Lions back at training camp with renewed hope, expectations

No matter what you might think of football, no time of the year seems long than this one. It’s brutally hot, and this summer’s dry weather has only made things worse. School’s out, and days seem to just run together in a long expanse of nothingness.

Right about now though, the first signs of fall start to show up. For my peers and our parents, now is about the time to register for classes and start to move out to school. Crops are starting to be harvested, with the you-pick berry farms in full service before the cider mills open up.

Most notably though, football will begin soon, one of the biggest tangible signs of the season. For the college football fan, the first rankings of the season will come out next week or so. And for the NFL fan, team training camps are opening around the country.

The Detroit Lions open up camp today in Allen Park, officially beginning one of the most anticipated Lions seasons in recent memory. Practice starts this afternoon, at the team’s practice facility. It will be the start of about a month of training camp, with many questions to be answered, games to be played and events for fans.

This training camp begins with expectation. In 2011, the Lions came back onto the NFL landscape with a 10-6 regular season, many wins that captured the national imagination, and a playoff appearance (that was a loss, but still).

For this season, Detroit fans will be seeing the Lions in a lot of the big stages that we’re not used to. The Lions are scheduled for two Sunday Night Football games on NBC, Sept. 16 in San Francisco and Dec. 9 against Green Bay, along with two Monday Night Football games on ESPN, Oct. 22 at Chicago and Dec. 22 at home against Atlanta. Wide receiver Calvin Johnson is on the cover of this year’s Madden game, and will have a segment in NBC’s Sunday Night opening video. The Lions will be appearing in all the NFL advertisements, in all the video packages, everything. No longer will the Lions be an afterthought in the national picture.

Locally, the team will be more prevalent than ever, as the Lions are now building upon some success, instead of grasping for something to hold onto. Every game will be a big event, and will surely dominate local discussion. This is uncharted territory for most Lions fans, as even the Barry Sanders era had question marks. For this group of Lions, the franchise seems to be built stronger than it was in the ’90s, and there’s greater potential with these younger guys.

Going into training camp, here are the two main points of discussion:

•Will Cliff Avril’s contract dispute be settled? Avril, a defensive end, was one of the Lions’ more unheralded stars last season, and he wants a long-term deal. Arbitration could not settle the issue, so Avril will be playing on a one-year, $10.6 million contract. Avril should be fine to start the season, but probably won’t attend much of training camp to reduce to chance of injury. Of course, a new contract would bring Avril in immediately.

•Will the Lions’ legal issues be resolved? One point of local and national discussion has been the somewhat staggering rate that Lions players were arrested over the summer. Everyone from star Ndamukong Suh (car crash) to relatively unknown running back Mikel Leshoure (pot) fell into legal trouble, and starting defensive back Aaron Berry was cut this week due to his second arrest of the year.

All of this stuff will work itself out with time and practice. Ultimately, the reason why this is such an issue comes down to a long off-season. Yes, arrests are bad. But everything football gets analyzed and over-analyzed by ESPN over the winter and spring, with numerous talking heads beating points into the ground. Then, writers will pick the Lions to struggle, while also painting themselves as making an “edgy” pick and moral arbiter of football. Instead, the Lions will be fine, all of this will get worked out, and those players affected will either learn from the experience or be out of football quickly.

Everything else is just hype upon hype. This city is ready for footbal. Here’s the schedule for the Lions, and for other games on national TV, with some notes attached.
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Gordie Fall

Gordon Fall has been around the Detroit sports scene for his entire life and even entered the world with a Red Wings hockey stick in hand. With a variety of connections around the Detroit area, Fall will be presenting the unspoken, yet optimistic truth of our city’s sports scene.

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