The Detroit Lions flagged down in loss to New Orleans Saints

I guess the Lions should be happy that one of the officials from last night had to sit out the game because of an injury, because as hard as it is to believe, they might have had even MORE yellow flags thrown in their direction. It’s no longer a contest between Lions and the Oakland Raiders as to who is the most undisciplined team in the league–we win, I mean, lose.

This has to go to the top. I love the intensity that Jim Schwartz has instilled in the Lions but this is taking it too far. He has to stop looking like Reggie Dunlap coaching the Hanson Brothers in the movie ‘Slapshot’ and start acting like a real NFL head coach. He benched Gosder Cherilus earlier this year for stupid penalties and it is time to send another message. Too bad he might have to bench half the team this time.

Raise your hand if you’ve EVER seen 3 offensive holding penalties called on a wide receiver in a single game. How do you commit flagrant penalties right in front of the referees? Mr. Pettigrew, didn’t you learn not to touch the officials in the Pee Wee league? Titus is young but even he has to know where to line up on certain plays and not to shove BACK on the five yard line. I hope Dominic Raiola just finished eating an onion before he reemed out number 16 on national TV. Hey Kevin Smith, it’s called blocking, not tackling. It was becoming an automatic response last night. If the lions had a big gain, You just KNEW that a yellow flag was coming.

At first I thought the referees were deliberately targeting the Lions, but they proved to be right almost every time. I still think that opposing teams hold the Lions on every single play but the Lions haven’t earned the respect of the leagues officials to get those calls yet. I’m pretty sure that guy was offsides when he blocked that field goal at the end of the first half. Why give a team a break when they keep shooting themselves in the foot?

As undisciplined as they were, the Lions still had a chance to win that game in the fourth quarter. Matt Stafford returned to his pre-broken finger ways and almost single handedly kept them even with future Hall of Famer, Drew Brees. The maddening thing is that despite the parade of flags, the Lions look like they’re in the same league as the Saints.

The Lions and their main competition, the Bears, Giants, Cowboys and Falcons all lost yesterday. It looks like nobody wants to be the Wild Card team this year. Even though the Lions are a paltry 2-5 in their last 7 games, they could easily back into the playoffs.

Remember last year when Coach Swartz told the team to PRETEND they were in the playoff hunt for the last four games of the year? Well guys, it’s the real deal this time. I’ve already written off the Packer game at the end of season as a loss, but the next 3 are very winnable games. The Lions are a very young team and they need to finish this year the way they started it.