Just when I thought that the curse of Bobby Carpenter had doomed the Lions to their second home defeat in two games with Sean Lee picking off two Mathew Stafford passes and nearly returning one of them for a touchdown, something happened.
I still don't know what it was, but something definitely happened. In fact, I heard myself asking out loud in disbelief, "How the Hell did THAT just happen?"
While Calvin Johnson had 329 receiving yards and one touchdown (nearly three), set the record for the most receiving yards in NFL history for a non-overtime game, he still arguably had his worst game as a Lion with a fumble and a dropped pass that deflected into the hands of a defender for a key interception.
The Lions had four turnovers, making them only the second team out of 55 in NFL history to overcome a minus four takeaway deficit.
The Lions slumping defensive line only managed to sack Tony Romo one time even though he holds on to the ball longer than an Ohio State fan holds on to a bitchin' pair of jean shorts from his college days at Northern Ohio University in "beautiful" Ada, Ohio.
But Mathew Stafford still had 50 seconds left on the clock to cover 80 yards to overcome a six point deficit and salvage the Lions day, and possibly their season.
Conceding defeat and attempting to get a jump on traffic, many of their fans had already left Ford Field. Included amongst those who did was Detroit Pistons forward Charlie Villanueva.
Sadly, that was the first time in a long time that Charlie managed to get out of his seat in what turned out to be a Detroit victory.
However, after completing two key long passes to Kris Durham and Calvin Johnson, Stafford improbably had the Lions at the 1-yard line with just under 20 seconds left in the game.
And somewhere between Megatron's final reception and the next snap, Stafford made the improbable decision to go "Sarah Palin."
As he instructed his teammates to line up to spike the ball and kill the clock, Stafford went rogue and ran a QB sneak that even his teammates didn't know was coming.
Along with Megatron's record breaking day, Mathew Stafford's "Decepticon" fake spike helped the Lions stun the Cowboys.
Fortunately it worked, as the Dallas defense was caught flat footed as Dez Bryant, Tony Romo and Jason Witten debated about who had the lowest Wonderlic score on the Cowboy sideline.
Meanwhile, Megatron ended any debate as to who the best receiver in the NFL is. But unlike Dez Bryant, he didn't even want to talk about it.
Even after a disappointing loss to the Cincinnati Bengals dropped the Detroit Lions to 4-3, they are still in position to not only make the playoffs, but to send one of their largest contingencies to the NFL Pro Bowl.
Helped by three of their newest additions (Reggie Bush, Larry Warford and Glover Quin), as well as the return of a key player from injury (Louis Delmas), the Lions could be in position to send up to seven players to Honolulu to get back in touch with their roots.
I know, I know...The NFL has revised the Pro Bowl this year, where players will be voted upon regardless of conference, with two fantasy football champions joining the "fun" to help draft the actual teams school yard style.
First of all, if your the most popular sport in America and your looking to Gary Bettman and the NHL for ways to improve your All-Star game, you've got more problems than can be solved with all of Ndamukong Suh's fine money for an entire season.
Secondly, I'm ignoring these format changes and pretending that the Pro Bowl is going to be played as it always has...In Hawaii, with actual soccer players kicking off the ball, and halves, not quarters, that end with two minute warnings and teams alternating possessions.
Did I mention that Roger Goodell can suck it?Anyway, here's a look at how the 2013 Detroit Lions might fare in a traditional Pro Bowl selection process.
Quarterback - This is the year Mathew Stafford should not only finally make the Pro Bowl, but cement himself as one of the league's top quarterbacks. With three active roster spots, Drew Brees is a lock, while Tony Romo looks like the next best bet as of right now, but there's no telling if and when he'll suffer a melt down. That leaves Stafford fighting for the final active spot with Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers, and right now Stafford is having the better season. At the very least Stafford should be a Pro Bowl alternative.
Receivers - Now that Titus Young is out of the league, Calvin Johnson is the best receiver in football.
In Nike's new "Calvin and Johnson" ad campaign, Sean Combs gets all of the notoriety, while Calvin Johnson does all of the work...At least Puff Daddy finally found a replacement for Biggie Smalls.
Running Back - With only three active roster spots, Reggie Bush is likely on the bubble. Adrian Peterson and Marshawn Lynch look to return to Honolulu, while Bush, Matt Forte and Frank Gore are all fighting for the third and final spot. If he can stay healthy, Bush should be squarely in the mix.
Offensive Line - Don't look now, but Larry Warford might be positioning himself for Pro Bowl appearance as a rookie third round draft pick, If he wasn't already under consideration as an alternate or as the final reserve behind Mike Iupati and Jahri Evans before this week, his strong performance against Geno Atkins and Cincinnati's stout defensive line should grab some attention.
Defensive Line - Ndamukong Suh is the best interior defensive lineman in football. His statistics don't reflect the 3 interceptions that he caused by forcing opposing quarterbacks to throw the ball up for grabs for fear of having their body parts mailed to the NFL league offices c/o Roger Goodell and Merton Hanks. Unfortunately, the rest of the Lions ultra talented defensive line has underperformed, and what should have been at least two Pro Bowl players from their over-hyped line will likely be limited to only Suh.
Linebackers - DeAndre Levy's transformation from a liability to a play maker is one of the better success stories for the Lions this year. With Clay Mathews and DeMarcus Ware injured, and Aldon Smith trying to figure out whether he'll be spending his offseason in rehab or Federal prison, Levy deserves to be a Pro Bowl starter this year.
Defensive Backs - Chris Houston is adequate, but hardly Pro Bowl material as evidenced by his rough game trying to cover Bengal receiver A.J. Green. With two interceptions and a fumble recovery already, Glover Quin deserves strong consideration at strong safety, while Louis Delmas is probably on the bubble to be a Pro Bowl alternate at the free safety position.
Special Teams - Sam Martin kicked his way out of Pro Bowl contention by shanking his final punt of the game against Cincinnati. Quite simply, you cannot go to the Pro Bowl as a soccer player when you are almost single handedly responsible for your team losing a game, no matter how big of a weapon you had been the rest of the season.
PREDICTION
-Starters (3): Calvin Johnson, Ndamukong Suh, DeAndre Levy
-Reserves (2): Larry Warford, Glover Quin
-Alternates (2): Mathew Stafford, Reggie Bush
A week ago former NFL head coach and current NBC analyst Tony Dungy referred to Detroit as the "same old Lions" following their road loss to the Arizona Cardinals.
Well, one week later the Lions are coming off of their first win over the Redskins in Washington, D.C. in 75 years as they head into a showdown for first place in the NFC North at home against the Chicago Bears.
Guess what people, these are not your same old Detroit Lions.
Want to bitch about Offensive Coordinator Scott Linehan's boring and predictable play calling? Maybe you didn't notice, but the Lions are regularly mixing in the read option.
Keep your eyes on the receivers. They're actually running pass routes and don't start blocking until they see that Joique Bell has been handed the ball after Stafford reads the defense.
No, Mathew Stafford may not be the most mobile quarterback, or even a running threat at all, but that hasn't stopped Peyton Manning from running the read option as a form of play action to keep
defenses honest.
How about the Lions secondary, where their most recent street free agent, Rashean Mathis, almost gave up a 57-yard touchdown pass to Redskins WR Aldrick Robinson?
Well, the key word was "almost," because despite getting beat, Mathis still managed to catch up to Robinson as he was trying to catch the ball in the endzone. That was just enough to jar the ball loose, and the catch was overturned on instant replay.
If all that wasn't enough, the Lions not only successfully converted a key 4th and 1 late in the 4th quarter, but they did so by running to the left side of their offensive line, between center and left tackle.
And while that center was Dominic Raiola, the left tackle was not Jeff Backus...So no, these are not your "same old Lions" by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, I think there might even be more "new Lions" to come.
In overcoming the ghosts of seasons' past, the Lions just might have treated their fans to something we didn't see coming...An unstoppable red zone offense, or at least a red zone offense that can only be stopped by the Lions themselves.
We even withstood a swift kick to the gnards when Adrian Peterson took the Vikings first offensive snap of the season 78-yards for a touchdown, reminiscent of Matt Ryan converting his first ever NFL pass into a 62-yard touchdown on opening day in 2008.
And even after leaving between 28-31 points on the field attributable to a
dropped FG snap, dropped passes, a dropped interception that would have gone for a touchdown, a needless
penalty that negated another potential interception return for a touchdown, and Brandon Pettigrew's best efforts to turn Ford Field into a bowling alley (and that was just in the first half!), the Lions finally teased us with a reason for some optimism...Their red zone offense.
The Lions already have the game's most fearsome receiver in Calvin Johnson, who combines size, speed and strength in a way that the NFL has never seen before.
In fact, last year teams even began covering him in the red zone in ways that had never been seen before, such as putting "gunner" coverage on him to prevent him from getting off of the goal line, or bracketing him with a safety over top and a linebacker underneath of a cornerback playing man coverage.
Of course, the Lions front office remedied that coverage problem this offseason by signing Reggie Bush, who can make teams pay underneath either as a running or receiving threat out of the backfield when they double or triple cover Megatron.
Like Megatron (and unlike Mikel Leshoure last season), Bush is an offensive weapon that defensive coordinators must account for on every single play. That alone takes away the opposition's ability to bracket Johnson with a linebacker as they did for much of last season.
Look for the Lions to play plenty of "21" personnel (2 TE's and 1 RB) in the red zone this season, with hybrid TE Tony Scheffler proving to be too big for safeties to cover, and too fast for linebackers.
But the most pleasant surprise of the Lions week 1 victory over the Vikings was the way they utilized undrafted free agent rookie TE Joseph Fauria.
Standing 6'8 and having exceptional hands, Fauria is an absolute nightmare of a match-up for opposing defenses in the red zone, especially when he will most likely be faced with single coverage given the attention that they will have to pay to Calvin Johnson and Reggie Bush.
That much was evident when Fauria scored on an all but uncontested 1-yard TD over Vikings cornerback Chris Cook, who was unable to muster much opposition at all to the lob pass that Mathew Stafford threw to his new towering and isolated target.
Throw Ryan Broyles in the mix, and the Lions have the makings for an unstoppable red zone personnel grouping this season.
While Broyles did not play in week one as a precaution from his his offseason knee
surgery, once he returns Broyles will be the perfect compliment given
his stellar route running and propensity to find seams in zone defenses, which
is what NFL teams predominantly play in the red zone.
On paper, this looks good...Maybe even too good. Now all that's left is for the Lions to execute and stop stopping themselves.
