Has the Detroit Lions’ Matt Patricia been ‘Lionized’ already?

If you sat down and randomly played Matt Patricia’s postgame comments from each of the Lions attempts this exhibition season, you would realize that they are almost completely identical.

The main message never changed and while that is simply the style that some coaches have, in Patricia’s case he was right each time with the same assessment.

That is worrisome because it denotes lack of progress.

Now after a whole offseason of O.T.A’s, mini-camps, training camp and the just completed preseason, the message that hasn’t been received, understood or at the least not carried out, has to be corrected in just a little over a week before the season opener.

Talk about a time crunch.

The results of Matt Patricia’s coaching were self-evident almost every day while he was the New England Patriots defensive coordinator. He took players that were often not overly talented or productive or whatever and molded them into effective pieces of his defense.

Were they dominant? No, but part of that was the way the Patriots philosophy was to save money on defense. Once players became good enough to start having contract demands, they were allowed to walk or traded to save money.

When Patricia was hired he, along with general manager Bob Quinn, made the executive decision to spend their resources mainly on bolstering the Lions anemic ground game this past offseason while mostly ignoring the defense.

Especially the defensive line which is very thin on talent.

That decision may reap rewards on offense if the Lions are able to run the ball as it is anticipated they will be able to, but on the other side of the coin where the Lions didn’t bolster the defensive line more or acquire a pass-rusher may ultimately be their downfall.

That combined with the inability of Patricia’s defenders to run his defense in a disciplined manner.