Since I've been in Florida a few weeks with the family, I've missed seeing the last two Lions games at all. So it's good that I have no recollection of the Green Bay horror fest, but it's bad that I have no recollection of the Giant's butt-kicking we administered. So today's game was the first game I've seen since the Atlanta game. And lets just say I wasn't impressed...
Well, another Lions game, another wild swing in performance. This time, it was the Defense that swung wildly to the dark side. As I watched this train wreck of a game progress, I kept asking myself "When the heck are we gonna get the D off the field?" OK, simple grades...
Offense - B-. Joey looked good, even without R.O.Y. KJ Looked good while he was getting the rock. Then we quit running. I don't know why, but we did. Without R.O.Y., the receivers on this team look an awful lot like the receivers we had last year, minus BS. R.O.Y., I hope that ankles heals completely this week...
Defense - C-. Yes, we had 3 turnovers, including one for a score. But how many 3rd down conversions did we give up? And who was supposed to guard Jason Witten? Shoot, we took Shockey and Crumpler out of the game against the Giants and Falcons, but we couldn't stop Witten? Ouch. The Boys were 9-15 on 3rd down. They punted twice all day. If not for the turnovers, this would be a D-...
Special Teams - E. Gave up big returns. No big returns for us. Stupid penalties killed a few decent returns. This area flunked today...
Coaching - D-. What the heck was Juaron thinking? How could we not account for Witten after he caught 5 passes on the first Drive? 10 penalties? Giving up on running the ball? This was not pretty...
With all that, I'm not sure what we really can come away from this game with that is positive. Maybe it's that Joey still did fine even when his main weapon was out. Maybe that Kircus finally caught a TD. Maybe it's that KJ seemed a bit more decisive in his running. OK, Bly making two picks is definitely a positive. But shoot, this was not a good game for us. Even with the officiating blunders (and yes, it was bad today), we still should have looked better against the Cowboys. But we just couldn't get the D off the field.
One item of note - Eddie George did not kill us today as some people may think. Look at his stats - 31 carries for 99 yards. That's right around his season average for yards per carry of 3.2. What killed us was the 3rd down conversions and stupid penalties that kept drives alive. That was a hard game to watch...
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