Martin Mayhew and Jim Schwartz have espoused to a long term team building plan which will never subjugate team needs to overt talent.  This is the primary reason that Nick Fairly wears a Lion on his helmet and Prince Amukamara does not. 

As the Lions went into the draft last year, they had an incredibly glaring need at cornerback...there were two "sure-fire" shutdown corners in last year's draft, Amukamara and Patrick Peterson.  The Lions had to hold their breath until their pick hoping that one of the two would miraculously fall to them...To their great relief Amukamara was there when the Lions came up on the clock...but so was Nick Fairly...whom the Lions had higher on their boards, even though he would strengthen a position that was arguably the strongest on the team...and yet still they skipped out on Amukamara and put in the card for Fairly...

So now we he head toward another draft and it would seem a little farfetched that they won't continue with the BPA scenario. Watching the Senior Bowl this past weekend, let's hope that miraculously DE Quinton Coples will fall through the cracks based on some nonsense about "work ethic" or "possible character issues."

DE Quinton Coples: Coples is tall and rangy and fast.  He looked out of place at the Senior Bowl...he looked more like he should be in the ProBowl.  He is the prototype for the new powerful, "Julius Peppers-type" end that will grow into the rage in the league.  Guys like Osi Umenyiora and Peppers and Justin Tuck...He is a worthy top of the first round talent.

LB Zach Brown: Brown is a bit on the lighter side, but incredibly fast and quick in short areas.  However, he looked a little out of control.  He missed several tackles and overran quite a few plays.  The Lions are in dire need of fast disciplined linebackers who will be sound in their assignments.  Now it is up to the scouts and the coaching staff to find out in interviews if he can be coached out of the tendencies he showed in Mobile.

CB Janoris Jenkins: Jenkins is tall and fast and great cover corner.  He would be a great pick for the Lions at 23 if he falls there...that is if he is well past his past poor decision-making.  The same poor judgement that got him kicked out of Florida and netted him two marijuana possession chargers.  Marijuana + Lions = Not gonna happen again...

OT Mike Adams: Adams missed most of his senior season due to injuries, but he came to play at Senior Bowl week.  He played very well against Coples and everyone else.  He had a great game and from reports a great week.  If Adams falls to 23, the Lions should take a little time to consider if they want to pick up the successor to Backus now.

OT Zebrie Sanders: Sanders, according to reports, had a great week, but that didn't show in the game.  He looked slow and will most likely, at best, be a starting RT in the NFL.  I'd be surprised to see the Lions take a run at Sanders, unless he shows incredible abilities at the Combine and his personal workouts, he appears to be a downgrade from Gosder Cherilus.

CB Brandon Boykin: Boykin looked fast, but small.  He appeared to be an adequate nickel back...I wouldn't take him in the first round.

Why do they even play the ProBowl?

I watched...five minutes...maybe...of the ProBowl...and if I could, I'd sue the NFL to somehow try and get those minutes back.  The game is a farce.  There is no pass rush...nobody wants to put forth any effort at all.  I don't care who won.  It wasn't a game...

The game would be much better served if they just brought back all sorts of positional competitions and then just ran 7 on 7 drills for the game.  Seriously, there'd be more drama and excitement if it was "Who's the strongest man in the NFL?" or "Who's the most accurate quarterback?"  or "Who's the fastest man in the NFL?"

I watched this past weekend's football fully expecting to have Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees and Tim Tebow shoved down my throat as a combined story lines of divergent ways that the future of NFL offenses may be going....Tom Brady and the Patriots embarrassing mutilation of the Broncos fully pushed into view exactly what the NFL thinks about the "Running Game/Sound Defense" theory of football teams...The NFL wants none of it.  In fact, after the Broncos-Patriots contest, I was fully of the opinion that what the NFL truly wants is 100-98 basketball-type scores. 

But then something funny happened...the Forty-Niners and Giants dethroned Drew Brees and Aaron Rodgers, respectively in what had to have the people back in the New York offices mighty upset.  Where has the long anticipated opening day rematch of the Packers and Saints gone? 

The old adage has always been "Offense puts people in the seats, defense wins championships."  The NFL, via rule changes, questionable officiating, and broadcast television, have been trying for years to debunk this theory.

And for the most part they have.  The five yard chuck rule, the overzealous flagging of hits to the quarterback, the horse collar tackle, the protecting of receivers going over the middle...all of this has led to defenses being almost completely hand tied in their attempts to slow down offensive juggernauts...just as the NFL has foreseen...

But this past weekend...SF and NY seemingly made stands for the way football used to be played.  They won with enough defense to slow down these passing juggernauts...although in the SF-NO game, one could make the argument that the 49er defense simply managed to keep them in the game until the last five minute onslaught of offensive fireworks...but still...there was defense and there was a lot of rushing from Frank Gore and even Alex Smith scored on a 28 year QB keeper...

The old ways can still stand...but will they be allowed to next year?

So what did we learn?

1.  Defense can still win, but I fear that the Lions are not built with the kind of defense that does.  The Lions defense is built upon the defensive line, from the tackles out.  Ndamukong Suh and Nick Fairly are cornerstones for the future...but the ends?  I'm worried about the defensive ends.

Kyle VandenBosch is an incredible motor guy and an unquestioned leader...but I don't think it's too far fetched to say that he gets by on his work ethic and non-stop motor than he does with his baseline talent.  If you look at the ends of SF and NY, you see lean long speedsters in the mold of a Julius Peppers (Justin Tuck, Osi Umeniyora, etc)...you might be able to say that KVB is a bit like SF's DE Justin Smith...but Smith is a much more powerful, younger, and faster version....this brings up the question of what to do about Cliff Avril, who will be negotiating for a new contract this offseason. 

Avril is a somewhat known commodity as he has increasingly gotten better every season, this year he had a career high 11 sacks...but he is not in the mold of a Tuck or a Peppers or Umeniyora...he is a shorter, fast end...he is not in the top 5 in the league...11 sacks is respectable...but that's supposed to be what he averages every year...if he's truly great, that'd be a down year for a pro bowl defensive end...Is that worth top 3-4 DE money in the league? 

On the other hand, this is the second new year under the new CBA--and most importantly, a rookie salary structure--and the prospect of trying to draft one or two of those long, lean speedsters and bargain basement prices might be best for the organization...especially when you consider the possibility of Calvin Johnson needing a new contract....

2. Great linebackers can make all the difference.  In SF, Patrick Willis and Navarro Bowman are studs.  They are fast, mean, glass-chewing tackling machines.  They are players with misguided, evil, malevolent hearts when they are on the football field and they can stop the run and cover tight ends out of the backfield.  I don't think the Lions have a single linebacker that can do that.

Willis and Bowman rarely ever miss assignments, and they almost never miss a tackle.  In the Lions loss to the Saints, Tulloch was out of place several times and Justin Durant missed several tackles.

The Lions were one of the worst teams this season in rush defense and while a lot of the blame tends to get heaped upon the D-Line, I'm sure a lot of it should also get shoveled in the direction of the Detroit linebackers who were unable to fill the proper holes and even when they did properly fill missed too many tackles.

3. Teams are going to start loading up on cornerbacks...probably taller cornerbacks if possible.  Last offseason, I set my hopes on two cornerbacks...free agent Carlos Rogers...who was signed up by SF and is going to the pro bowl and Nebraska's Prince Amukamara...who was drafted by the Giants, had an off and on year, but was a big part of eliminating the Packers WR Jordy Nelson this past weekend and is now heading to the NFC Championship game...

Chris Houston had some awful games...Eric Wright didn't exactly light the league...

So, while the Lions are completely stacked at DT...there are still ALOT of positions that the need to be addressed this off season, both prudently and financially intelligently.

This week, Martin Mayhew locked up offensive coordinator Scott Linehan, defensive coordinator Gunther Cunningham, and special teams coordinator Danny Crossman for at least the next year.  He is supposedly currently working on extending the contract of Head Coach Jim Schwartz.

This move ensures a consistent leadership in the organization and the kind of continuity in philosophies that perennial football powers like Pittsburgh and New England have used to maintain dominance in the league.  Pittsburgh's Dick Lebeau has been running the Steelers 3-4 defense for...what seems like forever.  He probably coached against Lombardi...Monte Kiffin was the DC for Tampa Bay for something on the order of ten years...and for those ten years Tampa had one of the best defenses every year.  Tom Moore was the offensive coordinator for most of Peyton Manning's tenure in Indianapolis.

Familiarity breeds high amounts of skill when applied to a football team.  An organization knows exactly what it needs to fill the requirements for their scheme.

As Linehan and Cunningham head into the fourth year of their schemes, they know exactly where their deficiencies are.  Also, just as importantly, they know exactly the most important pieces of their teams that need to be kept. 

Namely, Calvin Johnson and Cliff Avril respectively.  The offense, and the Lions organization as a whole, absolutely must, if they want to continue annual trips to the playoffs, extend Calvin Johnson to a long, long term deal.  This will probably take up an unhealthy part of the team's salary cap, but that's unavoidable.  Megatron showed how incredibly vital he is to the continued progression of Stafford and the legitimizing of the team's offense.  Megatron is a unique and very special talent.  He is this decade's Barry Sanders to the Lions.  The organization could never have justified losing Sanders, just as much as the Lions cannot afford to lose Johnson.

Avril managed 11 sacks this past season and was already on a one year contract.  In the NFL, a defensive end that can average 10+ sacks a season and apply consistent pressure on opposing quarterbacks has been placed on a pedestal right next to the franchise quarterback and the offensive cornerstone of a left tackle. 

Even though Avril, who has steadily improved year after year, managed double digits sacks for only the first time in his career, if he is allowed to test the free agent waters, he will be highly sought after around the league.  He will demand a large contract too.

Furthermore, the Lions must also attend to MLB Stephen Tulloch and CB Eric Wright, both of who were signed to one year contracts before the season.  Both Tulloch and Wright proved very valuable, especially early in the season, but as the season went on and the Lions defense seemed to fall apart, especially in the last two weeks of the season, one might have to wonder how much of that faltering falls on Wright or Tulloch or even Avril?

The Lions have a ton of decisions to make and only a limited supply of cash.  It'll be a very interesting offseason.

In the NFL you can only play who the next team that gets put on your schedule.  It's always a great argument whenever somebody puts a team down by saying, "Well, look at who they played!  Of course they're..."  If you take apart the Lions schedule this season and look at their 6 losses (2 losses to Green Bay, 15-1, 1 to New Orleans, 13-3, 1 to San Francisco, 13-3, 1 to Chicago 8-8, and 1 to Atlanta, 10-6), you might feel justified in keeping up with that argument.  Five of those six teams are going to the playoffs and Chicago was a real contender until they lost their starting quarterback for the year.  You might say that the Lions just can't beat the big boys...can't hang with the real contenders...

And you may be right...

But let's look at the Lions 31-17 loss a few weeks ago to this weeks wild card opponent, the New Orleans Saints.

1. 31-17 is only two scores...For the Lions, the way they've consistently come back in games this year, it's practically tied.

2. The first game was the first game Matthew Stafford played without his protective glove...and his hand was still sore...of course he still for over 400 yards in that game...

3. This was the first game of Ndamukong Suh's suspension.  Nick Fairly played extremely well for the first quarter and then was taken out after re-aggravating his previously broken foot. So the pass rush was severely hampered.

4. Kevin Smith, playing for the already IR'd Jahvid Best, went down in the second quarter with a high ankle sprain.

5. S Louis Delmas didn't play.  CB Chris Houston was held out with an injury too.  CB Eric Wright went out with an ankle or knee injury during the game...The secondary was decimated.

6. The Lions were called for FOUR personal foul calls which greatly helped the Saints sustain drives and score.  They were also called for an incredibly ridiculous face mask call on Nate Burleson when he tried to stiff arm a defender as he was going out of bounds. 

Now let's look at what will be different this game...

1. Stafford is completely healed and on fire after throwing for 520 yards and 5 TD's against the Packers (5,038 yards this season, only the fourth QB in the history of the NFL to accomplish this feat.)

2. Ndamukong Suh will play.  It appears that Nick Fairly will play.

3. The entire starting secondary of the Lions is set to play...and they have a lot to prove after they gave up 480 yards and 6 TD's to Aaron Rodgers' backup.

4. Kevin Smith is healthy.

5. New Orleans RB Mark Ingram, who scored in the first game, will be out this time around.

Now all that stuff is nice and all...but in the end, I really, really think that this game comes down two things...maybe three.

1. How good of a coach is Jim Schwartz...and his assistants?  The Lions have already played the Saints.  They know what they're all about.  What did they learn?  Will the Lions' adjustments prove to be better than New Orleans' coach Sean Payton's?

2. Penalties.  Will the Lions continue their assault on the NFL rulebook?  Will the whistles continue to blow against the Honolulu
Blue?  I'm sorry, but if you've noticed anything over this season...other than everybody and their brother calls the Lions "undisciplined and dirty"...is that they are not ever getting any calls, they are the victims of facemasks and holdings and offsides and pass interferences...and they do not get calls.  The Lions are getting mugged every Sunday and they are the ones being called dirty.

If you watched the Packers game, which was the first time anyone has said anything about the huge discrepancy in calls, you saw a blatant shot to the Kevin Smith's head as he scored a touchdown, no call.  A touchdown not called.  A muffed punt by Jordy Nelson.  A non-muffed bad call on Stefan Logan...

The Lions DO seriously need to stop with all of the dumb penalties and all of the regular penalties too.  They had 11 penalties against the Packers...but the games need to start getting called both ways too.

I'm not saying that's why the Lions lost to the Packers on Sunday...or all of their other losses, but the evidence of unbalanced officiating just keeps piling up.  The Lions lost to the Packers because they wouldn't have been able to cover a tree...but all those penalties and non-called Packer/Saint/etc calls.

3. Ndamukong Suh needs to have a Big 12 Championship type game...and if Nick Fairly and Corey Williams could chip in too that'd be awful nice.  The more pressure on Brees, the better.

The Lions blamed the wind.  The announcers for the game never mentioned the wind as being a problem.  Jay Cutler didn't seem to have that many issues with the wind.

Cutler didn't throw four interceptions.  Stafford did.

Stafford has a broken index finger on his throwing hand...Cutler doesn't. Stafford was wearing a glove for the first time to somehow protect that finger...

As a fan, I think "the wind excuse" in Chicago is only used by morons (I'm looking at you Marty Mornhinweg.)

If Stafford can't throw in the wind...he'd have never made it out of high school.  It is my personal opinion that the finger bugged him a lot...so much so, that he didn't really WANT to take off the glove.

I do understand why the organization would be so insistent on blaming the wind...instead of just putting a big target on the franchise's biggest asset.

Here are some other things that really, REALLY bugged me about this game.

1. How is Calvin Johnson's first fumble not voided by Julius Peppers' blatant clothesline and head tackle?  If Suh does that to anybody you know there'll be yellow flying.  Heck, if Suh eats too much garlic and breathes next to a QB's head he gets called for something.  This set the tone for the entire chippy fiasco that this game was.

2. Why is Stafford still playing in the fourth quarter after throwing FOUR interceptions?  Put Shaun Hill in.  You're not going to win this game and if Stafford really is injured, why keep him in there to get pummeled and possibly injured worse?

3. Stafford should have been thrown out too.  That was a punk move pulling DJ Moore down by his head.  I lost a little respect for him as I repeatedly watched that replay.

4. Stafford has an awesome report with Megatron...but, dude, you have a ton of other weapons and the ball was routinely forced into Johnson when multiple other options were WIDE OPEN.  I understand forcing it in to Calvin...throw it up high where only he can get it...this is a strategy that should work...but it's even easier to complete passes to players that aren't covered at all...like Titus Young in the endzone.  This is an issue that is typical of rookie quarterbacks...which I guess, since Stafford just managed to finish only his sixteenth career game...maybe we should still consider him a rookie.

5. If the wind really was that atrocious...the Lions needed to force the run.  Morris and Kevin Smith (yeah, he's back...how weird is that?) managed some decent runs.  At 20-6, the Lions were definitely still in the game...pick six, pick six...34-6...not so much. 

6. Never kick it to Devin Hester.  Ever.

7. Peppers might just be in Stafford's head. 

8. Burleson needs to be targeted more often.  He runs with a lot of determination...but he needs to hold on to the damn ball.

9. Suh needs to quit pushing people down after the whistle.  Fairly shouldn't have been called for anything when he followed through with the play and landed on Cutler...but the refs are looking at anything and everything the Lions do...and their itching to keep adding to the "Bad Boys" image.

10. Schwartz needs to start reigning the guys in now.  This overly aggressive play, while fun to watch and easy to cheer for, is getting the team in trouble...and he also has to start muzzling the players that won't keep their mouths shut--talking trash when you're down by 30 points is a sure sign of a loser.

11. I've already talked about my fan superstitions in regards to the last time the Lions were 6-2 and finished 7-9...the Lions haven't given me any reasons to change my mind.  I'm thinking 8-8 and out of the playoffs.  Please guys, prove me wrong.

When the Lions weren't blocking...or being blocked...or missing open receivers or dropping passes, they were busy taking dumb penalties.

This was the kind of game that beckoned back to the inglorious days of "same old Lions."  The hallmark of "same old Lions" is this: Less than three minutes left, down by seven or eight and needing a touchdown to tie...never a field goal...which is exactly where the Lions were again yesterday.

The complaints this year about the Lions have routinely gone back to the teams inability to run...with the loss of Jahvid Best last week the Lions decided to prove the world right...they CANNOT run the ball.  Kieland Williams looked pretty good on a couple of carries...so they took him out.

But it really wasn't a problem with the running backs at all, although it may have been a problem with the coaches continually calling running plays when the team was showing so efficiently that they have less chance of being a running team as the Detroit Pride have of getting invitations to the Ford Family Christmas party.  The problem was the blocking or lack there of. 

Jim Schwartz may have had something last year when he said that Jeff Backus was the best tackle in the NFC North last season...this year....Backus has looked his age or worse....and the rest of the line isn't fairing any better.  There is no running game, because it looks as if the guys on the line don't believe that they can run the ball.

Oh...and the defense can't stop the run either.  The Lions may have the most fear inducing, dominating defensive line in the NFL.  It is a line that, at times, has looked like it simply cannot be blocked...which is something that opposing offenses have almost come to accept...so instead they trick the D-lineman into overrunning plays and filling wrong gaps.  The Lions are giving up way too much on the ground and are being skewered by the quick passing game.

During the 5-0 start, the defensive backs were playing up on opposing receivers, now, inexplicably they have started playing back more often than not.

Here is the argument I am going to raise....the Lions are looking an awful lot like the 2007 edition.  They started off 6-2....beating the living snot out of the Denver Broncos....then went on to lose the next 24 games...The Lions built the 5-0 record by beating some run of the mill teams and the majority of the remainder of this year's schedule is against the primo teams in the NFL. 

This week, they go to Denver and should come out 6-2...