MORE PROOF THAT LIONS FANS SHOULD ABANDON HOPE

Though the Miami Dolphins, and the Atlanta Falcons have proven that chronically bad teams can be turned around in one year by making the right moves, the Detroit Lions seem to be fully content on staying the course, even as they close in on the first 0-16 regular season in NFL history. On Sunday, owner William Clay Ford, Sr. said that G.M. Martin Mayhew and COO Tom Lewand will be back in 2009, possibly in the same jobs they now hold. Mr. Ford also said that a new addition to the front office might not hold final authority over personnel, and that he doesn’t think there’s one person out there who can help reverse the team’s fortunes. Mr. Ford might be right, but only because Mr. Ford apparently isn’t inclined to hand the keys over to someone with the ability to fix the franchise, and then the willingness to get out of the way. As these Monday comments from Lewand illustrate, there’s still an “emperor’s new clothes” vibe apparently going on in Detroit. “Look, I look at this product maybe through a different lens than other people do,” Lewand said. “I grew up following this team. This is my team. When I was five or six years old, pulling the old ‘Christmas Story’ red wagon, this is my team.” [Editor’s note: Ugh. Will someone please shoot my eye out?] “And this is not the product that this city deserves,” Lewand said. “It deserves better. And there’s nobody who wants it to be right more than Mr. Ford does. And I think he will do everything in his power to get it right.” Though we now better understand how Lewand has used his silver tongue to remain ensconced in Honolulu Blue for so long, one thing the citizens of Detroit don’t deserve is a bunch of sappy crap about Lewand’s boyhood and the Ford family’s commitment to the team. They deserve results. History speaks for itself. The Lions have won one postseason game since Dwight Eisenhower lived in the White House. Despite having one of the greatest players of all time for a full decade (Barry Sanders, in the event you’ve forgotten) and the ability for half of that time to augment the roster via actual free agency, the Lions were at best a tease, a team that new how to create high hopes for the postseason and then failed to deliver on them. The best owners in the NFL know what they know, and they know what they don’t. They trust their employees who possess the requisite skills and experiences to do their jobs. And they hold them accountable when they don’t. In Detroit, we sense that the Fords like to dip their fingers into the stew from time to time, and thus whoever is working for them needs to be willing to defer from time to time to the wishes of folks who simply aren’t qualified to be calling the shots about whom they should draft, and/or whom they should hire to be the head coach. Unless and until the Fords get out of the way, things will not change for the Lions. The best hope for the folks living in Detroit? Start following one of the other 31 NFL teams. Or maybe hockey.