For the Detroit Lions, training camp is already in full swing. And new head coach Dan Campbell has been all about getting his players to buy-in.
Professional sports are a roller-coaster. Teams rise and fall with regularity. The smartest teams are the best at maximizing their window of opportunity. Other teams can lay claim to only one or two years of being serious contenders.
For the Lions, this is all a foreign concept. Even the 1991 edition that captured the franchise’s only playoff victory to date since the 1957 championship game was a decent team that defeated a not-yet-ready-for primetime Dallas Cowboys team before Washington unmasked them in front of the whole world in humiliating style.
No, the truth of the matter is that unlike other teams in the NFL or even other sports, the Lions have had their own embarrassing culture. A culture that has led to consistent losing.
Today we live in a PC world and aren’t allowed to make fun of other cultures around the world or even around the country. But the Detroit Lions are still fair game. They are still the poster team for infinite futility.
Just over the last 10 years alone how many times have we heard the debates about how the Lions can possibly change their losing culture. The answer that invariably comes up is that the culture can be changed by winning.
That theory is straight to the point and quite frankly any team that wins regularly will have a more positive culture than a team that loses on a consistent basis. The problem is that there is almost always a building process that teams go through before they start winning.
Whether it be one season or four, there is almost always a transition that usually involves some losing first. So if the culture changes with winning, how do teams stay unified during the losing to become winners?
The answer has to do with team leadership. Having a coach and system that players buy into while witnessing their own improvement on the field, even if it doesn’t lead immediately to winning. That type of buy-in is what Dan Campbell is trying to build here in the Motor City.