Why Your Team Sucks 2026: Detroit Lions

Some people are fans of the Detroit Lions. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the Detroit Lions. This 2026 Defector NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.

Your team: Detroit Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

Your 2025 record: 9-8. First to worst in the NFC North. The happiest moment for Lions fans a season ago was when Frank Ragnow announced that he was un-retiring. For three days. When team doctors discovered that Ragnow’s hamstring was detached from the rest of his body, the comeback attempt was over. Can you hear that, Michigan? That’s the sound of a window closing shut, and then being boarded over 1,000 times with oak planks thicker than your own thighs. For a solid couple of years there, you guys got to pretend that the Lions weren’t the Lions. That’s over now.

Things started out promisingly enough, with a 4-1 record to open the campaign. Back then, the Lions’ offense was still putting up fat numbers on the scoreboard and people were like, “Hey, they didn’t need Ben Johnson calling plays to score in bunches after all!” That was before head coach Dan Campbell had to yoink play-calling duties away from new OC John Morton (not the wideout), before the injury fairy went on a Gallipoli-level killing spree, before their defense got rolled at home by J.J. McCarthy, and before the Lions returned to the subterranean baseline they’ve occupied for the past 70 years.

What did that Same Old Lions regression look like? Well it looked a lot like S Brian Branch setting off a brawl after a loss in KC. Or a truly ugly loss to Philadelphia, which featured Eagles coach Nick Sirianni dropping this zen koan in its aftermath:

“As I watch football today, I saw a lot of teams waiting to lose. Our team's waiting to win. Because they know how to win. There's something to be said for that, of knowing how to win.”

The same could not be said for the Lions. They were swept by Green Bay, with the Packers converting all of their fourth-down attempts in the second matchup while Detroit converted none. They were also, bafflingly, swept by Minnesota, with Vikings “quarterback” Max Brosmer throwing for just 51 yards in the away game. They led by 10 in LA before the Rams outscored them 27-10 afterward. And they blew a home game against Pittsburgh because WR Amon-Ra St. Brown pushed off on the would-be game-winning touchdown at the end. Sorry, Amon-Ra, you don’t get to be named after the Sun God when you’re this much of a shit for brains. From now on, your name is Jeb.

Along the way, everyone got hurt. Branch tore his Achilles. All-Pro headhunter S Kerby Joseph got a visit from karma when he got put on IR early with a knee injury that’s still lingering, and hopefully keeps lingering until he dies of CTE at age 47. Corner Terrion Arnold also went on IR late in the season, then used his downtime to do some light (alleged) armed kidnapping. Opposite corner D.J. Reed also was out for an extended period. And EDGE Marcus Davenport missed half the season because he’s Marcus Davenport. No NFL team had as many adjusted games lost on defense as these Lions, and the offense didn’t fare much better. I already told you about Ragnow’s fugitive hammy, but a lot of rostered offensive players also couldn’t stay healthy, including T Taylor Decker, G Graham Glasgow, and TE Sam LaPorta. Decker and Glasgow were released this offseason. Your O-line is now is about as formidable as the Hagar/Satriani/Kid Rock supergroup that composed your fight song a year ago.

And Lem Barney died. For a few hours. I don’t who Lem Barney is and don’t care.

Your coach: Still America’s Moron, Dan Campbell. Campbell’s stint as chief play-caller late last season went over about as well as his fourth-down attempts. So he fired Morton this offseason and replaced him Drew Petzing, last seen calling plays for the … Arizona Cardinals?! THAT’S where you went to find extra brainpower? You may as have hired a fucking actor for this job. But don’t worry, I read that Petzing is big into deploying 13 personnel, which is good because the tight ends are the only good O-linemen left on this roster.

Your quarterback: Sigh.

Do you know how fucking weird it is to see these billboards while driving through Connecticut? Jared Goff probably couldn’t point out Connecticut on a map without an OC in his ear to guide him.

You and I know the book on Goff now. When our man is operating out of a clean pocket, he’s the best in the business. But should a defender get within breathing distance of him … OH DEARIE ME JESUS TAKE THE WHEEL! Goff has three years left to go on his deal. Three long, endless, painful years. There was a moment not long ago when the trade that brought Goff here in exchange for Matthew Stafford felt like a historically great deal for both sides. That feeling has since melted away quicker than the Greenland ice sheet.

Your backup QB is Josh Dobbs. If he plays at all, that means your season is fucked. Take it from someone who knows.

What’s new that sucks: Three years ago GM Brad Holmes, who looks very strong and powerful when stationed to the immediate left of Kevin Clark, was on a legendary hot streak in the draft. He’d already nabbed DE Aidan Hutchinson, diarrhea addict WR Jameson Williams, and Joseph in the draft prior. Now he was sticking it to “the analytics” by loading up on low value positions in the opening rounds of the 2023 draft. That bounty yielded RB Jahmyr Gibbs, LB Jack Campbell, LaPorta, and Branch. Together with Goff and perennial All-Pro T Penei Sewell, these players formed a core that would have the Lions competing for the NFC title every year in perpetuity. And imagine how loaded the cupboard would be when Holmes got to draft even more players after that!

***REALITY COMES CRASHING THROUGH YOUR LIVING ROOM WINDOW AND RUNS OVER YOUR DAD***

Holmes's drafting hot streak came to a violent end the following year, when he used his first two picks on Terrion Arnold, who was never very good and was released this summer after the Feds charged him with eight felonies; and CB Ennis Rakestraw, an even worse corner who was injured all of last season. The following year he drafted DT Tyleik Williams—all 18 tackles and one sack of him—plus WR Isaac TeSlaa, who is just Matt Jones with a stupider name. The good news is that you can put this TeSlaa on autopilot and know that you'll reach 20 catches for 187 yards on the season safely. This spring, with the team’s offensive line utterly decimated thanks to the departures of Ragnow, Glasgow, and Decker, he reached for T Blake Miller in the first round. Somewhere, Matt Millen is cackling through his oxygen mask.

At the same time, the bill has come due for all of those draft hits from earlier in the decade. Gibbs got paid, so much so that the team had to trade his backfield mate David Montgomery to Houston. Gibbs is the most explosive back in the NFL. He’s also so horrible in pass protection that he was unplayable for extended stretches last season. The team then extended Jamo, a wideout who eats instant-doodoo meals that fuel him to an unforgettable two-catch, 63-yard performance every game. And Campbell also got paid, with a gimpy Branch and LaPorta now surely hankering for extensions of their own.

That’s why the Lions couldn’t afford to keep key pieces like LB Alex Anzalone, DT DJ Reader, EDGE Al-Quadin Muhammad, and CB Amik Robertson this offseason. Roster patches have arrived in the form of DE D.J. Wonnum (forgettable), RB Isiah Pacheco (won’t look as good without Patrick Mahomes handing the ball off to him), C Cade Mays (isn’t Frank Ragnow, is already injured), CB Roger McCreary (the Rams let him walk so that they could find actual corners), and C Juice Scruggs (was a Texan). The result is a team that resides in that purgatory where they still have the players that made them really good a couple years ago, but with cap attrition having eroded everything else around them. This is an extremely grim and specific place to be, and guess what? You guys are about to stay here FOREVER. Forever and ever and ever and ever! Get ready to spend the rest of this decade finishing with just enough wins to never draft an adequate replacement for Goff. After that, it’s back to languishing in the NFC North basement every year until you finally die of alcoholism. You know, the way Kid Rock will.

Ben Johnson will win a title in Chicago and you’ll have to watch it happen.

What has always sucked: The state of Michigan exists in a permanent economic depression and is populated by White Walkers who possess an accent grating enough to shatter steel. Dan Campbell is three months and eight losses away from replacing Tony Romo in the CBS booth. This team will NEVER find another good pass-rusher. And anytime the Lions bust out an alternate uniform, a million orphans go blind. The University of Michigan is now somehow both more incompetent and more evil than Michigan State. Hutch is a Maxx Crosby–level racist. Cut this state off at the wrist.

What might not suck: Last place schedule! WHAT A COUP!

HEAR IT FROM LIONS FANS!

Dan:

Will we try something other than press man coverage when our entire secondary is either in hospital/jail or is washed and/or slow and short? We have not. We will not.

Chris:

Terrion Arnold has been living out an unaired season of Fargo.

Dan:

I felt worse about the Lions reverting to being bad than I did about Donald Trump being re-elected. I hate this team more than I hate myself. Fuck Matt Patricia WITH Matt Millen.

Josh:

The offensive line is Penei Sewell and a series of Fatheads affixed to tissue paper. 

Blasé:

Dan Campbell is eye candy for horny Haley Stevens look-a-likes trapped in loveless marriages. His crying/grit schtick is more Hallmark Christmas Movie than an organizing principle for a franchise.

Bill:

The window slammed so fast on this team it severed my fingers. Dan Campbell goes for every 4th and 26 and then calls a run up the middle. Every trick play is now a blooper reel. The fanbase has reached a level of delusion that makes Browns fans point and laugh. Gibbs will need to be picked up with a sponge by Week 3 of being a bellcow back.

Hunter:

This is the best period of Lions football since the merger and the accomplishments amount to an NFC Championship game collapse and a roasting by Jayden Daniels in what looks to be the signature moment of his RG3 career.

Andrew:

I'm just looking forward to seeing Calvin's statue next to Barry's someday. That's the only kind of hardware this team is able to acquire.

Brian:

Any hope we had of ever winning a Super Bowl slipped through Josh Reynolds' hands in the 2024 NFC Championship Game. We followed that up with the most hollow 15-2 season of all time which ended at home with a thud against the goddamn Commanders in the Divisional Round. Last year, it was a horrific collapse to 9-8 and last place in the NFC North, which was capped off with a loss on Xmas Day to a Vikings team who had a parking attendant at QB. 

The fun, plucky Lions teams that everyone was rooting for in the early 2020's are long gone. The brains of that operation now sits in Chicago while our head coach who operates as if we're playing Madden against an eight-year-old.

Our vaunted GM is asleep at the wheel and hasn’t had a good draft or free agency in three years. 

Pete:

Someone went to a tattoo parlor and asked them to give them this. It’s Dan Campbell biting a kneecap. His kneecap. 

Jed:

Lions GM Brad Holmes operates on two guiding principles:

1. Time is not linear. There is no possible way that a player's skills can decline. Every player is a Highlander to Brad, even when some are starting to play like The Kurgan post-decapitation.
2. The team that went 15-2 must be retained at all costs. To defy the idea that the core of that team must stay together is threatening an MCU-style cosmic disaster. Not only does this mean keeping the band together season after season, this also means not diluting it with any new talent. A second edge rusher? Better corners? Nonsense, the team that got us to the NFC Championship can do it again!

Dan Campbell, the frothing, kneecap-biting, big-dawg-energy lunatic the town fell in love with got heeled last year when his coordinators got poached, and we all saw we'd been viewing him through a magnifying glass. He's really just a loud, yippy Chihuahua, and nobody likes those dogs for long. All the "Jared Goff can't scramble so we can't win the big one" talk ignores the fact that he ALSO turns into a football-heaving lawn sprinkler the moment he sees defenders any closer than fifteen feet away.

Kiah:

If this team ever had an average defense they'd be contenders, but unfortunately theyre gonna roll out the Legion of Whom again and hope that the offense can drop 50 burgers every week

Brian:

In a league that is realizing the importance of athleticism at the quarterback position, we decided to commit to a man who looks like he's wearing 30-lb. kettlebells for cleats.

In the entire Super Bowl era, Mark Sanchez still has more playoff wins than the entire Detroit Lions franchise.

Rev. Lennon:

We will continue to roll out Goff and hope he doesn't turn into his Goffulness. We will waste generational talents at RB and WR all at once instead of spacing them out (I love you Barry and Megatron). We do the “right” and “moral” thing in releasing one of our only competent DBs who will probably be playing on parole for the Cowboys in October.

Reid:

The fans here are fucking insufferable. I know someone who cancelled a family vacation because it conflicted with the 2024 Superbowl. Who fucking cares if you have to watch the Super Bowl at 2am in France, instead of your windowless suburban basement with your idiot friends? I swear half the fans of this team just woke up from a 100-year slumber like Snorlax on Route 12 and acted like a Super Bowl was promised to us 3000 years ago. How did we even get here?

Jamie:

Yet again, we contributed nothing to an otherwise divinely schadenfreudeful Packers season. We also got swept by the Vikings (ew).

Doug:

Amon-Ra did the fucking Trump dance against Washington and then forgot how to catch the football. Our offense will somehow drag this team to a 10-7 finish and a first round exit after Jared Goff loses all coordination because the weather is just a little cold. Then we’ll try and run it back with a team that’s not good enough. 

Dan:

It took just two years of 12+ wins for every Jobbie Nooner, Kid Rock wannabe in town to paste "GRIT" all over their F-150 (financed for 80 months at 11.5% APR). 

Haley Stevens IS Matt Foley.

James:

Let's not pretend Detroit has suddenly become some urban mecca. Anyone with ambition, talent, or even a basic desire to see the sun more than four months a year eventually leaves for a city that matters (NYC, LA, shit even Chicago).

There’s a mythology regarding "Detroit grit" and "blue-collar values." The people who talk most passionately about those things are usually the ones furthest removed from them.

Nick:

There have been a couple times where I'm out having fun with my wife and kids doing whatever and then I'll suddenly and randomly think of the helmet doink. We'll never win a Super Bowl.

Chris:

In the time it took to read this sentence, five Lions DBs tore their ACLs and Brad Holmes traded two 3rds for that Cabo Verde goalkeeper.

Travis:

Oh, we have one guy commit some light kidnapping and we simply must release him, because the Detroit Lions are some paragon of virtue? If OJ Simpson played for the Chiefs, he would have committed 9/11 and they would have kept him around to rush for 1500 yards that season.

Joseph:

Will they return to form with a healthier roster and still tons of skill position talent? Yes, but only if you recognize what “return to form” means for the Lions. It is not 15-2. It is not conference championship games. It is a limbo between 7-10 and 11-6, with a loss in their first playoff game if they qualify. 

Andrew:

Starting at some point last season I started an awful descent into the depths of cocaine addiction. It cost me dearly: my health, my marriage, my finances. A total shitshow. It ended with me spending over a month in rehab this spring. These days I'm feeling great about my recovery. I've been intentional about making sure I don't keep things in my life that aren't serving me well.

The Detroit Goddamned Lions have served me almost nothing but pain, disappointment and teaching me about obscure portions of the NFL rule book that end up being applied against them to heartbreaking effect. As such, it should be a no brainer that I should not spend my Sundays this fall watching this pathetic outfit. But I will. I've learned a lot this past year, but I don't think I'll ever learn to stop watching these assholes.

Deidra:

"The ruling on the field is a touchdown, HOWEVER..." will continue to haunt me until the end of my days.

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