Another Beginning...

After mentioning that we're in the dog days of Summer yesterday, today is the day that ninety percent of sports fans come out of hibernation. Training Camps across the country opened up today. You know what that means, football season is almost upon us. I have managed to avoid the forced chaos the machine (namely ESPN) has brought about for months. In fact, I have deliberately tried to keep away from thinking about football ever since the worldwide leader published their 32 team power rankings in May and proceeded to dedicate segments of Sportscenter to debating the selections. Yes, May. Before all the free agents are signed, before any trades are made, even before minicamps come around for players to skip.

Well today means I can no longer ignore the fever. With football season comes everything else: a bunch of chumps coming on television beating one topic to death (Brett Favre gave them their ammo this season but Chad Johnson would have sufficed beforehand), seven hundred different player rankings from so called fantasy experts with can't miss advice sure to win you your league (none of them particularly smarter than the rest), and another miserable Lions season that wastes 15 of my Sundays along with Thanksgiving. Oh, the latter is just me and a segment of masochistic folks who yearn to see some kind of direction (preferably positive) from this inept franchise.

Am I being too negative? Perhaps, but I'm also being realistic. After seven straight losing seasons and missing the playoffs every year since 1999, I think I'm allowed a certain amount of pessimism. They almost had me last year, I was so close to actually believing I saw a light at the end of the tunnel. A 6-2 start capped off by a smack down of the Denver Broncos had me entertaining visions of going to the postseason. The end result was a pitiful 1-7 finish and a 7-9 overall record, a four win improvement from the year before and their best mark since going 9-7 in 2000.

So with apparent progress made last season, what happened next? Well, after finishing 16th in the NFL in points last year (their best rank since 1999), the team proceeded to show Offensive Coordinator Mike Martz the door to let Jim Colletto call plays (something he has never done at the professional level). Now, Martz absolutely infuriated me for the complete lack of balance in his play calling and he seems to be living off his reputation from the Rams high flying years (1999-2001 most notably). That said, I guess you can't argue with the results. Especially compared to those of his predecessors.

The logic behind the change was to have someone who would actually call a few running plays and not expose Jon Kitna to so many hits behind a suspect offensive line. I can buy that. However, the Lions decided to let go of their leading rusher from last season, the oft injured Kevin Jones. Leaving the workload in the hands of notorious fumbler Tatum Bell (who didn't play at all after week 5), 3rd round pick Kevin Smith, and injury prone 3rd year back Brian Calhoun. The wild card here is Smith, a player who was drafted out of UCF presumably because he is familiar with the blocking scheme Colletto wants to implement. Until he proves himself on Sundays, however, there appears to be a serious lack of talent at runningback.

On the other side of the ball, the Lions defense was statistically the worst in the National Football League last season. While the rush defense was sub par, the pass defense was an albatross (31st in pass yards/game allowed). To that end, the Lions nabbed two new starters at corner via free agency (Brian Kelly) and trade (Leigh Bodden). They will be improvement if for no other reason than they can't be any worse than Fernando Bryant and Travis Fisher were.

The acquisition of Bodden cost them their most talented (and most frustrating) defensive lineman Shaun Rogers. Head coach Rod Marinelli is credited with developing several Pro-Bowl D-linemen as an assistant in Tampa, but has his work cut out for him with this group. They brought in Chuck Darby as a pulse to man the interior next to the debilitating contract known as Cory Redding. When the Lions were winning games, the front four provided enough pressure to mask the ineptitude of the secondary. The secondary is better, but now the front four is a huge question mark. It's always one step forward and two steps backwards with this franchise. Unless DeWayne White can recover from his injuries of a year ago, the defensive line has no legitimate pass rushers and the Lions will find a new way to get beat on that side of the ball. Dieing a slow painful death on the ground as opposed to having their brains blown out through the air.

The Lions are using a pretty awful slogan in their season ticket commercials "Do You Believe in Now?". Um, no. For a lot of the reasons I just stated. I could go on, but I won't for now. I've said enough. Though I will be doing some research/predictions fairly soon as we get into the preseason.