Howdy all,
I'm a Lions fan visiting from MotownSports.com. I found this site from the link at
http://www.sportsforumindex.com/.
First off, I'll say that I'm not expecting the Lions to win on Thursday. They are certainly capable of winning, but I think the Packers are the better team. I'd say 80% of the time the Packers win. I just hope this is one of the 20%!
A quick run down on the Lions:
QB Stafford broke a bone in his index finger on his throwing hand a few weeks back. He's played with a glove on his hand the last two games. He played like crap against the Bears two Sunday's ago, and he played like crap for the first Qtr. of the game last Sunday against the Panthers. But then he seemed to figure it out and the finger/glove didn't bother him anymore. He went on to have a stellar 5 TD day against the Panthers in the final 3/4.
Our OL had been really poor most of the year... especially at run blocking. Kevin Smith had a very good day against the Panthers, but they are a really poor run defense team. Jahvid Best will almost certainly not be playing... BUT... the Lions have actually been BETTER on the ground without him. What the Lions do miss is Best as a receiver out of the back field.
Receiving starts with Calvin Johnson of course... but it certainly doesn't end there. Nate Burleson and Titus Young are very legit receivers. Young especially has been seeing a lot of action. Pettigrew and Scheiffler are also threat from the TE location. If a defense focus too much on taking CJ out of the game, Stafford is more than happy to kill you with other targets. Each of last weeks 5 TD passes went to a different guy... none of them named CJ.
Defensively the Lions strength is the front four. They don't always get the sacks, but they are always putting pressure on. And the Lions have a number of guys on the DL that they can rotate in all game long. This has been them MO all season long. The announcers will surely comment at some point in the TDay game that Suh is out of the line up like it's some amazing thing! Why isn't he in there?!?! Is he hurt!??! Is the coach mad at him?!?! No... idiots. If you did your research you'll see that they do this all game long to keep the DL fresh and keep the pressure on the opposing OL to tire them out.
Beyond the DL the Lions aren't bad though... The LB are much improved from last year, and our CBs aren't complete scrubs either. Our biggest weakness is the gashing runs. Our DE's play really wide and this opens up running lanes between the Tackle and Guard. If a LB doesn't get in that hole to fill it you can get 10, 20, 30 yards easy. Don't run between guard and center though... you'll get stuffed more times than not. The Lions are usually pretty good against screen passes too.
Now for the bad part... and I do mean really, really bad. Our special teams just SUCKS this year. Hanson is still a really good FG kicker, but that's the only bright spot. Our return man, Logan, seems lost out there this year. He makes poor decisions and 'Fair catches' way too much. Our coverage teams stink. We let WAY too many returns go long. We can't block for Logan when he ever does actually try to return. And we're on our 3rd Punter of the year. (First was okay... but he got injured. Replacement wasn't very good. The replacement of the replacement was okay against the Panthers.)
Last thing... I think someone eluded to it here before: The Lions are definitely a second half team. So far this year: First half: scored 110, gave up 145. Second half: scored 188, gave up 74. If the Packers are up by even 17 points at half time, don't assume the game is over.
Well, that's the Lions in a nutshell. At least that's my opinion of them. Hope for a good game, and no injuries... Honestly, I do hope that Rodgers gets a nasty hangnail and can't play, but other than that, no injuries.
Like I said above, I think the Lions lose, but I hope I'm wrong.