Detroit Lions news: Record noise at Ford Field, a very young roster, playing outside?

More confirmation on how young the Lions roster is, and how bright the future is

ESPN's Bill Barnwell release Snap-Weighted Age data for the full 2023 season. The Lions are the fifth-youngest team overall, with the third-youngest defense.

The rebuild led by Brad Holmes and Dan Campbell has been driven by getting younger and relying on draft picks, starting with Penei Sewell and Amon-Ra St. Brown in the 2021 draft to Jahmyr Gibbs, Sam LaPorta. Brian Branch and Jack Campbell this year. With cap space to burn and continued shrewd drafting, the future is very bright.

Playing outside in Detroit?

First things first on this one. The thinning of the ranks in sports departments has led to reporters who are not sports reporters being asked to cover things like press conferences with a coach, sometimes on short notice. Also, any reporter who has done it for any length of time, sports or otherwise, would acknowledge a big mistake they've made along the way with a question they asked or something they did.

On Tuesday, a reporter asked Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles an odd question looking toward Sunday's game against the Lions. An odd question for those of us that know, anyway.

“Looking forward to Detroit, the weather has been a factor in some of the playoff games, even for the most prepared teams … today it’s 13 in Detroit,” the reporter said. “Any special plans to acclimate the team to not only endure but perform in those kind of frigid temperatures?”

The Lions moved into the Pontiac Silverdome in 1975, then Ford Field in 2002 with no gap. The reporter clearly didn't know that, and props to Bowles for how he handled it.

"You do know we play indoors, right? They got a dome,” Bowles said, cracking a smile.
I don’t — no, nothing planned,” Bowles added. “We’re indoors and only have to be outside for 20 seconds, getting off the bus, going under the thing, so we’ll be OK.”

Mistakes happen. It seems that reporter does not closely follow sports, so they tapped into the weather storyline from Wild Card Weekend. But it also seems a little bit of research into the upcoming game may have solved the problem, especially if that's a question you're going to ask, and not brought an embarrassing moment. It's also a symptom of a bigger issue in media on a local level-the understaffed sports department that puts reporters like that in a position to fail.