Some people are fans of the Detroit Lions. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Detroit Lions. This 2025 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.
Your team: Dan Campbell and some other stuff.
Your 2024 record: 15-2. Actually, 15-3, and here's where the suck comes in. The nation has never loved the Lions they way they loved them last year, and this includes all the Thanksgivings when the weather was lousy and you were stuck inside looking for something to watch. The Lions were the one football thing most folks could agree upon, even if it was "What's my second favorite team after the shitheads closest to me geographically?"
They were the certified triumph of the meathead class because of Campbell, the jutjawed cartoon who had lifted the concept of Honolulu blue from the dustbin of history to the finest uniform in all the land, made all the better by the 53 people filling them. They repaired QB Jared Goff. They found RT Penei Sewell, made him the best lineman on either side of the ball in the entire sport, and even gave him a chance to throw the ball. They made Dan Skipper, the journeyest of journeymen, an absolute vomiting star. They had twice as many quality running backs as any of the other teams in the league. They tricked up plays without infringing on the Eagles' copyright of the tush push. They put together the most complete full team in the league and their most complete team statistically since 1970.
You don't remember that 1970 team, though, because of what happened in the playoffs, which was the Lions losing to Dallas, 5-0. Not 50-0. F-I-V-E. No walkup win, no positive developments, maybe the worst postseason game ever cricket-batted into people's corneas.
All that was eradicated last year as though the Lions had become the new Patriots. They lost in Week 2 on a late Baker Mayfield touchdown run, then won 11 in a row by an average score of 34-17, including 50 burgers against Tennessee and Jacksonville, which is the equivalent of scoring 31 against an actual NFL team. Their second loss was a 48-42 let's-see-what-happens-if-we-all-play-high masterwork against Buffalo, a much-advertised harbinger of Superb Owl The Fifty-Ninth.
Except that the Lions got boatraced again in their first postseason game, giving up 45 points and five turnovers to the even more nouveaux Washington Commandies. An even better season wiped out by out-of-character profligacy. The 'manders gave up 55 the next week to eventual parade-thrower Philadelphia, making the Lions' regular season achievement even less visible.
Does this seem like the end of the window? Not necessarily, but the longer a team makes its fans wait for the miracle, the less like a miracle it seems. The Lions may not have won a title since 1957 (in fact, they haven't), but as Super Bowl champions go, the 1981 49ers are probably the clubhouse leaders for "How the hell did that happen?" followed closely by the 1969 Jets and 2009 Saints. The Lions under Campbell have gone from 3-13-1 to 9-8, 12-5 and 15-2 last year, and to be honest, their 2023 season had the more jaw-dropping feel to it. They are no longer hyperbolically downtrodden, which is an achievement in and of itself, but winning the big'un this season won't be nearly the jaw-drop as the Lions history suggests it would be.
Last season, though, introduced us to the clinical Lions, a sentence never before conceived let alone read. The groundswell became a national movement in Week 6 when they went to Dallas and beat the always-not-appealing Cowboys, 47-9, running up 492 yards of offense and scoring on nine of their 12 possessions and making Jerry Jones turn purple, which is the best way to become a national movement. By Week 9, when they gained 645 yards (third-highest total in this century) in their 52-6 mauling of Jacksonville, the Lions were by acclimation the best entertainment value in the entire NFL and therefore anything that does not directly involve Aisling Bea. They were winning comfortably every week (their 564 points were the fourth highest in the Super Bowl era, and their point differential of plus-222 is 13th), and they were peaking at the right time.
Thus, losing to the RomCommies as a 9.5-point favorite came as quite the letdown to you yobs who mindlessly play the favorite, and we only mention the spread to indicate how much of a public team the Lions had become. And between then and now, they have transitioned from The Next Big Thing to The Overdue Powerhouse, eventually careening into Buffalo Bills territory as The Train That Never Arrives. This too is a measure not of competence but of reputation, and the clock on that is always ticking.
Your coach: Dan Campbell has singlehandedly reversed the decades-long image of coach-as-room-temperature-technocrat, and proof if proof were needed, voila! His players allegedly love him (I mean, how would we know for sure?) for this very thing, because he has not yet transitioned from player to head coach, but player to glorified assistant coach. More accurately, he plays well with the fan who imagines his or her seemingly demonic high school coach who was actually regular folks—though not this regular.
But the funny thing about coaches is that they all have sell-by dates until they treat the owner to a parade. Campbell is one of 65 head coaches hired in this century who got at least four years of work, and 20 of those have better records in those four years (Campbell is 39-28-1) including Mike McCarthy twice. Ten of those won a trophy; the others eventually got fired, sometimes soon after.
What we are trying to tell you here is that most coaches are fungible; of the 32 current ones, only Andy Reid has a chance to be allowed to retire from (or die in) his present role. In other words, Campbell may be a total hunk in all the ways you choose to picture that word, but eventually the shiny patina of taking a team with no self-respect other than the noon window on Thanksgiving Day and making it a powerhouse wears off. Either you give the owner a float, or the owner will eventually throw you off the ship. That's not likely how it plays out this year, but who knows what gremlins gnaw at the base of Sheila Ford Hamp's brain stem.
Your quarterback: Goff is the quarterback you kind of like in that "he's not a bad guy for a neighbor and he keeps his bushes trimmed" kind of way—that is, until something better comes along. But as they learned with Matthew Stafford, sometimes that's all you get and you learn to live with it. The Lions have no business complaining about him because statistically he is clearly a top five quarterback, but everyone looks at you when you owe them money until you become the playoff guy. Goff also won't end up as one of the first five fantasy quarterbacks picked, and as we all know that is the truest measure of a quarterback's value by people who have no business evaluating their own shoelace lengths. He's perfectly fine in every way, but quarterbacks are held to different standards because we are all tunnel-visioned bastards, and he has not yet had the breakout playoff game that allows him to be Patrick Mahomes, the gaudy numbers that allow him to be Joe Burrow, or the gotta-beat-'em-singlehanded situation that allows him to be Josh Allen. Oh, and he's 30, which is the prime for any quarterback except the ones who haven't won anything yet. Plus, he was the losing quarterback in the worst Super Bowl ever created by upright mammals. You should very much like your chances for a deep run with him but you don't because you're the version of you that you know, so deal with the consequences.
What's new that sucks: Expectations, that's what. The roster has not been overturned for perfectly good reasons, and the changes along the offensive line did not include Sewell, so they're good to go there. So these Lions are those Lions only without the braggable pedigree, but that 15-2 (err, 3) becomes an anvil until ... well, you know. In addition, being a very good team means you lose your coordinators. Offensive coordinator Ben Johnson went to become the new head coach in Chicago, the equivalent of beating yourself across the back with tire chains, and Aaron Glenn went to become the new coach with the New York Jets, the equivalent of beating yourself across the face and between the legs with spiked chains. Their replacements, John Morton and Kelvin Sheppard come from different tracks—Morton is the lifer who has only had one other coordinator gig (2017 with the Jets, and yes, you are right to assume that), while Sheppard was promoted from within after four years as Campbell's linebackers coach. Presumably Campbell has his ways of doing things, which should make for an easy transition with Sheppard, but Morton and Campbell will have to figure out how this all works, so there will be moments where it does indeed suck.
What has always sucked: The team's history. The last four years have been their best chunk of success since 1970-73, so these are the good old days. Assuming that we don't really start making memories until we are at least four years old, nobody below the age of 70 remembers their last championship in 1957, and since then only the Cardinals, Jaguars and Texans have fewer playoff games (17), and nobody has fewer postseasons wins (three). When you're making your own best history, you don't have to chase the ghosts of 90-year-olds, but now you've created the possibility of disappointing the young and middle-aged and letting them carry the same historical burdens of the elderly and infirm. Worse, you've created the possibility of disappointing them in January rather than November, which at first look seems like the better choice, but as any Buffalo Bills fans will tell you loses its magic fairly quickly. You think Bills fans head-firsting through picnic tables is performative when it is clear that it is Western New York's version of early winter pain relief.
What might not suck: They might actually win it all, and Campbell will become his own statue. The Tigers, Lions, Pistons and even those devious champion Wolverines will recede from view, and the entire state, UP included, will be all about Sundays in the fall. It might suck to know that all your jerseys and T-shirts will be owned by everyone else on your street and therefore will no longer be special, but you'll just have to buy an authentic game-worn jersey for each player, home, away, alternate and throwback, starting with Skipper. The cost will be a mere $31,104, not including local, state and federal tax and shipping, but either you care about your team or you passively hate them in your true guise as another lightweight dilettante trying and failing to impress your slugs-in-human-form friends. Truth is, the Lions don't actually suck, you do, at least until you show us the receipts.
HEAR IT FROM LIONS FANS!
Jed:
Last season was the worst possible thing to happen to the Lions. They won too much and got drummed out of the playoffs in the divisional round, and now it's either the loss was a fluke or the success before it was a fluke. It's split the fanbase down the middle for this season. Half are suffering from worse PTSD than the soldier in the "One" video; they think the team is destined to revert back to being the NFC North's working bye-week. The other half have now decided 15-2 is the baseline expectation, and anything less than winning two Super Bowls in one season is a failure.
Bob:
You know, I was going to say that at least the last time we got absolutely manhandled by Washington in the playoffs, they went on to win it. But no, they lost to them in the 1999 season too, to infamous lawn dart enthusiast Gus Ferrote. Somehow that makes it even worse.
Chris:
Hey there! I was the guy who emailed you last year about the Lions not letting my grandpa die by winning the Super Bowl finally. Guess what. He’s still alive! He sleeps now about 16 hours a day and can’t talk anymore either. He looks worse than Edgar in MiB after the bug uses his skin. He’s hanging on for a super bowl victory that will never, ever come. Fuck this team. They are torturing him in his final years. They will find some terrible way to boff it this year too. Like Dan Campbell has an aneurysm in week 18 and they have to forfeit the game and they get eliminated or something. Fuck me.
Andrew:
The Lions suck because of fans like me who like to brag about how I would watch (at least a portion of) every game even during the Matt Goddamned Patricia years. As if there is some virtue in wasting hours of your valuable weekend watching an inept football team that has been barely able to achieve mediocrity for the 40 years I've been alive. For some reason I sincerely believe I have grounds look down on the bandwagon fans who had the good sense to not waste their time on this sorry ass outfit until they were actually worth a good goddamn. I also got my kids hooked on watching them which should probably be considered child abuse. I can't wait for another first round exit in the Playoffs.
Doug:
Our entire fan base thinks we would have won the Super Bowl if Hutch didn’t get hurt while completely ignoring that Ben Johnson would have lost us the NFCCG by calling an entire game with trick plays to Taylor Decker and Dan Skipper or Jamo throwing deep passes to a triple covered Jared Goff. Everyone knows that guy is an asshole who is going to flame out so hard in Chicago and at least we have that.
Fuck Josh Reynolds’ stone hands for costing us a trip to the Super Bowl.
John:
Because they still contact Kid Rock for stuff. The Pistons partnered with Malcolm X and J. Dilla's families. They had events honoring HBCUs, the Divine Nine, and American Muslims. They did playoff videos set to Tee Grizzley's music. And the Lions brought back Kid Rock! To represent a team in Black ass Detroit. (I can say "Black ass Detroit" cuz I'm Black. LOL.)
Travis:
The most horrific sound of last season was not Aidan Hutchinson's tibia snapping in half but rather that of our Super Bowl window slamming shut with the weight of the ocean. Half the defense is still dead. Frank Ragnow retired because I guess he wants to be able to walk when he's 40. Without the wiz kids running the offense we've been reduced to inexplicably hiring former Stanford ground-and-pounder David Shaw as a passing game coordinator. Our best player is a right tackle.
Jace:
2024 was the first season in an eternity where the Lions actually had real expectations. And what happened with those expectations? Well, they shit their dicks of course.
Any long-term fan of this team knows that you don't carry hopes for anything but total and abject failure. But we fucking bought in anyway.
Any person with eyes can see that Dan Campbell is a caffeine fueled bologna brain with emotional issues. Yet we love him so dearly.
Somehow, we've told ourselves that, in fact, WE won the Goff-Stafford trade. This despite the fact that Clayton Kershaw's bestest little buddy in the whole world immediately went and won the Super Bowl, and Mr. Detroit himself (I can hear the Goff chants now) turns into a Ken doll that the dog got a hold of come playoff time.
We have the roughest, toughest, grittiest got damn team you've ever seen. Until they all got paid and everybody's legs fell off.
These may not be the previous generations' Lions, but I'll be damned if they aren't still the same old Lions.
Fuck Aaron Rodgers with RFK's brain worm.
Dan:
Jared Goff is Napoleon Dynamite with Uncle Rico’s arm.
Aaron:
I've been a Lions fan my whole life, and this is the least sucky we've ever been in my 32 years, but this franchise is cursed. They're on the cusp of the superbowl as I leave work, my colleagues excited for me with the Lions finally doing it, only to get home and turn on the game as the Niners take it all away. Then we're hyped for this year, Hutchinson is the best rusher in the league until he Anderson Silva's himself in a meaningless Dallas game, and the rest of the defense deciding they'd follow him onto the IL. Speaking of Dallas, refs screw up on the Dan Skipper touchdown which meant we were the 2 seed instead of the 1. Jim Caldwell running Megatron on a million digs and slants so safties can destroy his knees and ankles. Jahvid Best being the best rusher the franchise had seen since Barry only for him to be the League's example for "concussion safety" since Wes Welker played for the Patriots. Jim Scwartz' challenge flag causing the Texans to get an obvious non-touchdown ruled a touchdown on thanksgiving when refs let Mike McCarthy pick his back up in the same situation to beat us.
And on and on. Every year this team finds a new and exciting way to crush my already broken football fan spirit. But this is the year, I can feel it.
Brian:
The team had the greatest regular season in both my and my 74 year old father's lives but it was all smoke and mirrors made painfully clear when our defense, that by that time was composed of Brian Branch and ten guys on work release, was exposed by Jayden Daniels in our own building.
In reality, our chances of ever going to or winning a Super Bowl snapped with Aiden Hutchinson's leg back in October. It was just a matter of time until that bill came due and in true Lions fashion, they gave you false hope and made things as painful as possible. Now both of our coordinators bolted, 2/5 of our vaunted O-line is gone, and we still only have one guy that can pressure an opposing QB. Oh and top of al that we probably have the hardest schedule in the league this season. We are so incredibly fucked and the whole country will get to bare witness to it since we're on national TV nearly every damn week.
Also, every skill player on the team changed their goddamn number in the offseason which I'm sure was a ploy by the front office to increase merch sales.
Travis:
I tried to get the nickname "Throwbocop" to catch on for Matt Stafford. It did not work.
Dan:
A business colleague took me to the Vikings game at Ford Field where the Lions had your young doppelganger Sam looking like a gladiator facing real lions armed with only a loincloth.
The tickets came from a company in MPLS and I was asked to not wear Lions gear, fair enough, so I wore a yellow UofM fleece. There were only a few Vikings fans nearby and one particularly drunk man in my section was so pleased with himself for calling them "VI-QUEENS!" I thought his head was going to explode. He eventually gave up and turned around to heckle me for not wearing a Lions jersey.
I miss the days when Lions fans were known for eating ass.
Scott:
I took my mother-in-law to see the "Hamilton" matinee in Chicago (one of her Christmas presents) the day of the 2024 NFC title game. She didn't give a shit about football, but was nice enough to stop on the way home at a NW Indiana sports bar. We got into the car when the Lions were flying high at the half. We got to the restaurant just in time to see the whole fucking thing fall apart. I expected nothing less.
That was their shot. They're not going to the Super Bowl this year, or next year. It is written.
You could see the loss to Washington coming down the interstate. Both coordinators were mostly worried about their next jobs (lotsa luck, Bears and Jets!) and they got roasted by a rookie quarterback. What a Lions way to lose!
Michael:
I grew up in Erie, Pennsylvania, and have seen a couple thousand exhibits of the fact that God hates the Rust Belt and wants everyone there dead. Exhibits 24 to 7 are the Detroit Lions.
Colin:
My favorite part about the lions wyts is that most other team write-ins are about ownership malfeasance, underperforming players, organizational inertia, etc. and the lions one is way heavier on existential dread and mortality. "Grandpa had a stroke, and his last words were 'the lions are bums'" or something.
Want to be part of Defector’s NFL previews? It’s simple: just email us here and tell us why your team sucks. Next up: Washington Commanders.
