GAME DAY! Vikings at Lions 1/5/25

[Awful Llama]

Read this and thought, "Theraflu? WTF is that? Not another Coronavirus thing! "

Googled it ---->>> Drugs. Our UK equivalent is "Lemsip"..... thank goodness.

But get well soon Llama.

https://youtube.com/shorts/MruyxDvK_...Zz7hE43Jroe8ba

I have had covid twice already, but this does not appear to be that. In both instances my senses of taste and smell were compromised, and that has not happened. At least not yet, anyway.

[Awful Llama]

I swear by Theraflu,.it doesn't have any different drugs than you can get by pill form, but something about hot lemonade helps.

Dinking some now as I type. It's my go-to cold and flu medicine. I keep an ample supply on hand each winter. The only drawback is that despite it supposedly being a non-drowsy formula, that has not been my experience.

[edindetroit]

I have had covid twice already, but this does not appear to be that. In both instances my senses of taste and smell were compromised, and that has not happened. At least not yet, anyway.

I have Covid right now and haven't lost my sense of taste. Tart things weren't as tart for a couple of days but everything else was fine.

[Awful Llama]

I have Covid right now and haven't lost my sense of taste. Tart things weren't as tart for a couple of days but everything else was fine.

That's fortunate. When it happened to me it kinda freaked me out. My grandfather permanently lost both senses in his sixties, and spent his golden years not tasting or smelling a damn thing. I do not want that.

[Marko69]

That is scary.

Posted on the infamous Detroit Lions coronavirus thread (starring: Chemi, Froot, ULF…… was an entertaining thread) that both senses left me for about 4 months after getting cv19 late 2020. Not good.

We have “Wild Bean Cafe” here. No idea if that’s American or not, but if wanting a stronger than usual , real coffee, thats where we go.
I couldn’t even taste a wild bean coffee! Scary as fk!! Not good.

Those senses not coming back for yer poor grandfather is a flippin nightmare. Sorry to read that.

[-Deborah-]

I have Covid right now and haven't lost my sense of taste. Tart things weren't as tart for a couple of days but everything else was fine.

Hope you have a quick recovery!

[edindetroit]

A coffee chain opened up here years back called Beaners which, as it turned out, is a derogatory term for Mexicans. Not long after they changed their name to Biggby.

[whatever_gong82]

[Tom]

Just heard an interesting stat. The 2024 NFC North, with a record of 45-23, is the best division winning percentage (.661) of all time. And Chicago sucked.

And the other three teams lost to Detroit twice.

[Iron Lion]

I have Covid right now and haven't lost my sense of taste. Tart things weren't as tart for a couple of days but everything else was fine.

Just inject some disinfectant.

[DanO]

A coffee chain opened up here years back called Beaners which, as it turned out, is a derogatory term for Mexicans. Not long after they changed their name to Biggby.

I did not know that. Interesting.

[chemiclord]

Just heard an interesting stat. The 2024 NFC North, with a record of 45-23, is the best division winning percentage (.661) of all time. And Chicago sucked.

In fact, the NFC North's combined record against the rest of the NFL was 33-11, 7 of those losses by the Bears.

[Marko69]

Just inject some disinfectant.

Just did......., then grabbed my Mrs by the p*ssy.

In hospital now with two broken arms.

[whatever_gong82]

Brick by brick, Dan Campbell and Lions’ ‘core’ laid groundwork for historic moment

Another late paywall article.



By Nick Baumgardner
Jan 6, 2025


Two mornings before the biggest fight of their season to date, Dan Campbell talked to his team about trust and respect.

Because, what the hell else is there?


On Friday, they talked about it. On Sunday, they walked it. Again. Detroit Lions 31, Minnesota Vikings 9. How does a team with so many injuries withstand every single one of them on its way to a second straight NFC North championship and the first No. 1 playoff seed in team history?

With that trust and respect.


“This has been in the making for a while,” Campbell said Sunday night. “It takes a special group of guys, and I think you kind of have to go through what we’ve been through over the last four years. … Our guys didn’t bat an eye.”

The victory not only gave Detroit a first-round playoff bye for the first time since 1991, it also served as the magnum opus for Campbell’s entire Detroit operation. Once again, the Lions played a massively important game with more than half its starting defense on injured reserve. Standing across the field were Kevin O’Connell’s Minnesota Vikings. If there was one coach in the NFL who had an argument over Campbell for the league’s coach of the year honor before this game, it was O’Connell. That should not be a conversation now.


Campbell’s team was perfect on the road and perfect in the division, led by a man in charge of a team of men who will never have to buy a beer in this state again.

“(This) was a statement,” said Lions linebacker and captain Alex Anzalone, who returned Sunday after breaking his arm six weeks ago to lead the most inspired defensive performance Detroit has had all year.

“This was a legacy game.”

https://x.com/Lions/status/1876173593479991779

As the biggest week of the absolute best regular season of Detroit Lions football wound down, Campbell spoke to his club about the first bricks he ever put down here. It also gave him reason to think about the first Lions team he coached, in 2021. Some of those pieces are gone; many are still here. Campbell calls the latter his “core.”

That core features guys like Jared Goff, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Penei Sewell, Anzalone, Kalif Raymond, Dan Skipper and so many others. It also features guys who rarely, if ever, play on Sundays — practice squad receiver and training camp legend Tom Kennedy, backup running back Craig Reynolds, special teams ace Jalen Reeves-Maybin and recently re-signed linebacker Anthony Pittman.



On nights like Sunday, with the entire NFL watching, Campbell couldn’t help but think about all those people who set the standard here at the beginning — one of toughness, effort and togetherness, no matter the situation. That standard is now the envy of so many inside the NFL, and one Campbell’s beloved core has fought tooth and nail every day, for four years, to protect.

Just like he said they were going to.


“(I want) a bunch of guys (that) want to better themselves,” Campbell told the world at his introductory presser on Jan. 21, 2021. “They want to learn from the game, they want to learn about the game, but they want to grow together, and one man’s strength is another man’s weakness and vice versa. (I want guys who) know how to cover for each other.”


Like most things Campbell says, there was a lot going on there. But the most important line, the one that could’ve been said without anything in front of or behind it, was about how his football team would feature players ready to learn from the game of football — not just those willing to pay the extreme mental and physical price to reap the financial reward.



Campbell wants players who are truly willing to lose themselves in football and to something that is, and will forever be, bigger than themselves. Because, as Campbell knows, it’s not until a person finds that outlook they can truly see why the game changes lives.



Giving yourself up to football means being man enough to admit, in front of other men, that you need help sometimes. That’s, literally, how combination blocks work. It means learning that no matter how hard your grind is, you’ll never be able to do it all yourself. That’s how an offensive line works. Losing one’s self in football allows one to see why a shared belief can make you fly — coaching collaboration — and how differences, when trusted and respected (like when it comes to scouting), can make a team soar.

“Compatibility,” Campbell also said on his first day in Detroit, “is more important than coachability.” Campbell and general manager Brad Holmes have used this philosophy to build the Lions’ coaching staff and front office, but they’ve also used it to craft the roster that revolves around their core.



After beating the Las Vegas Raiders in a hard-fought Monday night game last year, Campbell and defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn made note of a smallish Raiders cornerback who never gave an inch in man coverage, no matter how long the odds against him. Months later, that cornerback, Amik Robertson, became a Detroit Lion.

On Sunday, they told the 5-foot-9 Robertson that Justin Jefferson — the NFL’s most dynamic receiver — was all his. Jefferson left the building with just three catches, his second-worst showing of the year. Robertson earned a game ball, the first of his life.

https://x.com/Lions/status/1876154481760678372

“When I signed here, I told Dan, Brad and AG (Glenn) how much I appreciate them. I’ve been through a lot,” an emotional Robertson said Sunday, forcing his voice not to crack as he spoke. “(People in this league) tried to bury me, man — saying I was ‘too small, too this, too that.’

“But you can’t bury what comes from the dirt.”



If there’s a line that better describes Dan Campbell’s Detroit Lions, I don’t know what it would be. Being overlooked or given up on in life is damn near the team motto.

When the Lions hired Campbell, they were mocked nationally for trusting their team to a meathead. When they traded for Goff, the football world acted as if he’d been banished to an eternity in hell. When they drafted Jahmyr Gibbs in the first round, people called Holmes foolish. When they traded T.J. Hockenson (who did next to nothing in Sunday night’s game) so they could draft his old backup at Iowa, Sam LaPorta, a lot of people didn’t get it.



And when Lions owner Sheila Ford Hamp, her team 1-6 in 2022, walked out unscheduled to address a bunch of reporters and tell everyone to back the hell off, people snickered. They tried to bury the Lions’ rebuild before it ever got started because failing was all anyone knew about with this franchise and the people who worked for it.

But, as we now know, you cannot bury what comes from dirt.



“There are so many things on my mind that I’m not ready to share yet — if that makes sense,” Campbell said Sunday. “I’m no different than anybody else in that locker room. I’m fueled by different things, too.

“And we did what we needed to do here (Sunday).”



The final chapter for these Lions has yet to be written. Goff was quick to point out that Sunday’s victory and all it signified — including another banner that’ll hang in Ford Field next season — was not the cherry on top of anyone’s sundae. This team entered the season intent on winning a Super Bowl, and nothing about that goal is different now. Whether or not Detroit pulls it off will determine this team’s final legacy.

However, with or without a trip to the Super Bowl, it’s important for Lions fans to understand how this franchise’s health — its present and future — literally has never been better.



People talk a lot about “windows” in sports and how everything needs to line up perfectly or else. There’s plenty of truth in that, but there’s also truth in the fact the Lions are still one of the NFL’s youngest teams. Goff just turned 30; Jameson Williams just broke 1,000 receiving yards for the first time; Gibbs set the franchise’s single-season touchdown record; Sewell is 24; Aidan Hutchinson and Alim McNeill, both of whom missed this game due to injury, have yet to turn 25.

Bottom line: As long as Campbell and Holmes are around, Detroit’s window is going to be firmly wide the hell open.

As far as the here and now goes, though, Campbell’s Lions took another step toward immortality Sunday night, in front of more than 60,000 of their best friends.

Only three more to go.



Nick Baumgardner is a senior writer/NFL Draft analyst based in Michigan. He co-hosts “One of These Years," a Detroit Lions podcast with Colton Pouncy. He joined The Athletic after stops at the Detroit Free Press, MLive Media Group and other newspapers in Michigan, Indiana and Kentucky. Follow Nick on Twitter @nickbaumgardner