I didn't post about the Lions' 2nd loss of the season (to the Vikings) because I was on the road and didn't see the game. I was on the road yesterday as well, but due to the later start time, I made it home with time to spare and witnessed that particular debacle. Let put this to you straight - if you had any hopes that the Lions would return to the playoffs this year, squash them. Sometime, somewhere, I'm sure an NFL team that started 0-3 has gone on to make the playoffs. It's like the sports movie cliché, a raggedy band of misfits finds common ground and gels, and discover that they each possess a unique talent that gets amplified when working in conjunction with the rest of the team. The Lions are NOT that team.
The Broncos are a particularly talented defense. They have 2 great pass rushers in DeMarcus Ware and Von Miller, they have a stout interior D line, their LBs are solid, and their defensive backfield, highlighted by Aqib Talib and Chris Harris, is top shelf. It's not like I was expecting the Lions to light up the scoreboard. I did hope they'd be better than they were. The offensive line looks equally as bad as last year, which is MASSIVELY disappointing because they spent a 1st round pick and a trade on improving the line, and they got back starters who were injured last year. They still can't run-block, and their pass protection is horrendous. Stafford was practically annihilated in the Vikings game, and last night he had about 1.5 seconds to get rid of the ball on most of his dropbacks.
Speaking of Stafford, holy crap was he atrocious. His passing stats don't look THAT bad - 31-45 for 282 yards, 1 TD and 2 INTs - but that belies the reality. Both picks were bad throws, one a toss into triple coverage where he never looked off the receiver, the other was a low-angle throw (I'm not generally opposed to Stafford throwing sidearm, but it hurt him here) that didn't get past the LB. David Bruton, the LB, made a great play to get that pick, but it was still a bad throw. Stafford had another throw that SHOULD have been a pick, but Calvin came back and took it away from Aqib Talib.
The worst, however, was the fumble. The timing hurt because the Lions were threatening to score, it was in the 4th quarter, and they were only down by 2 at that point. On the play, Stafford had the ball in the pocket for a couple of seconds and needed to avoid a rush. He managed not to get sacked but he HAD to get rid of the ball immediately, as Barrett was bearing down on him, or eat it. The direction Stafford took to avoid the rush and the throwing motion put the ball right in Barrett's face and it was an easy takeaway. It actually reminded me of the Statue of Liberty Play, except that is designed to go to a RB, not the opposing LB. Stafford argued at the time that his arm was moving forward and it should've been ruled a forward pass. I agree that it was a bad call, but it was still monumentally stupid of Stafford to ignore a pass rusher who was unblocked. The irony is literally seconds before this play, color commentator Chris Collinsworth said that Matt Stafford should be at his peak right now and able to beat Manning's Broncos in a home "must-win" game.
Detroit's Win Probability dropped from about 50% to 15.3% with that fumble. It was the play that changed the course of the game. The Lions were in Denver territory and very well could've taken the lead on that drive. It was 1st down, no need to force anything. Instead of going ahead, they gave the ball back to Denver with pretty good field position. Denver mounted a mediocre drive, and assisted by a defensive illegal formation penalty, got 3 points out of it. This was one of the more ridiculous turn of events in the game, by the way. Denver missed their initial FG try, but Detroit had lined up with 6 guys on one side of the defensive line. That's illegal for some reason (seriously, you can't line up over the center and you can't send 6 guys on one side?), and for some the Lions' Special Teams Coach didn't know that. That was probably the most animated I've ever seen Jim Caldwell on the sideline, when he was chewing out the ST Coach.
The defense was adequate. I thought they did a decent job on Manning, and Denver's run game had nothing going on. Darius Slay had a bad game (got burned for a long TD at the end of the half, had an INT pulled away from him by Sanders, was the guilty party on the illegal formation penalty on the missed FG) and Rashean Mathis continues to not cover anybody, but Glover Quin was good, Josh Bynes was good, Ihedigbo was much improved (although he got nailed for an iffy late hit penalty), Ansah was good as usual, and Ngata looked like the perennial Pro Bowler he was (in spots, not all game). They managed to pick Manning once and returned a fumble for a TD, although that was negated by the refs initially making the wrong call. Like I said, the defense was adequate, but no one was GREAT. The defense had 2 Pro Bowlers last year (should've been 3, DeAndre Levy was robbed again), but aside from Quin, no one on the defense is near that level right now.
The offense is BAD. We've already covered the line and Stafford. The run game hasn't done anything since game 1. The line sucks at run blocking, but the run game often takes a while to reap larger gains. The Lions' best RB by far is Ameer Abdullah. He's gotten 21 carries through 3 games. That's an average of 7 carries a game. How are you supposed to establish a rushing attack if you only give your best RB the ball 7 times? Additionally, the Lions are under some kind of delusion that Abdullah isn't head & shoulders above the rest of their RB corps. I like Joique Bell and he's a great story, but he doesn't deserve to get equal or more carries. The way they're holding Ameer back reminds me a bit of Lawrence Frank's refusal to promote Andre Drummond to the starting lineup. Let him loose already. The Lions have run 134 passing plays and only 51 running plays. That's a 72/28 split. They need to strive for something closer to a 60/40 split, but that would require more patience than I think they have.
This brings me to Lombardi. I'm starting to suspect that he draws up a game plan without any consideration to what the other team is going to do. We knew 2 basic things about Denver's D: they rush the QB well, and they have good pass coverage. There are plays you can call that turn those strengths into weaknesses, but Lombardi called very few of those plays. Most of the runs were designed to go between the tackles instead of outside, where they could exploit the gap created by a strong pass rush. The passing game was a bit more successful, but I thought they could've done a better job of starting out with shorter crossing routes to get rid of the ball sooner, and then incorporating longer routes as the offense got going. Nothing the offense did threw Denver off guard or made them adjust their game plan.
In fact, Lombardi has NEVER drawn up a game plan that had an opposing DC scratching his head. If Caldwell has any ambitions to beat the odds and make the playoffs after starting 0-3, his best bet is to fire his OC and take over the play-calling. Lombardi was pretty bad last year (his first season calling plays), but Caldwell was reluctant to publicly assign any blame for the team's 0-2 start. I wonder if his tune will change now that the Lions are in desperation mode and their high-powered offense has yet to catch fire.
***
I realized I failed to post about my half marathon, which was 2 weekends ago. My bad.
I went into the race having JUST crammed in some barely-adequate training, but I felt confident that I could finish without having to walk. Based on my pace and how I finished my 10 mile run, I thought a reasonable expectation for my half marathon was 2:05:00, which is about a 9:30 mile pace. My pie-in-the-sky GOAL was under 2 hrs, which is closer to a 9min mile pace.
The actual race was in Lansing, the Capital City River Run. It started by LCC, near the park where Common Ground takes place. It was a slightly tardy start (I was could see the clock and was counting down), probably 30 seconds or so after 8am. We ran up Michigan Ave through MSU's main drag, heading East with the rising sun directly in our faces. I was wearing a Batman Under Armour t-shirt that my sister had gotten me for my birthday, so I had a few randoms cheering me on. Everbody loves Batman.
I was running a few steps behind the 9min Pacer Guys for the marathon. If you've never run a road race before, the larger ones have a pace team that run (supposedly) a set pace so you can match speeds and hopeful make your goal time. This race had four pacers for every pace at 30 sec intervals, two pacers for the marathon and two for the half. The 9min pacers for the marathon were running a bit faster, maybe an 8:40 pace or so.
We turned the corner at Hagadorn and I saw my folks for the second time on the path (they were yelling & ringing cowbells, so they were easy to spot). From there the track turned down the river trail, which was a really nice place to run. It was away from traffic, the surface was better than the roads (which are pot-holey), and there was plenty of shade and nice scenery. I passed the 6 mile marker at about 52 min, which was still an 8:40 mile pace.
My wife & daughter were supposed to cheer me on at the 9 mile mark, but I was running faster than predicted & I'd given my wife terrible directions. They probably missed me by 3-5 minutes. I started to slow a bit around then, and definitely was running slower by mile 10. I saw my folks for the third time with about half a mile to go. My dad chose to encourage me by saying, "You're gonna beat 2 hrs if you don't die!" I finished with a bit of a kick and clocked an official time of 1:58:12, which is a 9:01 mile pace. I nailed my goal.
The defense was adequate. I thought they did a decent job on Manning, and Denver's run game had nothing going on. Darius Slay had a bad game (got burned for a long TD at the end of the half, had an INT pulled away from him by Sanders, was the guilty party on the illegal formation penalty on the missed FG) and Rashean Mathis continues to not cover anybody, but Glover Quin was good, Josh Bynes was good, Ihedigbo was much improved (although he got nailed for an iffy late hit penalty), Ansah was good as usual, and Ngata looked like the perennial Pro Bowler he was (in spots, not all game). They managed to pick Manning once and returned a fumble for a TD, although that was negated by the refs initially making the wrong call. Like I said, the defense was adequate, but no one was GREAT. The defense had 2 Pro Bowlers last year (should've been 3, DeAndre Levy was robbed again), but aside from Quin, no one on the defense is near that level right now.
The offense is BAD. We've already covered the line and Stafford. The run game hasn't done anything since game 1. The line sucks at run blocking, but the run game often takes a while to reap larger gains. The Lions' best RB by far is Ameer Abdullah. He's gotten 21 carries through 3 games. That's an average of 7 carries a game. How are you supposed to establish a rushing attack if you only give your best RB the ball 7 times? Additionally, the Lions are under some kind of delusion that Abdullah isn't head & shoulders above the rest of their RB corps. I like Joique Bell and he's a great story, but he doesn't deserve to get equal or more carries. The way they're holding Ameer back reminds me a bit of Lawrence Frank's refusal to promote Andre Drummond to the starting lineup. Let him loose already. The Lions have run 134 passing plays and only 51 running plays. That's a 72/28 split. They need to strive for something closer to a 60/40 split, but that would require more patience than I think they have.
This brings me to Lombardi. I'm starting to suspect that he draws up a game plan without any consideration to what the other team is going to do. We knew 2 basic things about Denver's D: they rush the QB well, and they have good pass coverage. There are plays you can call that turn those strengths into weaknesses, but Lombardi called very few of those plays. Most of the runs were designed to go between the tackles instead of outside, where they could exploit the gap created by a strong pass rush. The passing game was a bit more successful, but I thought they could've done a better job of starting out with shorter crossing routes to get rid of the ball sooner, and then incorporating longer routes as the offense got going. Nothing the offense did threw Denver off guard or made them adjust their game plan.
In fact, Lombardi has NEVER drawn up a game plan that had an opposing DC scratching his head. If Caldwell has any ambitions to beat the odds and make the playoffs after starting 0-3, his best bet is to fire his OC and take over the play-calling. Lombardi was pretty bad last year (his first season calling plays), but Caldwell was reluctant to publicly assign any blame for the team's 0-2 start. I wonder if his tune will change now that the Lions are in desperation mode and their high-powered offense has yet to catch fire.
***
I realized I failed to post about my half marathon, which was 2 weekends ago. My bad.
I went into the race having JUST crammed in some barely-adequate training, but I felt confident that I could finish without having to walk. Based on my pace and how I finished my 10 mile run, I thought a reasonable expectation for my half marathon was 2:05:00, which is about a 9:30 mile pace. My pie-in-the-sky GOAL was under 2 hrs, which is closer to a 9min mile pace.
The actual race was in Lansing, the Capital City River Run. It started by LCC, near the park where Common Ground takes place. It was a slightly tardy start (I was could see the clock and was counting down), probably 30 seconds or so after 8am. We ran up Michigan Ave through MSU's main drag, heading East with the rising sun directly in our faces. I was wearing a Batman Under Armour t-shirt that my sister had gotten me for my birthday, so I had a few randoms cheering me on. Everbody loves Batman.
I was running a few steps behind the 9min Pacer Guys for the marathon. If you've never run a road race before, the larger ones have a pace team that run (supposedly) a set pace so you can match speeds and hopeful make your goal time. This race had four pacers for every pace at 30 sec intervals, two pacers for the marathon and two for the half. The 9min pacers for the marathon were running a bit faster, maybe an 8:40 pace or so.
We turned the corner at Hagadorn and I saw my folks for the second time on the path (they were yelling & ringing cowbells, so they were easy to spot). From there the track turned down the river trail, which was a really nice place to run. It was away from traffic, the surface was better than the roads (which are pot-holey), and there was plenty of shade and nice scenery. I passed the 6 mile marker at about 52 min, which was still an 8:40 mile pace.
My wife & daughter were supposed to cheer me on at the 9 mile mark, but I was running faster than predicted & I'd given my wife terrible directions. They probably missed me by 3-5 minutes. I started to slow a bit around then, and definitely was running slower by mile 10. I saw my folks for the third time with about half a mile to go. My dad chose to encourage me by saying, "You're gonna beat 2 hrs if you don't die!" I finished with a bit of a kick and clocked an official time of 1:58:12, which is a 9:01 mile pace. I nailed my goal.
I haven't run since, but I'll get a run in tomorrow. My feet were/are pretty banged up and my legs were achy all last week. I've got a 10K to run in mid-November and I'm planning to run the Lansing Turkey Trot again, so no slacking off!
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