After a dreadful start to the 2012 season, the Detroit Lions seem to have found a groove. Entering their bye week with a 1-4 record, the Lions needed to find momentum or result in having their playoff hopes diminish. With two wins in their last three contests, the Lions have done just that.

Detroit has allowed just 20 points per game since the bye week after giving up an average of 28.5 points in the previous four. Special teams have been a big reason for the improvement. The all important unit has not given up a single touchdown since the bye, after allowing four in the two contests before the bye.

They all showed a lot of heart and tenacity against the Seattle Seahawks, with Matthew Stafford leading the team down the field late in the fourth quarter. With 20 seconds remaining, Stafford connected with wide receiver Titas Young on a 1-yard slant to help the Lions win 28-24.

By facing the Jacksonville Jaguars this week, the Lions have a terrific opportunity to get to .500 on the season with their fourth win. At 1-6, Jacksonville is one of only two teams in the NFL with just one win on the season.

With Maurice Jones-Drew out with a foot injury, the Jaguars will struggle to score points more than they usually do. Even with Jones-Drew in the lineup for every game but last week’s 24-15 loss against the Green Bay Packers, the team averages just 14.7 points a game.

Going against a revived Lions pass defense that has allowed only four passing touchdowns in their last three games, it is going to be a difficult task for second-year quarterback Blaine Gabbert to defeat a Lions squad that seems to have found their confidence.

Prediction: Lions 27, Jaguars 16

Another week. Another collapse on special teams for the Detroit Lions, who fell 20-13 to the Minnesota Vikings to lose their third consecutive contest and fall to 1-3.

Like the Tennessee Titans a week ago, the Vikings took advantage of poor cover kick coverage from the Lions, scoring on the opening kickoff and a punt to move to 3-1 in the competitive NFC North.

Percy Harvin ran the first kickoff back 105 for the opening touchdown to give the Vikings the early 7-0 lead. With 13:09 in the remaining in the third quarter, Marcus Sherels returned the first punt of the second half 77 yards to put the Vikings ahead 20-6. Those two touchdowns were the only two the Lions allowed.

Detroit now has the dubious honor of allowing both a kickoff and punt return for touchdowns in consecutive games since 1940, according to STATS LLC.

Matthew Stafford completed 30 of 51 pass attempts, albeit for just 319 yards. He also added a rushing touchdown, scoring on a quarterback sneak for the Lion’s lone touchdown of the contest with 2:56 in the final period.

With the loss, the Lions fall to 1-3 and with the Green Bay Packers taking down the New Orleans Saints, will fall to last place in the NFC North by themselves. This, of course, is a far cry from the 2011 version that did not see its third loss until week 10.

The Lions were unable to establish the running game whatsoever in the contest. Mikel LeShoure, who ran for 100 yards on 26 carries in his debut against the Titans, tallied just 26 yards on 13 carries including a lost fumble. The Vikings, on the other hand, were able to use Adrian Peterson comfortably as he netted 102 yards on 21 carries. Clearly, the Lions were simply taking advantage of a poor Titans’ defense a week ago in LeShoure’s debut. Entering the week, Minnesota was allowing just 3.8 yards per carry for the season on the ground.

The lack of a running game forced Matthew Stafford to throw 51 times. However, he was only able to complete 30 of those passes for just 6.3 yards an attempt. The Lions’ down the field passing game has not been what it was in 2011. Detroit’s leading receiver was actually back-up running back Joique Bell, who caught six balls for 72 yards. Star wide receiver Calvin Johnson was limited to just five receptions for 54 yards, as he faced constant double teams throughout the game.

Entering their bye week, the Detroit Lions have a lot to figure out before traveling to face the Philadelphia Eagles in week 6 if they have any real hopes of coming back and making the playoffs this season.

Prediction Review: Well, my hopes of the Lions getting back in the winner’s circle proved to just be false. I had the Vikings point total on point with 20. Unfortunately, the Lions fell 10 shy of my number in the loss.

NFC North Standings:

Minnesota Vikings (3-1)

Chicago Bears (3-1)

Green Bay Packers (2-2)

Detroit Lions (1-3)

Bye Week Update: I will be posting a more in-depth blog on the Lions’ season so far later on this week.

After last week’s stunning loss against the Tennessee Titans, the 1-2 Detroit Lions will look to get back into the winner’s circle at the friendly confines of Ford Field in Detroit. In order to do that, they will have to defeat a 2-1 Minnesota Vikings squad fresh off an impressive 24-13 victory over a team that many think is the best in the entire NFL in the San Francisco 49ers.

Sitting a 1-2 before their week 5, this contest can almost be considered a must win game for the Lions, even at this early point in the season. Immediately following their bye, the team plays consecutive road games at Philadelphia and Chicago. Not exactly a favorable schedule. A 1-4 start would damage Detroit’s playoff hopes immensely, while a 1-5 start would essentially put the nail in the coffin for Detroit in 2012.

With that in mind, expect the Lions to come out hungry against their division rival.

Last season, the Lions swept the season series with a 26-23 win in week 3 and a 34-28 win in week 14 in 2011.

Detroit played extremely flawed football last Sunday, allowing five touchdowns that went for at least 60 yards a piece, an NFL record. They will need to make sure they contain Adrian Peterson, who keeps asking for more carries he continues to improve from off-season ACL surgery. As long as the Lions are able to keep Peterson in check for most of the game, that will force quarterback Christian Ponder to beat them.

Although Ponder has shown improvement during his sophomore season, throwing for 713 yards to go along with 4 touchdowns and 0 interceptions, he still relies on opposing defenses focusing their gameplan around Adrian Peterson and stopping the run. As long as the Lions can get even a little pressure on Ponder to knock him a bit off balance, they should be able to hold him in check as he has yet to develop much off a deep ball and likes to use wide receiver Percy Harvin with short passes.

The Minnesota Vikings defense might just be the toughest that Detroit has seen also season. Their passing defense is ranked eighth in the league and their rushing defense comes in at 13th. Detroit will need Mikel LeShoure to show the promise that he did last week against the Titans, where he became the first Lions running back to rush for at least 100 yards in his debut since Billy Sims in 1980.

With a passing game that is beginning to click at the helm of Matthew Stafford and a running game that may have finally emerged with Mikel LeShoure leading the ground attack, expect the Lions offense to control the game and the clock. The Vikings secondary will also be forced to double team Calvin Johnson, which will be especially difficult without the services of their starting safety in Mistral Raymond. In turn, this will put too much pressure on the front seven of the Vikings to put pressure on Stafford and stop LeShoure.

The emergence of Mikel LeShoure coupled with the Lions home-field advantage and a sense of desperation gets them the victory against the Vikings.

Prediction: Lions 23, Vikings 20

Note: After being knocked out of the game against the Titans during the fourth quarter, Matthew Stafford is expected to play after being officially listed as probable with a hip injury. Mikel LeShoure is listed as questionable with a groin strain, although he too is expected to take the field.

Woohhh. Sit back for a few moments and try to take this one in.

After a wild fourth quarter that saw a total of 46 points scored between the Detroit Lions and Tennessee Titans, the home team was able to edge out the visiting Lions by a score of 44-41.

Rob Bironas netted a 26-yard field goal on the first possession of overtime to give the Titans a 44-41 lead. With a chance to either tie or win the game, the Lions inexplicably decided to go for it instead of kick the field goal on the 7-yard line of Tennessee. Backup quarterback Shaun Hill was stopped on the fourth-and-1 attempt to clinch the game for the Titans.

Head coach Jim Schwartz called it a “miscommunication” and stated that the team was “trying to draw them offsides,” as center Dominic Raiola snapped the ball to an unprepared Hill.

The Titans scored five touchdowns all from at least 60 yards out, a first in a single game in NFL history .Two of those came on special teams, where Darius Reynaud and Tommie Campbell channeled their inner Frank Wycheck and Kevin Dyson. Reynaud  threw a cross field lateral to Campbell to score the Titans first touchdown of the game in their updated version of the Music City Miracle from the 1999-2000 playoffs.

Although Detroit held Tennessee to just 59 yards rushing, Jake Locker nickled and dimed the Lions for 378 yards and two touchdowns.

Matthew Stafford suffered an apparent right leg injury, which led to Shaun Hill’s entry into the game late in the fourth quarter. Stafford finished with 278 yards on 33 of 42 passing and a touchdown.

The question now is: Where do the Lions go from here?

This was a contest that they needed to have to not only avoid starting out 1-2, but being sent to the bottom of the difficult NFC North (EDIT: Green Bay’s Monday Night loss also puts them at 1-2 and in a tie for third in the division).

Once again, their defense failed to show up allowing 437 net yards offense. Their special teams, as mentioned, allowed two touchdowns. That cannot happen for a team wishing to make the playoffs a second consecutive year.

Despite winning the battle of time of possession by nearly 13 minutes and outgaining  the Titans by almost 150 yards of net offense, the Lions came up just short for a second straight week. As terrible as allowing five touchdowns for over 60 yards apiece is, the Lions also suffered 91 penalty yards compared to the Titans 32.

Simply put, through three weeks, these Detroit Lions are an extremely fundamentally flawed team. Their defense seems to have taken a step back from last season (and it was not great to begin with), but also, the Lions offense has yet to click on all cylinders. Even though Stafford has a 68.9 percent completion percentage in 2012, he has just three touchdown passes compared to four interceptions.  He is also averaging a half yard per attempt less than in 2011.

With two road games after their week 5 bye against Philadelphia and Chicago, the Lions home game against division foe Minnesota Vikings next week essentially puts the Lions in a must win position in week 4. If they fail to come home with a win, there is a distinct possibility of this playoff Cinderella from 2011 starting out their 2012 season with a dismal record of 1-5.

Note: One of the lone bright sides for Detroit was the emergence of running back Mikel LeShoure. Making his first NFL start after missing 2011 with an Achilles’ tendon injury and missing the first two games of 2012 due to a suspension, LeShoure had 26 carries for 100 yards and a 1-yard touchdown. Running back Kevin Smith, the Lions start for the first two weeks, interestingly received no touches.

Prediction Review: Although I’m probably not alone here, I missed the mark on this one…badly. I had the Lions point total close with 38, but I did not quite see the Titans putting up 44 in a victory. Back to the drawing board.

NFC North Standings:

Chicago Bears (2-1)

Minnesota Vikings (2-1)

Detroit Lions (1-2)

Green Bay Packers (1-2)

After last week’s 30-22 loss at San Francisco, the Detroit Lions (1-1) look to bounce back and earn their first win away from home in 2012. To do that, they will have to defeat a Tennessee Titans squad looking for the first win of the season.

Coming off a sloppy 27-23 win over the St. Louis Rams in the opener and the loss against the 49ers, the Lions are looking for some stability as they travel to Nashville. With its first playoff appearance in over a decade coming in 2011, certainly, the team has goals of advancing further in the playoffs and making a Super Bowl run.

Look for them to earn a comfortable win against the crumbling Titans, who have possess the form of one of the league’s bottom teams through two games.

Only four teams have allowed more points than the Titans’ 72 so far. Tennessee also has the dubious honor of scoring the fewest points through two games in the league with 23, and consequently, has the league’s worst scoring margin with a deficit of 49 points in the early going.

Quarterback Matthew Stafford will be firing early and often in this one. After throwing for 41 touchdowns and over 5000 yards in 2011, Stafford has begun the 2012 season with two touchdown passes in comparison with four interceptions.

Against a team that allowed San Diego Charger’s quarterback Philip Rivers to throw for 284 yards on 24 of 32 passing with three touchdowns, expect Stafford to light up the scoreboard.

He will certainly look to have star wide receiver Calvin Johnson find the end zone for the first team this season. Johnson has contributed 19 catches for 204 yards without finding pay dirt. Despite being limited on the injury report with a sore ankle, he is expected to play at full speed against the Titans.

Also, Detroit will try to establish a true second receiving threat behind Johnson. Certainly, it is going to be a near impossible task for opposing defense to stop “Megatron” at any point this season. However, both the Rams and 49ers have been successful at containing the NFL’s best wideout and have prevented the big play. Expect Stafford to try and assert either tight end Brandon Pettigrew or wide receivers Nate Burleson and Titus Young to draw some attention away from Johnson as the season progresses.

Against the Titans, the weakness of their secondary will not be as exposed this week. Although safety Louis Delmas remains out, cornerback Chris Houston is expected to make his 2012 debut after suffering a high ankle sprain in the third week of the preseason against the Raiders. It won’t matter too much against a Titans’s passing attack that ranks in the bottom half of the league with just 219 yards per game. Quarterback Jake Locker has yet to find a rhythm in 2012 and was just 15 of 30 for 174 yards with a touchdown and an interception in last week’s loss against the Chargers. For one week, at least, the Lions will get away with having one of the league’s worst secondaries.

And we have yet to mention the demise of running back Chris Johnson. “CJ0K” (in response to his 2009 nickname of CJ2k), as he may be known by the end of this year, has just 19 carries for 24 yards so far. The Titans have just 58 rushing yards as entire team through two games and rank last in the league. Not only has Johnson yet to show the burst and quickness that he had shown a few years back, but their run blocking scheme has been utterly horrific. Left guard Steve Huchinson, signed in the offseason to a three-year deal, has not shown the promise that once made him one of the league’s best lineman.

Considering the urge for the Lions to get going their passing attack going at full strength and the all around weakness of what may be the league’s worst team in the Titans, this one will be over early. Running back Mikel LeShoure will also play for the first team in his NFL career after being injured throughout the 2011 season and serving a two-game suspension in 2012, trying to help the Lions establish a dependable ground attack as the season goes on.

Prediction: Lions 38, Titans 17

Showcased in the bright lights of Sunday Night Football, the Detroit Lions fell to the San Francisco 49ers a second consecutive year,  27-19, to fall to 1-1 to begin the 2012 season. The ridiculously stingy defense of the 49ers held the Lions under 300 total yards and kept star wide receiver Calvin Johnson out of the end zone, forcing the Lions to try and turn to the running game more so than they would have liked to.

Predictably, a 49ers defense that did not allow their first rushing touchdown until week 15 stymied a below average ground attack from the Lions. As a team, Detroit rushed for 82 yards on just 3.2 yards an attempt, led by Kevin Smith’s 53 yards on 16 carries.

49er quarterback Alex Smith finished with an efficient 226 yards with 20 completions against 31 attempts with two touchdowns. Smith, who had just seven turnovers throughout all of the 2011 regular season, once again was turnover free. Tight end Vernon Davis was on the receiving end of both Smith touchdown passes, coming from 21 yards out in the first quarter and 23 in the fourth quarter.

While the Lions did manage to limit their turnovers to just one on a Stafford interception, the tough 49ers defense managed to keep Detroit outside of the red zone until late in the fourth quarter. The lone Lions’ touchdown score came on a 9-yard strike from Stafford to tight end Brandon Pettigrew with 1:29 to make the game just one possession. Stafford finished the game with 230 yards on 19 of 32 passing with that one touchdown and the earlier pick. The first 12 points of the Lions came on four Jason Hanson field goals.

It was going to take a near perfect game from Detroit to pull out a victory against what looks like a team that could be primed for a Super Bowl run in San Francisco. While they managed to stay even in the turnover department at one apiece (49er running back Kendell Hunter fumbled on a kick return), the Lions offense was just not able to generate enough drives into the 49er red zone to pose a serious threat. Touchdowns win games in the NFL, and only one red zone opportunity is no formula for doing that, especially in today’s offense heavy league. Unfortunately, for the Lions, they came up a bit short.

Prediction Review

My prediction for the Lions week 2 contest had them falling to San Francisco by a score of 27-16. They may not get any closer than this all season, as the final score was just three points off of what I thought at 27-19. We’ll take it.

Takeaways

Second Threat: The Lions need to establish a second receiving threat alongside Calvin Johnson. Despite have 94 yards on 8 catches, Johnson was constantly double teamed and prevented from scoring for the second consecutive week to begin the season. Stafford needs another threat that he can turn to so he can stretch the field more than he has been able to through two weeks. Backup running back Joique Bell was the Lions second receiver with 59 yards. 50 of those yards came on one play.

Running Game: Once again, the Lions running attack has not been able to provide balance to their offense. Kevin Smith and Joique Bell have helped to feed a rushing game the ranks just 26th in the league out of 32 teams. Mikel LeShure returns from a two-game suspension in week 3 against the Tennessee Titans hoping to provide a more consistent threat.

Defense: Despite the better part of the Lions defense coming from the front four, led by Ndaumkong Suh, they were still gashed for 148 yards on the ground. With a secondary that has been short-handed in not having cornerback Chris Houston and safety Louis Delmas to start the season, the Lions front four as well as their linebacking core must be able to stop the run in order to cover up the weakness of the secondary as best as possible.

Next Week

The 1-1 Detroit Lions travel to Tennessee to take on the Titans, who have begun the season 0-2 and been outscored by 49 points.

NFC North Standings
Detroit Lions (1-1)

Green Bay Packers (1-1)

Minnesota Vikings (1-1)

Chicago Bears (1-1)

The Detroit Lions and San Francisco 49ers both opened their 2012 seasons with close victories. In Detroit, Matthew Stafford hit running back Kevin Smith with 10 seconds left lift the Lions to a 27-23 against the improved St. Louis Rams. Perhaps more impressively, the 49ers squared off against Green Bay at Lambeau Field and held on for a 30-22 win. The win for the 49ers gave Green Bay their first loss of the regular season, a fate the team did not suffer until week 15 in 2011.

Last season, the Lions hosted the 49ers in week 6, where the 49ers were able to edge out a late victory over the 49ers. In the final two minutes, a 6-yard touchdown pass along with a field goal from David Akers allowed San Francisco to get past Detroit 25-19 to give the Lions their first loss of the 2011 season.

However, what happened between Lions’ coach Jim Schwartz and 49ers’ coach Jim Harbaugh took center stage. In what had become known as “the handshake,” Harbaugh gave an overenthusiastic handshake and pat on the back. Schwartz took issue with it and charged at Harbaugh directly after. However, both coaches have seemingly put away the controversy with Schwartz stating that it’s “long in the past.”

The Lions will need to improve tremendously if they hope to defeat a 49ers team on Sunday Night that looks to be the NFC’s best to start the season. Already with one of the league’s top, if not the best, defenses, the 49ers added wide receivers Mario Manningham and Randy Moss to improve their aerial attack over the offseason.

The Lions will certainly need to win the turnover battle to contend in this one. Against the Rams, they lost the takeaway battle three to zero on account of Stafford’s three interceptions. St. Louis actually possessed the lead until the final minute of the ball game before Stafford’s touchdown pass to Kevin Smith.

San Francisco features a stout rushing defense featuring Pro Bowlers Patrick Willis and Justin Smith that only allowed three rushing touchdowns during the 2011 regular season. They also limited the Packers to just 45 yards on the ground in the week 1 opener, meaning that a win for the Lions is likely going to go through the arm of Matthew Stafford and the hands of Calvin Johnson.

Johnson, who managed 111 yards on 6 catches against the Rams, will need to try and exploit the 49ers secondary if the Lions wish to have any chance in this contest.

With one of the best defenses in the league, a quarterback in Alex Smith who rarely turns the ball over (just 5 interceptions in 2011), and a consistent rushing attack led by backs Frank Gore and Kendell Hunter, expect the 49ers to control this game early and give the Lions their first loss of 2012 as well. Even with his club’s A-game, Jim Schwartz’s Lions will be too overwhelmed in this one.

Prediction:

San Francisco 49ers: 27
Detroit Lions: 16

After throwing three interceptions before halftime for the first time in his career, Matthew Stafford responded with the mental fortitude of an NFL veteran.

Stafford tossed a 5-yard touchdown pass to running back Kevin Smith with only 10 seconds remaining in the contest. The late score helped push Staffords’ Detroit Lions over the St. Louis Rams by a score of 27-23 at Ford Field.

Looking to continue their momentum brought on by last season’s 10-6 regular season record and wild card berth, the Lions were heavy favorites heading into Sunday’s game against a Rams squad that netted just 2 wins in 2011. However, these Rams have looked to have made significant strides during the offseason.

Former Tennessee Titans head coach Jeff Fisher, in his first regular season game with St. Louis, helped put together a conservative game plan that nearly throttled the Lions to start the season. Rams’ quarterback Sam Bradford threw for just 198 yards with one touchdownon 18 for 25 passing. The defense of the St. Louis Rams almost forced the upset against the Lions on opening weekend.

One of Stafford’s three interceptions was returned for a touchdown by Cortland Finnegan with just over a minute remaining in the first half. At that point, the Rams led 13-7 and eventually took a 13-10 lead into the break.

Down 20-13 after Bradford’s touchdown pass, Kevin Smith forced a tie with a 5-yard scamper midway through the fourth quarter. After a field goal by Greg Zuerlein put the Rams back up by a score of 23-20, Stafford then led the Lions down the field on a nine-play, 80-yard drive that concluded with the winning pass to Smith.

Although the Lions only won by a slim margin, the team in can take some solace in the fact that they outgained the Rams in total yardage, with 429 compared to just 251 for St. Louis. Also, despite the fact that the Rams did not turn the ball over once compared to the Lions three, Detroit still won the game. Losing the turnover battle is usually a solid indicator of which way the game went. Very rarely does a team have three more turnovers than a team and still win the game, as the Lions did on Sunday.

Detroit also managed to, as mentioned, hold the Rams’ improved passing attack to just 173 net yards along with just 78 yards rushing on 2.9 yards per carry. For a team, that, in 2011, allowed nearly 368 yards per game, this has to be viewed as a good way to start the season.

Although head coach Jim Schwartz can take relief in his team pulling out the victory to start the season 1-0, he has to know that his team cannot lose the turnover battle by three if they wish to upend next week’s opponent: the San Francisco 49ers. The 49ers made defending Aaron Rodgers look easy in week 1, as they defeated NFC North rival Green Bay 30-22. Detroit will square off at San Francisco on Sunday night at 8:20 for their week 2 contest.

NFC North Standings

Detroit Lions (1-0)

Chicago Bears (1-0)

Minnesota Vikings (1-0)

Green Bay Packers (0-1)

After a decade of futility during the 2000s, the Detroit Lions finally made the playoffs in 2011. By compiling a 10-6 record and earning a spot as the 6th seed in the NFC, Detroit earned its first berth in the postseason since Barry Sanders’ final season in 1999. Despite a 45-28 wild-card loss to the New Orleans Saints in the Superdome, Detroit comes into the 2012 season riding the overall success resulting from their improvements during last season.

Head coach Jim Schwartz looks to begin his fourth season in Detroit with a win over the St. Louis Rams. After taking a over the first team in NFL history to lose all of their 16 regular season games, Schwartz has helped steadily improve the team from the Motor City; The Lions won just 2 games in 2009, but tripled their total to 6 in 2010 before finishing with their first playoff berth of the new century.

Matthew Stafford and Calvin Johnson look to continue one of the most prolific quarterback to wide receiver combos in the NFL. Last season, Stafford became just the fourth different quarterback to break the 5000 passing yard barrier, while Johnson hauled in 96 catches for 1681 yards and 16 touchdowns.

Despite the importance of this combination, the Lions went only 5-4 (including the playoffs) in 2011 in games where Johnson topped 100 yards and surprisingly, 0-3 in times that Johnson hit the 200 yard marker.

What does this tell me? The Lions need to activate the running game against the Rams.

In 2011, the Lions had a revolving door coming in at running back. Rookie Mikel Leshure suffered a torn achilles during training camp and ended up on injured reserve. Jahvid Best only made it through 6 games before multiple concussions forced him to sit for the season. Kevin Smith, singed in the middle of the season, had some moments, including a 140 yard, 3 touchdown game against the Carolina Panthers on November 20th. Veteran Maurice Morris and former Redskin Keiland Williams did not make much of an impact.

With Best and Leshure out still to begin the season, Smith becomes a key focal point against the Rams for several reasons: The Lions will look to bring some sort of balance to their offensive attack to keep the Rams defense honest. Despite a 2-14 season, the Rams actually ranked 7th in the NFL in passing defense with just over 206 yards a game allowed. On the ground, however, they ranked 31st with 152 rushing yards per game. Getting Kevin Smith going against a weak Rams front 7 will help propel the Lions to an opening week victory.

Defensively, the Lions need to constantly put pressure in the face of third-year quarterback Sam Bradford. In its last two games including the playoffs, Detroit allowed 45 points each to both the Green Bay Packers and the New Orleans Saints. The Lions secondary got torched through the air against two of the league’s more prominent passing attacks, despite squaring off against Packers’ then backup quarterback, Matt Flynn (Aaron Rodgers sat out the game for injury prevention reasons before the playoffs).

With two members of the Detroit secondary possibly out for week 1 in safety Louis Delmas and cornerback Chris Houston, defensive coordinator Gunther Cunningham will look for his front four to make Bradford uncomfortable in the pocket. Led by controversial tackle Ndamukong Suh, Detroit should have a field day against a Rams offensive line that surrendered 55 sacks during the 2011 season. Hiding the weakness of their secondary is a must for the Lions for not only week 1, but for the rest of the 2012 season.

Prediction: Lions 34, Rams 17