Detroit Lions most important asset: Matthew Stafford or Matt Patricia?
By Robert Jones
Matt Patricia has coached in all the big games. From conference championships to Super Bowls, he has performed his coaching duties on the biggest stages in front of the brightest lights.
Now he will face his greatest challenge. He has to rejuvenate a moribund franchise out of its 60-year hibernation from championship play as a first-time head coach on any level.
Yeah, that’s kind of a difficult task.
For those of us who have watched this franchise for a decade or two or more, it has become the literal incarnation of the Keystone Kops on the gridiron.
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They have written the book on insane, humiliating ways to lose games and what most people in this world call ‘heartburn’, we call ‘being a Lions fan’. You should always wait at least two hours after eating before watching the Lions play.
But Bob Quinn has decreed this to be a new era in Lions football. An era that will be filled with winning and championships. An era that will happen because of the arrival of Matt Patricia.
Together Stafford and Patricia have an opportunity to turn around the Lions and create indelible legacies for themselves not only in Detroit but across the NFL landscape. They just have to do what so many coaches and quarterbacks have failed to do in Detroit over the last 60 years; become champions.
Yet doesn’t one piece or the other have to be more important in the winning equation? If I asked who is more important to the Patriots success, Tom Brady or Bill Belichick, wouldn’t there be a decisive answer?
Maybe or maybe not.
Let’s be honest, what Stafford and Patricia bring to the table are two different components. Stafford is the field general. He’s the signal-caller who has to make adjustments to opposing defenses every time the Lions get to the line of scrimmage. He’s the gunslinger who has to drop back in the pocket in pressure situations when the Lions have to score and find a way to get them in the end zone.