Building the Detroit Lions monument to Super Bowl success

Next we will find our defensive representative.

This is easily the hardest choice to make, because finding one player to represent the best of a teams defensive history is no simple task unless someone like Lawrence Taylor or Reggie White or even Ronnie Lott had suited up for the franchise.

Now the one thing that should be pointed out is that the Lions have a very rich history of outstanding defensive players. Men that were very talented or hit like a freight train. The list of qualifiers is not lacking.

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Players like Al ‘Bubba’ Baker, Lem Barney, Robert Porcher, Chris Spielman, Doug English, Benny Blades, Dick ‘Night Train’ Lane and Alex Karras to name a few make this a very difficult decision.

Unlike the other positions on this monument, the defender we use doesn’t have to be a proven champion because defense doesn’t have a dominant position like quarterback on offense. Great defenders come in all shapes and sizes as well as positions.

A great pass rush will always make any secondary look so much better, just like a lock-down secondary will make almost any pass-rush more productive.

Any defensive player that is truly great is good enough to be part of a championship defense. They just need the right players around them and best scheme to get the most out of the unit as a whole.

That being said, there seems to be one choice that does stand out over the other candidates; Joe Schmidt.

While he was unable to find his way on this monument for his contributions as the Lions head coach, Schmidt is one of the game’s great all time defenders.

Schmidt was part of the early wave of middle linebackers who truly taught everyone else how the position was to be played. He read opposing offenses with the ease of a scholar leafing through a preschooler’s bookshelf and despite it being less of a prerequisite to won a championship, Schmidt was indeed a member of the Lions last championship  team back in 1957.

The truth of the matter is that Schmidt is very much one of the prominent faces of this franchise and has certainly earned the honor of representing the defense on our Super Bowl monument.