The Super Bowl has come and gone and somehow the Giants beat the Patriots again for the title. The Boston media is calling out Tom Brady, and some are even asking for Ryan Mallet to begin starting football games for their team. The nation is again in love with Peyton’s younger (and less talented) brother. And somehow Tom Coughlin avoids getting fired for another year.
I will admit it, I was rooting for the Pats. I like watching Tom Brady do his thing, and on the other side I just really don’t like the Giants. I am not sure how people can be calling for Tom’s head after that game. He was not on the defense that couldn’t just get one more stop, or recover one of the Giants three fumbles. He did not drop one of the 4 dropped passed from Pats receivers on the game. He did make a bad decision that resulted in the safety (on the Pats very first offensive play) and threw the one interception that really played like a good punt from Zoltan. To say that Brady was the cause of this loss is just ignorant. Yes, he did get outplayed by Eli (again), but nobody would have been talking about that right now if the 20 yard pass to Welker was caught. Welker has some of the best hands in the league, and to blame the loss on just him is also very ignorant. But he will make that catch 9 times out of 10, and if we are in one of those situations, the Patriots have a new set of downs inside the 25 yard line. They are able to play their normal aggressive style, and would have likely scored at least a field goal. At that point though, running time off of the clock would have been more important. It would have left Eli under 2 minutes to pull off that last drive instead of 4. But the pass fell to the ground and the Pats fell to the Giants, yet again. The Pats have an incredible 5 losses vs the NFC since Super Bowl 42, and 4 of them are against the Giants. I think the main reason why the game left a bad taste in my mouth though is… our very own Detroit Lions are not that far away talent wise as the Giants.
When was the last time you could honestly say that? Not in my life time I don’t think. Think about it though, the Giants have their franchise QB in Eli. He has been criticized over and over, but somehow has 2 rings. Yes, he plays like a completely different QB in the post season, but I think Matt Stafford is just as good as Eli. Regular season for sure, and we only have a 1 game sample for Stafford in the playoffs and he really didn’t play too bad. The Giants have an average offensive line that cant seem to run block well, does that sound familiar? Yes, the Giants have 2 very good running backs, better than the Lions group, but if the line does not create running lanes it doesn’t matter how good the backs are. The Lions actually finished higher than the Giants in rush offense this season (every team in the NFL finished higher than the Giants). New York has a pretty good set of receivers (Nicks, Cruz, and Manningham), but the Lions have a very good group of their own. The Lions have the best receiver in the league, no team can really shut down Calvin. And when a team tries too hard it leaves the other guys (Burleson and Young wide open). The Lions have better tight ends than the Super Bowl champs, which create even more of mismatches in coverage. So offensively I actually like the Lions better right now.
Defensively, the Giants strength has been their pass rush for years. They are dominant up front and rarely need to blitz an extra guy which allows them to match up well with most teams. Sound familiar? The Lion’s strength on defense is supposed to be their defensive line. They are loaded with talent that just underperformed for the 2011 season. The Giants front 4 has gotten more recognition and awards, but the Lions are right there in terms of talent. The Giants have a very underwhelming linebacking crew. If the Lions can hold onto Stephen Tulloch this offseason and draft a future replacement, this group becomes better than average and should rack up tons of tackles with our defensive line. The Giants do not have one of the top secondaries in the league, but they are better than what the Lions currently can put on the field. I don’t expect a dramatic improvement in this area in just this offseason, but I think a key free agent and a draft pick could really make a lot of difference in this area.
It is not crazy, the Lions are very talented team. All it takes is for the team to get hot at the right time (like the Giants and Packers did the past 2 years) to make a Super Bowl run in the very near future. Even though I can prove that with stats and projecting talent for next year, it seems like a dream that the Lions are closer to a Super Bowl title than going 0-16.
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