NYLion

They're young outside of Davis. I think most people reasonably thought that it would take time to gel.

I know I shouldn't take the bait but here I go... They were 13-4 last season just about went to the Superbowl two years after being the worst franchise in football and are 3-1 this season. Yes Johnson and Glenn have flaws like just about every coach does but. my man, you need to take it down a couple of notches. Sheesh

Lol, I missed Aikman saying that but it's true. I think Terrion will be a good player but he takes "grabby" to another level, calm down young man.

Good win, defense looked really gassed in the 2nd half but managed to make the big plays when it mattered. Lions got really lucky with that offensive PI on 4th down, this could have been a completely different game had that call not been made. Regardless, you take the win but there's a lot to clean up defensively especially.

I'm not buying stock in Seattle yet. They beat Bo Nix in his first start, Walter White's wife and the Tankriots. Seattle has plenty of talent and shouldn't be underestimated but I'm not convinced that they're a playoff team yet.

Division is really tough, probably the toughest division in the league, the Lions have to win games like this at home. Plus the schedule gets quite a bit tougher after the bye week, can't lose this game.

Yeah I agree and the most important thing is no long term commitments, not one albatross contract on the books which is an extreme rarity in the league. The only real bad contracts he added was Romeo Okwara and Walker but those guys had injuries that nobody saw coming, they were solid players pre-injury. I guess the Cominsky contract isn't great but that's small potatoes.

Holmes is arguably the best drafter in the league but there's been a lot of whiffs in free agency banking on previously injured guys to contribute. Started with Williams and Perriman in his first free agency class, Moseley, CJGJ, Davenport and a few others that aren't immediately coming to mind. The good thing is that they were all low risk deals so no harm no foul but it does hurt depth. In fairness, Holmes has had some hits. Anzalone and Reynolds were two big ones, Raymond and Cominsky were for a time, Harris for a year, Jamaal Williams for a year, Monty obviously, Zeitler and Reader could be big contributors so actually more good than bad now that I look at it and no long term commitments with those guys either outside of Anzalone and Montgomery who are on sweetheart contracts. Damn, Holmes is pretty freaking good lol. Even something that might be seen as a negative on the surface with free agency is still in the positive column for him overall.

The only injury that really concerns me is Ragnow. I know he can play through a lot of pain but a torn pec is a tough one to play with. All the other injuries are next man up situations but I don't know how they can replace Frank if he's out long term.

lmao

lol

Lots of teams are figuring things out early in the season, this isn't exclusive to the Lions. The Niners and Ravens are 1-2, the Cowboys are a mess (although this isn't shocking), the Bengals are 0-2. The Steelers, Seahawks and Vikings are 3-0, who had that on their bingo card? The Lions are 2-1 while figuring their **** out (and really handed that game to the Bucs), we should all take that. I know it's engrained in the psyche of some Lions fans (the SOL mentality) to default to negative at the slight hint of adversity but I'm not overly concerned about the offense, they'll get going eventually. My biggest concern continues to be for the millionth time the lack of a #3 receiver. Holmes depending on Raymond and some guy who hasn't played football in 3 years in Patrick to fill the Josh Reynolds role when he had enough cap space to fill the void baffled me this offseason and continues to baffle me, they're not getting anything from these guys like literally almost zero in 3 games. The Lions are lacking that Jared Goff safety outlet and it's bogging the offense down on 3rd downs too often, this is something that needs to be addressed.

Fine by me, pay that man his money. He, Sewell and St. Brown are their true building blocks.

Also, the Niners and Ravens lost to teams that most people didn't have in the playoffs. Lots of weird things happen early in the season. Not worried about the Lions in the least, I had a feeling that there might be some rustiness early on with them not having played one snap in preseason (not a fan of that btw). This team will be humming in the second half of the season, I have little doubt about that, but there might be some rough patches until then.

I'm sure it's been talked about plenty, as I haven't read through the thread, but Hutch going back to late last season when he was transforming from very good edge to absolute beast is hitting a level that the league might not be ready for. Tampa's line is actually pretty darn good and he ragdolled them, lots of other pressures as well as per normal with him. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Alim has yet to show up this season. I wonder if he's fully in shape or if the thought of the new contract in a contract year is weighing on his mind a bit. It could be just a matter of the season really being young and him needing to gain his footing (he started slow last season too) but it is noteworthy.

I didn't read the thread, I just assumed that TP was trashing Ben the whole time haha. The 6-11 comment is obviously idiotic.

I'm on Team TP today. Ben Johnson was absolute poop and Goff but that's obvious. Whatever. 1-1, not the end of the world but there's a lot of stuff to clean up and I'll say for the millionth time that they miss Josh Reynolds or somebody to fill that role. They have zero big bodied receivers that can make a 50/50 catch, it's a problem on 3rd downs and in the Red Zone in particular.

I think they missed Josh Reynolds. When the middle of the field is covered like it was last night, Reynolds was a guy that was a threat to make the tough catches when the top guys weren't open and I thought it was a missing element on 3rd down passing situations last night. Hopefully Tim Patrick can get up to speed and somewhat fill that void because Tom Kennedy sure as hell ain't the answer.

The Giants were the worst of all. I was watching the early games with some Giants fans and they were losing their ****. That was an all time clunker in a home opener against a mediocre opponent, the only other game Darnold had like that in his career was against Patricia just to put in context how awful the Giants were.

The Lions beat a very good team (albeit without Nucua for most of it) without getting much of anything from St. Brown and LaPorta. Yeah there's a lot to clean up but winning without much from those two was impressive in itself. I thought they got plenty of pressure, Hutch, Davenport and Levi especially early were creating lots of pressure, but Stafford got the ball out very quickly on those short throws and he made some unreal throws with guys in his face. The biggest issue is that the secondary severely lacks experience and will need time to gel with a completely new CB group but we sort of knew that going in. I thought the defensive line outside of McNeil who was surprisingly quiet was very good.

He's a big talent, health has always been the biggest thing holding him back. If healthy, he's a game changer for the defense.

Montgomery might be the most underrated player in the league, what a beast. I know the O-Line deserves credit but he was driving through guys on the regular and has great vision to find the holes. Great player

Defense was very good in that half. If Davenport stays healthy, big IF, but if he does he's a game changer opposite of Hutch.

The defensive line looks ferocious. Stafford just happened to get the ball out very quickly so they only got home once.

This is the type of game where they need all pass rushers on board so unless he's injured I don't get why he's scratched.