With the Detroit Lions playing well and also adding a major piece to the puzzle this past week, are they suddenly being run like a championship franchise?
The Detroit Lions entered this season with plenty of offseason hype from their fan base that lifted expectations. Then when the curtains rose up for the regular season, they played with the same undisciplined abandon of their predecessors from the last 60 years.
It seemed that perhaps they might just continue to be a cursed franchise that plays down to their opponents and can’t break free of the shackles of their past. A sad and gloomy thought process, but from what they displayed on the field, it was justified. The real irony was that this truly felt different from so many previous failed regimes.
General manager Bob Quinn was the hero in this town. He had quite obviously improved the talent level of this franchise, then after narrowly missing the playoffs last season, he discarded Jim Caldwell who had actually put together one of the better Lions eras since the championship days back in the 1950’s. Quinn’s reason was that this team was underachieving.
Like that was some sort of newsflash. That’s pretty much all this team has done since 1957. Yet the opportunity for this franchise to bring in a coach that was Bob Quinn’s choice was exciting. After all, he had inherited Caldwell and unlike most general manager’s that bring in their own choice as the new head coach, Jim Caldwell was given an opportunity to prove himself.
In the end, it didn’t meet Bob Quinn’s standards, so he reached back to his roots with the New England Patriots and hired longtime friend and associate Matt Patricia.
As the Patriots defensive coordinator, Patricia had known virtually nothing but success. He was also literally a rocket scientist, which made him the smartest guy in the room and one of the hottest candidates available.
It was everything Lions fans dreamed of, an outstanding pedigree and a man with a championship plan. Yet the disappointing start to the season had fans up in arms.