what's to come.

In sports, expectations are a huge part of fandom.  There’s no clearer example of this than the most recent Super Bowl: New Orleans set up a massive Super Bowl parade—regardless of whether the Saints won or lost.  Meanwhile, when the Colts returned to Indianapolis, they were met by a crowd of . . . eleven fans.  Even if the Saints hadn’t brought home the Lombardi, they were far and away the best team NOLA had ever seen.  Meanwhile, Peyton and the Colts have set the bar quite high for themselves over the past decade or so—and last season, anything but a championship felt like a disappointment.

There are generational expectations, bars set by great epochs of success, spanning many players, coaches, and executives: the Yankees, the Lakers, the Steelers.  These fan bases simply assume they’ll be contending for titles year after year, and are livid when they don’t.  It’s these kind of expectations that lead Michigan fans to snarl that Michigan State football will never supercede Michigan football, “no matter how many times” in a row MSU beats U of M on the field (and yes, Wolverine fans, I have heard some of you say this).

Next, there are institutional expectations, inspired by dynasties beget by one player, coach, or executive.  A decade or more of perennial title contention caused the bar to be set there, temporarily.  The current Colts are a perfect example of this: they were mostly irrelevant before Peyton Manning, once blessed with Peyton became perennial title contenders, and may slip back into mediocrity when he’s gone.  For what it’s worth, I’d say the Red Wings are between this stage and the one above—though if they won a post-Lidstrom Cup, they’d get a promotion.  Coming down off of this high can be painful.  See: Cowboys fans who think the road to the Super Bowl always runs through Dallas—despite only 3 double-digit-win seasons since the onset of the Dave Campo Era a decade ago.

More fleetingly, there are annual expectations, which is as atomized as this discussion usually gets.  What happened last year, what happened in the offseason, how many “wins are on the schedule,” etc.  Talk right now is about what “you’d be happy with” in terms of number of wins: would five wins be acceptable?  Would you be pleased with six?  Is seven wins a run-naked-through-the-streets number, or would you keep your clothes on until the Lions won more games than they lost?

Ermanni touched on something I always think about when discussing expectations: the week-to-week grind of finding out what this year’s edition is really all about.  Every week, fans’ idea of exactly what their team is varies wildly from week to week.  We might, at the beginning of the year, say that we’d be “happy” with five wins, but when your team is 2-8 out of the gate, can you really be happy—even if they rally to a 3-3 finish?  Ermanni said he just wants the Lions to be in the mix, to be relevant, deep into the season.  That they have to “win ballgames”.

Really, what we're talking about here is a belief that there’s a point.  That it’s worthwhile.  That there’s a reason to tune in.  At the tail end of 2010, there simply wasn’t.  Once Matthew Stafford was shelved for the rest of the year, Lions fans knew that there was zero chance of victory, zero chance that the games would be worth while, and zero reason to watch.  So, Ermanni argued, the Lions have to come out winning.  Even if the end result is 6-10 or 7-9, if they’re at least not mathematically eliminated from the playoffs when Thanksgiving rolls around, Lions fans will be happy.

It’s a solid point; he’s probably more right than wrong.  However, one of the most interesting examples of shifting expectations was the Lions’ 2007 season.  Despite horrific road losses to the Eagles and Redskins, two of the most appalling on-field forfeits I’ve ever seen, the Lions got off to a 6-2 start.  Quoth Mike Furrey after a post-bye-week win over the Buccaneers:

The Lions are 4-2, media! You can kiss my ass!

The Lions kept winning, picking up two more Ws in spectacular fashion, including the last time the Lions kicked anyone’s ass, a legendary 44-7 whupping of the Broncos.  I would be remiss if I did not include this clip, so I will:

. . . brings a tear to my eye every time.

Lions fans were exultant.  The Lions were 6-2!  The playoffs were nearly certainty.  The division crown was well within reach.  Fans even started speculating about playoff byes and home field advantage.  Certainly, these mighty Lions could not be satisfied with a one-and-done run through the postseason!  No, they [embarrassingly premature smugness redacted].

The crash back to Earth was excruciating.  The Lions finished 7-9, and played some of the most God-awful football anyone has ever seen along the way.  The nine-turnover, nineteen-penalty 21-31 turd at Arizona bobs up to the top of the Honolulu Blue Port-O-John liquid that marinates the worst games ever.  Look at the weather: “72 degrees, no wind.”  The two teams combined to lose six fumbles.  How does that even happen?  As Greg Eno put it over at Out of Bounds:

OK, Mike. Ready? The Lions are 7-8! You can plant one between my back pockets, too.

So, did Lions fans walk away happy?  Were we pleased or content with seven wins?  Absolutely not—even though, had we been offered a guaranteed 7-win season at the outset, we’d probably have taken it.  I think the same applies this season: yes, we’d take seven wins; Hell, we’d be giddy!  And yes, there’s no doubt, winning a few of the first several, or several of the first eight, games would go a long way towards rejuvenating the fan base.  Hitting the halfway point of the season at 4-4 would do wonders for attendance, for spirit, for—yes—the blue flame.  But, who among us is ready for a 1-7 finish?  Who here wants to be eager to come home from church and mow the lawn because the Lions will be on?  Not I.

Yes, I’d like to avoid a three- or four-game losing streak to start the season.  Yes, I’d love for everyone to get amped for Lions football right out of the gate.  But, saying that you want the Lions to blow all their wins up front, because winning them in the back half “doesn’t matter?”  I can’t agree.  The only thing crueler than another double-digit-loss season would be to get a sniff of victory, only to get our faces pushed back into the garbage.

At the car wash.

Technorati Tags: nfl,detroit lions,denver broncos,philadelphia eagles,washington redskins,shaun rogers,mike furrey

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brownpocalypse

Icon SMI

Last night, I watched most of the Monday Night game between the Browns and Ravens.  I’d decided it'd be a good idea to take some notes, effectively TV scouting the Browns.

I’m going to be real for a second here, folks: if the Lions can't beat the Browns in Ford Field, they will not win another game this season.

The Browns' offense is the most anemic, pathetic, limpid, impotent unit in football.  They have absolutely zero confidence in their quarterback.  The Browns’ gameplan for victory last night was to completely remove Brady Quinn from the equation.  I didn’t actually chart the game, but I would venture to guess—without exaggeration—that over eighty percent of the Browns’ offensive snaps were either a run, a screen pass, a TE screen, a WR screen, a bubble screen, or a Wildcat play.

It’s difficult to imagine, but Browns offensive coordinator Brian Daboll appeared to be petrified by the prospect of Brady Quinn making a read and throwing the football.  On the  few occasions where Quinn dropped back and threw a real pass, he and his receivers almost never agreed on the route to be run.  Five yards ahead, behind, outside, inside; WRs not expecting the ball, WRs expecting the ball and not getting it . . . every conceivable misfire or miscommunication occurred.  I’m going to let the numbers speak for themselves:

13 of 31, 99 yards, 0 touchdowns, 2 interceptions.

Folks, that is miserable.  13 of 31 is 41.3%--and again, he was throwing a large percentage of screen passes.  41.3% should not happen.  You know what else should not happen?  3.13 yards per attempt.  When Brady Quinn drops back to pass, you can expect an average of three yards gained . . . that would be anemic for a running game, but for a passing offense, it’s . . . apalling.

Daboll is trying like crazy, though, to disguise what he’s doing.  He’s using Martzian levels of pre-snap motion: TE from one side to the other, new strong-side slot WR to weak side split end, RB from tailback to offset FB; all on the same play!  However, once that’s all settled down, they’re either running up the middle or running a screen.  I am completely confident in the Lions’ ability to stop these guys.

The one thing that really stuck out to me was the explosive playmaking ability of Josh Cribbs.  They try to run the Wildcat with him, but the total lack of offensive threats around him stops it cold.  When Josh Cribbs fakes a handoff to undrafted free agent rookie James Harrison, is there a linebacker in the world who bites?  Even so, Cribbs often makes hay, even with insufficient daylight.  I’m neither joking nor exaggerating when I say that a full-time Cribbs “Wildcat" would be much more dangerous than their current base offense.

Of course, there is the other side of the ball, and I won't sugarcoat it: the Lions are going to struggle to run the ball against the Browns. Besides the OT-to-OT havoc we all know a motivated Shaun Rogers can wreak, and the constant penetration by former Spartan Robaire Smith, the Browns’ secondary is not afraid to get up and support the run.  CB Eric Wright is a tackling machine, and safety Abram Elam loves to lay the lumber across the middle.

In the end, though, we're talking about a team that simply can't beat anyone.  As I've mentioned in the past, there's a special quality about offense: it can beat itself.  If you can't run block, and can't complete a pass, it doesn't matter which defense is across from you.  Given the state of this Cleveland Browns offense, the Lions probably won’t need to score 10 points to win.

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why did the 400-pound chicken come home to roost? to get whatever he wants!

It puts me in a difficult spot, as a fan.  When a player like Shaun Rogers--an impossible beast who can outrun, outjump, and generally out-athlete men half his size--gets drafted by the Lions and sees immediate success, it's hard not to love him.  When you see this big doofy mug (thanks, Sports Illustrated):

How can you not love him?  When it looks like he's on his way to being one of the best players in the game at his position--maybe even on his side of the field--how can you not love him?  How can you not want to drive to Ford Field, buy a Big Baby jersey and an eight dollar beer, and holler like a Texas country boy every time he blows somebody up?

Here's the problem.

As NFL.com's Adam Schefter points out, that big fat lovable tub of badass carries a lot of baggage--and I am neither referring to Samsonite, nor the keg of flesh behind his doubtlessly-melon-sized belly button.  Rogers plays hard when he is happy, or feels he has something to prove, and that's it.  If he's not happy, doesn't feel like he's under the gun, or just plain doesn't wanna be sweet that day, he goes from being a badass to a lardass, effective purely for his size and nothing else.

We as Lions fans saw plenty of both the unblockable monster, and the wind-sucking goldbricker.  Many have correctly noted that the loss of Rogers put a dagger in the heart of a nearly-moribund defense, and the one INT we got out of Leigh Bodden in the one year he was here, can't possibly make up for the every-down impact Rogers had.  I concede that removing Big Baby from the middle of the defense created a cavernous hole, and our run defense was horrifyingly bad without him.  

However, it was only 'pretty bad' with him--and there were critical times (like the Philly game of 2007) where he was technically present on the field, but got blown off the ball by 100-pounds-lesser men.  Moreover, his play on the field is only part of the picture.  He clearly buys his own hype, and wants to be treated at all times like the lead dog--regardless of recent production or attitude.  Everything I heard while he was here was that the was a literal and physical enormous presence in the locker room, and he more or less ruled it with an iron fist.  He, like most other talented players stuck on the Millen-era Lions, grew completely sick of it all and turned the coaches out.  His influence became entirely negative; his off-field antics grew increasingly unpalatable.  Finally, his on-field play absolutely melted into nothing; he could be counted on nothing more than 20 snaps of 'meh', occasionally punctuated by a big play if the game was still close in the fourth quarter.

The Browns got most of a season of "good" Shaun Rogers, making the Pro Bowl as the rarest and most integral piece of a 3-4 defense: the nose tackle.  Now that they're building around him, Mangini has realized--too late--the importance of handling Big Baby with kid gloves.  He's seeing the problems that come with making Rogers the foundation of your defense.  And he'll find out that Rogers will find the chinks in his armor, and undermine his ability to coach.  Good luck, Mangenius, you'll need it.

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