Detroit Lions: Blame Matt Patricia For Week One, But It’s Only One Week

Hope springs eternal in NFL season openers, but maybe more so in Detroit Lions season openers. Maybe even more so than that when the Lions fan base finally believes their franchise is starting to turn the corner after giving them absolutely nothing for 25 years.

But when that hope gets siphoned off at the hands of a rookie quarterback in a week one tie – I just had to rewrite loss to tie twice because that’s how it feels –  it’s effortless to revert to that dark place of same old Detroit Lions.

I’m not going to let Lions history – especially history that has zero relevance on the present –  affect how I view football. I don’t believe in magic, curses, S.O.L or anything like it and I’m not letting the Lions history of wildly consistent ineptitude change that about me.

On paper (reality), this Lions team should have won Sunday, because the football players on the field are more relevant to the score than history or curses. The Lions had better football players than the Arizona Cardinals. It showed too, for about three and a half quarters. Then… what? Was it magic? Is Bobby Layne‘s ghost still screwing with Detroit? Nah man.

More from Detroit Lions

• Lions vs. Bears Week 14 Opening Odds Disrespect Detroit
• Signing This Former Pro-Bowl CB Would Be Huge Mistake for Lions
• Forecasting the Rest of This Lions Season (Score Predictions)
• Lions Get Exciting Injury Update on Rookie QB Hendon Hooker
• Betting Preview: Best Bets for Lions vs. Packers Thanksgiving Day Game

In my best attempt to put Sunday’s game in a proper perspective, the biggest reason Matt Patricia lost this win was that the defense was straight up gassed by the fourth quarter. Here’s a quote from Kyler Murray post-game;

"“Late in the game, I think they were just tired, I know (Damon) Harrison wasn’t on the field a lot, probably due to him not playing a lot in the preseason. So the tempo can get to them, and I think that’s what helped us out later in the game as we actually started going.”"

The Lions defense was making ‘Air-Raid’ offense look like a just a breeze for three and half quarters. The Lions D-Line was playing volleyball with little man Murray. Everything looked exactly how we expected it to look; until the fourth quarter. That’s when some of the Lions starters started feeling the effects of playing their first full football game in over nine months.

I wrote an entire article on this very subject; ‘Matt Patricia’s Running A Soft Camp’ detailing how concerned I was with the amount of conditioning and days off Matt Patricia was allowing this offseason. A 180-degree change from last seasons ‘grueling’ training camp. While I agree with being cautious with injuries in camp, conditioning and ‘football’ shape is more important and also prevents injuries.

Matt Patricia chose not to play and to some extent even practice a lot of his defensive starters this preseason for various reasons. No, I don’t believe it was 100% injury-related, this was a philosophy going into the offseason. Players like Trey Flowers and Damon Harrison barely got any game time work this offseason. I’m talking practice, team scrimmages, joint practices, preseason games, hardly anything. After seeing Harrison’s tweet Sunday night after the game, the proof is in the pudding;

I have a more significant problem with the physical preparation for this game than I do anything else. In a 180 degree turnaround from the first three quarters. In the fourth quarter, you suddenly had missed tackles. No pass rush, defensive lineman getting blown up off the line, hands-on-hips and DB’s getting beat by 36-year-old Larry Fitzgerald on go routes. The Detroit Lions were getting beat up the end of that game, and they had to energy to fight back like a boxer you know has nothing left but is still waddling around in the 12th round looking clueless.

Now, contrary to what you’re going to hear from local and national media, maybe even contrary to what you want to hear right now. There were some MAJOR positives from the Detroit Lions week one tie.

I thought for a regular-season debut, that had less than four total drives of preseason work with its starters. The Darrell Bevell offense and play-calling looked really good. Matthew Stafford looked better than he has since his MVP run in 2016 and very comfortable with a new offense. So comfortable he was out there running read options, taking the option, and running for first downs.

He was obviously more comfortable than his coaches give him credit for, given the timing out ‘the time out.’ Yes, there were issues getting lined up on the play, but it was close enough where you have to trust your quarterback to know whether to call it or not.

The Detroit Lions top two heavily scrutinized draft picks in T.J. Hockenson and Jahlani Tavai looked like two of your best players on the team. That’s no over-exaggeration either. T.J. Hockenson set an NFL record for a rookie TE in week one with 124 yards on five catches and a touchdown all while looking every bit of the hype in blocking as well. Jahlani Tavai was just as impressive making his NFL debut as a starting MIKE linebacker and playing like a starting MIKE linebacker in the NFL. He finished with 3 tackles a sack and multiple pressures.

Bevell, Hockenson and Tavai were some of the most important additions and definitely the biggest question marks for the Detroit Lions this offseason. In my opinion, they all had a really, really…really good game, which makes this tie such a weird pill to swallow.

No, you shouldn’t throw away expectations after one loss in the NFL, it can happen any team. But the Lions have the Chargers, Eagles, and Chiefs before a bye week. With how the Eagles and Chiefs look, next week’s home opener is about as much of a must-win game you can get in week two of the NFL season.