NFL pundit boldly compares Lions to undefeated Patriots (and he's right)

The Detroit Lions look like the NFL's best team right now, on a nine-game winning streak and regularly winning games by notable margins. During that nine-game winning streak, just three games have been decided by single digits.

The Lions have the league's highest-scoring offense entering Week 13 (32.7 points per game) and the second-best scoring defense (16.6 points allowed per game). The defense has not allowed a touchdown in the last 10 quarters.

Recapping the Lions' win over the Indianapolis Colts in Week 12, Colin Cowherd of FOX Sports, via his podcast brand "The Volume", compared the Lions to the 2007 New England Patriots, who had an undefeated regular season before losing to the New York Giants in the Super Bowl.

"Detroit is the most dominant NFL team since the Brady, Moss Patriots," Cowherd said. "Because Kansas City's won back-to-back Super Bowls, would you be shocked if Detroit went to a Super Bowl and clobbered Baltimore, the Chargers, Buffalo or Kansas City? With two weeks to prepare, rolled. When you play the Lions, you will have no rhythm offensively, because even if you score you're gonna sit and watch for eight minutes. They take all of your rhythm away."

Cowherd's guest, John Middlekauff, echoed the sentiment.

"Their defense today was really impressive. It's like, 'We can win an ugly game.' But offensively, where they don't hesitate is they have two back," Middlekauff said. "So their Lamar in their offense is the running back duo. One guy will run right up your throat and break tackles, and the other guy, when he gets in the open field he looks like Deion Sanders. That guy can fly. And Jared Goff made a couple throws today on the move, it was like, 'Jeez.'"

The 2024 Lions would have the fourth best DVOA of all time (47.5%) if the season ended right now, behind the 1991 Washington Redskins (56.9%), the 2007 Patriots (52.9%) and the 1985 Chicago Bears (52.5%). The Redskins and Bears won the Super Bowl those years., while as mentioned the Patriots fell short.

To Cowherd's point, there's a case the Lions are having the most dominant regular season since the 2007 Patriots right now. But like the 2007 Patriots showed us, regular season dominance doesn't mean anything if you don't get the job done all the way through the playoffs.

But the Lions are in some very rare air with how their getting it done on both sides of the ball, with no major signs of slowing down.