Lions Lose to 49ers, 27-19

Many fans might say I am being hard on the Detroit Lions when I say they should be embarrassed. I say it is simple fact. I expected them to lose to the 49ers, but what I did not expect, was that they would be beat in practically every phase of the game.

The Lions star quarterback, Matthew Stafford, who threw for over 5,000 yards and had 41 touchdowns last year, was out shined by Alex Smith, who has never thrown for even 3,200 yards in a season. Stafford was all ove rthe place with his passes, placing the ball behind his receivers, over their heads, and in one case, threw the ball where none of his receivers were within 10 yards of it. For the second game in a row, he did not throw a TD until the last two minutes of the game.

Where Stafford was at his worse was in the way he seemed to revert to the ways of a rookie as he seemed to have eyes for Calvin Johnson and nobody else. Johnson had 8 catches while the next best was Pettigrew with three. A couple of times, Pettigrew was wide open, but Stafford threw to Johnson who was double covered. Burleson and Young had one reception each.

Kevin Smith was back to his own self as he gained only 3.3 yards per carry and never made anyone miss. His longest run was 9 yards.

The offensive line was beat by the 49ers d-line. The Lions great D-line was too often held in check by the San Fran O-line. And as expected, the Lions secondary could not cover for even two seconds.

The Lions defense was supposed to be better against the run this year and showed that against the Rams. Then they gave up 89 yards on just 17 carries to Frank Gore, as well as a touchdown. Gore averaged 5.2 yards per carry. Kendall Hunter averaged 4.6 yards and Mario Manningham ran once for 29 yards.

The very worst of it however, was how badly the Lions were out coached.

The run play that beat the Lions against SF last season was a play they reffered to as the Wham Play. Where an offensive Lineman crossed and took a defensive lineman out from the side to open a hole. Gore had a few long runs on the Lions last year due to that same play. Gunther Cunningham has had a full year to plan for that and when the 49ers used it, it worked again. And again. That is simply inexcusable!

Scott Linehan ran the ball 24 times compared to Stafford passing 32. I can understand that the Lions wanted to establish the run. But to force the issue against a team that is known for not allowing teams to run? Even so, 15 of those 24 run plays came on first down. At one point the Lions had ran 3 times on first down and passed 3 times. Then went on a streak of running the ball on 12 of the next 15 1st down plays.  So now, Linehan was not only trying to force the run against a great run defense, but he was telegraphing it by running on almost every first down. That is terrible play calling and nothing else.

Then to make everything worse, even Jason Hanson missed a 40 yard field goal.

Before the season started, I predicted the Lions would win 9 games and miss the play-offs. I have had a lot of people tell me I was a pessimist. In the last week, leading up to the game, I tried to find reasons the Lions would beat the 49ers and be a better team than I was expecting. Instead, the Detroit Lions proved to me that they were not even up to the level I had given them. If they cannot right this ship, they will not even win 8 games this year.  I believe they will get things straight, but only back to what I had expected before the season.