I’m going to make a bold prediction about the Detroit Lions: They won’t make the playoffs this season.
Yes, it’s not easy being this brave.
Here’s another bold prediction about the Lions: They won’t make the playoff next season, either.
The Lions wrapped up a three-day minicamp that concluded their spring practices and they headed into their summer break having answered exactly one question: This is a team that is very much in the nascent stages of a top-to-bottom transformation.
New front office. New coaches. New players. New scheme. New hope.
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It’s going to take a good, long while for the dust to settle, for the coaches to get comfortable, for the players to execute the coaches’ plans and for the roster to take shape and suit the organization’s vision.
When the Lions return for training camp in late July and play in front of fans, it should be very apparent to everyone that this team simply doesn’t have much elite talent, which is exactly the predicament of teams that are in transition. The Lions’ only outright star is Pro Bowl tight end T.J. Hockenson, who continued to look very good this spring.
This team is so starved for star talent that the prospect of signing Todd Gurley — this year’s version of Adrian Peterson and LeGarrette Blount — has probably set some kind of record for Twitter notifications.
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After Hockenson, you have promising second-year running back D’Andre Swift, Pro Bowl punter Jack Fox and the beautiful mystery that is Jared Goff. But the team’s two best defensive players, Trey Flowers and Romeo Okwara, are being asked to play new positions as outside linebackers in the new full-time base 3-4 scheme.
Dom Capers is in charge of overseeing the transformation of the 3-4 defense, but he’s doing so without players who naturally fit certain positions, like Flowers, Okwara and Jahlani Tavai. So it’s going to take time — at least another full season — to find the right pieces by drafting and developing more players.
I hope you don’t think I’m being negative about this, because I’m not. In fact, it’s almost the opposite. By stating that I think this is going to be a slow process, I’m giving this regime and this team time to develop at a reasonable pace.
But make no mistake. This year will be challenge for everyone. The front office, coaches and players will struggle to find success on the field. Fans will again have to contend with the frustrating and familiar sight of more losing. There will be plenty of mistakes by players and coaches along the way.
Dan Campbell is a rookie full-time head coach and, while he wouldn’t have been my pick, I’ve been impressed with his approach. He’s been very accepting of his situation and freely admits he doesn’t have all the answers. He hasn’t shown the defensiveness that sometimes comes with a first-time coach who’s out to prove how smart he is. In fact, Campbell said Thursday “you have to be comfortable enough in your own skin to ask for help.”
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“I think if you’re worried about, ‘Man, I really would love to know this. I really want to ask these questions to my staff (but) everybody’s in here,’ but you’re so afraid that somebody will think of you as, ‘Oh, I can’t believe the head coach doesn’t know that or doesn’t think that way,’ well I think you have a problem there too,” he said. “I’m comfortable enough to know that, look, I’m in charge and I think everybody knows I’m in charge. I think that’ll be very clear.
“So I’m comfortable with that. And guess what. If I need help or I’m asking a question, there’s a reason why I’m doing it.”
That doesn’t mean Campbell won’t make mistakes. He will. Plenty. In fact, he already has. He demonstrated his inexperience when he messed up the timing of asking opposing coaches to schedule joint practices, leaving the Lions looking like the kid sitting by himself next to the punch bowl at the middle school dance.
But you know what I loved about that screwup? Campbell owned it. He didn’t try to talk his way around it and pretend he didn’t want a joint practice, only to have the story leak later that he was turned down by other teams when he asked too late. He owned his mistake and he learned from it.
And that’s what this season — and the next — will be about for the Lions. Learning. For everybody.
There’s something else, too. While the Lions aren’t flush with talent right now, there could be help on the way. According to Tankathon’s projections, the Lions will have 11 picks, including two first-rounders, in the 2022 NFL draft, more than any other team.
That gives the Lions a chance at more firepower to produce results, possibly next year but more likely in 2023. Let’s not forget Calvin Johnson only had 756 receiving yards and four touchdowns as a rookie. Even Hall of Famers usually need at least a year of seasoning.
I’ll make one last bold prediction about the Lions. The 2023 season will be fascinating because by then we won’t be talking about learning and foundations and patience. We will need to see results and we will see if this is the regime that can finally produce them.
Contact Carlos Monarrez at cmonarrez@freepress.com and follow him on Twitter @cmonarrez.