Another Sunday, another Detroit Lions choke job. The Lions take a 23-27 loss to the Chicago Bears in a very ugly fashion.
Imagine hiring a defensive-minded head coach who’s defense is garbage. Imagine keeping that coach for three years. That coach is Matt Patricia. Last year, Patricia’s defense gave up the most passing yards in the league, in the opener they follow it up by allowing by far the worst starting quarterback in the league in Mitchell Tribusky to have a 104.2 passer rating. And I don’t wanna hear that they were without their top 3/4 corners because last year with pro bowl corner Darius Slay they still couldn’t stop the pass. If Tribisky was able to complete a pass in the first half, the Bears would have put up 40 points on them. Hopefully this secondary gets healthy because they are going to Green Bay next week and Aaron Rodgers and the Packers just put up 43 on a very good Vikings defense.
The second issue I have with today’s game is the play calling. I haven’t had too many bad things to say about Darrell Bevel’s offense but my god is it conservative. I really like the idea of trying to get a run game going but as soon as the Lions get a lead they don’t pass the ball and it leads to way too many three and outs. Bevel plays to not lose when he should be playing to win. If they keep the pedal to the medal on offense, the Lions easily run away with the game.
The Adrian Peterson signing confused me at first. The Washington Football Team didn’t even want him and they just had to cut Darius Guice and you know the Lions ownership likes “high character people” in their organization. Signing a 35-year-old washed-up running back really puzzled me but he was great today. He rushed for 93 yards and averaged 6.6 yards a carry. On a day where De’Andre Swift is limited and Kerryon Johnson coming off an injury he stepped up and I’ll give him credit.
I’m convinced Matt Patricia doesn’t have this team ready to play. There were some very sloppy penalties in today’s loss. Like Jahlani Tavia basically falling over into the neutral zone. A lot of dumb things happened today but nothing as boneheaded as Jamie Collins Sr.’s ejection. Collins was upset with the referees after he did not get a call. Collins coped with his anger by head butting one of the officials and was ejected right after. What Collins did was extremely selfish and boneheaded but I think this leads back to Patricia. Nobody in this locker room respects him, nobody. You’ve heard countless former players come out and bash Patricia for being a guy nobody wants to play for.
The Lions will take on the Green Bay Packers next Sunday at Lambeau Field. The current betting line has the Packers winning by 6 (I would expect the number of points to increase at some point this week). The Packers are coming off a shoot out with the Vikings in which they put up 43 points. I think the Lions get blown out so I’ll take the Packers to cover that -6 spread.
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Photo: USA Today Sports
