Lions beat Vikings; take first place

The Detroit Lions are a team that slacks off during the entire semester and is staring down a failing grade with just a few weeks left in class. So let’s check the report card. Six of them have come in 2016.

“We don’t feel lucky to be down in every fourth quarter”.

“All we can do is worry about who we have next week, and that’s Dallas”, quarterback Sam Bradford said.

Detroit has been doing that a lot this season. He seems to finally have that sixth sense of when and where to escape when pressure is imminent. But it could be so many players on the Lions roster these days.

The biggest reason Detroit has roared back to life from a 1-3 start to a surprising 7-4 record and control of the NFC North is the ability to make timely plays.

Bradford hadn’t attacked down the field all day, and this would be no exception. “It’s hard when you’re only picking up five, six, seven (yards) at a time”.

This would help out with the short throws he has to call, by making sure the defense remains honest, can’t “trap” plays the way Slay did while also forcing the defense backward and opening up the short routes for some added value yards.

The Vikings are now the ones caught in a trap. This year’s group, despite being down in every fourth quarter this season, is a good football team. This is an incredibly tough defensive line to go against, and that became clear for almost the entire second half.

The inability for the offense to sustain drives late to kill off the clock and the defense’s inability to close out games in the final stages has become something that hasn’t been a trademark of the Mike Zimmer era in Minnesota.

Bradford did an admirable job passing the ball against the Lions in week 12.

After completing 31 of 37 for just 224 yards in a 16-13 loss at Detroit on Thursday, Bradford said the Vikings must “find a way to create some explosive plays”. Therefore, generating any type of a pass rush never really stood a chance. They are a good team because they win games and nothing else.

Yes, you read that correct. All four interceptions either sealed the Lions win or gave them possession to win the game.

Bradford wasn’t sacked and Zimmer said he got hit just three times, which was “pretty good”. Pretty much all of the issues with this offense begin and end with the offensive line, and they’re a pretty sizeable portion of the parts in between, too.

The Lions had posted just 24 yards of offense when a stellar Jeff Locke punt pinned the Lions inside their own 2 with 5:02 remaining and the Vikings up 13-10. The Vikings have lost three offensive tackles to season-ending injuries.

The Lions didn’t turn the ball over.

Minnesota Vikings receiver Stefon Diggs is inactive for Thursday’s game against the Detroit Lions. The low water mark for team rushing yards in a 16-game season belongs to the 2000 San Diego Chargers, who rushed for a collective 1,002 yards. It was a game the Lions of the past so often lost.

Prater has made game-tying and game-winning field goals 100 percent of the time in his career, and the Lions are thankful for that.

On one hand, the Vikings defense deserved a much better outcome on Thursday.

I understand that people are angry that the Vikings gave up a first-round pick for Bradford’s services and that the deal now appears to be a very big flop.