Sunday's St. Louis-Detroit matchup appeared destined to be one of the worst of the NFL season -- the teams entered Week 8 a combined 1-12 on the year -- and one second-quarter play summed up the ineptitude of both teams pretty well.
With Detroit facing 3rd-and-10 from the Rams 12, quarterback Matthew Stafford fired a pass over the middle that ricocheted off the hands of running back Aaron Brown and right to waiting St. Louis safety James Butler.
Amid all these NFL predictions flooding the web this week there are few certainties. But if recent history is any indication, we know for sure that at least one of this year's division winners will be a team that finished in last place a year ago. At least one team has turned the trick every year since the NFL went to the current eight-division format -- 10 teams total in six seasons. The Dolphins did it last year, the Buccaneers the year before, and the Eagles and Saints the year before that.
The reasons for this phenomenon are obvious -- overall parity, four-team divisions, a scheduling system that (basically) makes life easier for the teams at the bottom and tougher for the teams at the top. The only question as the 2009 season dawns is which of last year's last-place finishers will be among this year's division winners. We ranked all eight of them in order of their chances to continue the trend:
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- David Carr has been where Mark Sanchez and Matthew Stafford are -- sort of. He knows what it feels like to be a high draft pick with huge expectations who's named a starting quarterback in the NFL right out of college. A 16-game starter on the 2002 expansion Houston Texans, Carr got to experience first-hand what Sanchez and Stafford will start experiencing for real this weekend. And it's not that he's trying to scare anybody, but ...
"If I had it to do all over again, I think I would have rather watched," Carr, now the Giants' backup QB, told FanHouse on Monday. "There were just so many bad habits I picked up that, if I'd seen another guy doing it, I don't think I would have."
Top draft pick Matthew Stafford will be the starting quarterback for the Detroit Lions' regular-season opener Sunday in New Orleans, Lions coach Jim Schwartz announced Monday. Stafford has beaten out veteran Daunte Culpepper for the job and will join No. 5 overall pick Mark Sanchez of the Jets as a rookie starting quarterback on Day One of the 2009 NFL season.
The Stafford-Culpepper competition was, by all accounts, a close one, with the veteran Culpepper having reported to camp in top shape. He impressed the coaching staff with his mobility, arm strength and attitude during offseasn workouts and the preseason. But in several interviews with FanHouse this summer, Lions offensive coordinator Scott Linehan also praised Stafford, saying at one point that "you don't get the feeling you're dealing with a rookie quarterback."
Byron Leftwich will be the starting quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, coach Raheem Morris has informed his team. Leftwich beat out Luke McCown in one of the least inspiring QB battles in recent memory, and will direct a Tampa Bay team of which little is expected through a likely rebuilding season.
Morris' decision leaves only two NFL teams -- the Cleveland Browns and the Detroit Lions -- undecided about their starting quarterbacks as the third week of the preseason hits its climax. (That is, unless you count the Patriots.) Daunte Culpepper gets the start for Detroit this afternoon against the Colts and at this point looks like the favorite to open the season as the Lions' starter over rookie Matthew Stafford. Meanwhile, true to frustrating form, Browns coach Eric Mangini isn't saying who will start tonight's game against the Titans, though the thought in Cleveland seems to be that a decision will be made today on whether Brady Quinn or Derek Anderson will be the regular-season starter.
It's July, the slowest month of the year for the NFL, and it's driving you nuts. You need a fix. A hit. Anything NFL to pull you through the dog days. FanHouse is here to help with an in-depth look at each division that should have you plenty prepared for training camp. We're calling it the Summer Scramble. Today we look at some burning questions in the NFC North and offer a ridiculously early prediction for how the teams in the Black-and-Blue Division will finish.
It's July, the slowest month of the year for the NFL, and it's driving you nuts. You need a fix. A hit. Anything NFL to pull you through the dog days. FanHouse is here to help with an in-depth look at each division that should have you plenty prepared for training camp. We're calling it the Summer Scramble, and today we look at the NFC North's looming position battles.
The Detroit Lions, who haven't won a football game since 2007, just wrapped up their final minicamp of the offseason. There's a lot that's new about them, including offensive coordinator Scott Linehan, who was good enough to return FanHouse's phone call on Thursday afternoon and answer some questions about the way the team looks to him so far.
Linehan, the former head coach of the St. Louis Rams, addressed the quarterback competition between top draft pick Matthew Stafford and veteran Daunte Culpepper, had very high praise for rookie tight end Brandon Pettigrew and called himself a longtime admirer of new Lions head coach Jim Schwartz. He also spoke of the challenge of coming in as part of a new coaching staff on a team that only has to win one game to call 2009 an improvement over 2008.
When you go a whole season without winning a game, it's hard to fault people who don't want to watch you play anymore. So rather than grumble about losing season ticketholders, the Detroit Lions are doing something about it. The team sent e-mails to about 6,000 former season ticketholders a few weeks ago, inviting them to attend Wednesday's minicamp session. A few of them took the team up on it and attended workouts.
"I think it's important for them just to reconnect with the team," new coach Jim Schwartz said. "There have been a lot of changes since they had season tickets. I want them to see the direction that we're taking. I think if you watch practice, you can see sort of the philosophies that we're going to have and you see a lot of different faces and you need to get reacquainted with your team. There's so much turnover."
One of the reasons the Detroit Lions didn't prioritize linebacker at the draft was their belief that the Steelers were on the verge of releasing Larry Foote, and that the Detroit native and former University of Michigan star wanted to sign with them. If that was the plan, it worked. The team announced this morning that Foote has agreed to a one-year contract to fill its hole at middle linebacker.
The 28-year-old Foote, a two-time Super Bowl champion with Pittsburgh, is likely to start at middle linebacker ahead of DeAndre Levy, the Wisconsin linebacker the team picked in the third round of this year's draft. Levy, who played outside linebacker in a 3-4 defense in college, would then spend this year learning the middle linebacker position as Foote's backup.
Sunday's St. Louis-Detroit matchup appeared destined to be one of the worst of the NFL season -- the teams entered Week 8 a combined 1-12 on the year -- and one second-quarter play summed up the ineptitude of both teams pretty well.
Amid all these NFL predictions flooding the web this week there are few certainties. But if recent history is any indication, we know for sure that at least one of this year's division winners will be a team that finished in last place a year ago. At least one team has turned the trick every year since the NFL went to the current eight-division format -- 10 teams total in six seasons. The Dolphins did it last year, the Buccaneers the year before, and the Eagles and Saints the year before that.
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- David Carr has been where Mark Sanchez and Matthew Stafford are -- sort of. He knows what it feels like to be a high draft pick with huge expectations who's named a starting quarterback in the NFL right out of college. A 16-game starter on the 2002 expansion Houston Texans, Carr got to experience first-hand what Sanchez and Stafford will start experiencing for real this weekend. And it's not that he's trying to scare anybody, but ...
Top draft pick Matthew Stafford will be the starting quarterback for the Detroit Lions' regular-season opener Sunday in New Orleans, Lions coach Jim Schwartz announced Monday. Stafford has beaten out veteran Daunte Culpepper for the job and will join No. 5 overall pick Mark Sanchez of the Jets as a rookie starting quarterback on Day One of the 2009 NFL season.
Byron Leftwich will be the starting quarterback for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, coach Raheem Morris has informed his team. Leftwich beat out Luke McCown in one of the least inspiring QB battles in recent memory, and will direct a Tampa Bay team of which little is expected through a likely rebuilding season.
It's July, the slowest month of the year for the NFL, and it's driving you nuts. You need a fix. A hit. Anything NFL to pull you through the dog days. FanHouse is here to help with an in-depth look at each division that should have you plenty prepared for training camp. We're calling it the Summer Scramble, and today we look at the NFC North's looming position battles.
The Detroit Lions, who haven't won a football game since 2007, just wrapped up their final minicamp of the offseason. There's a lot that's new about them, including offensive coordinator Scott Linehan, who was good enough to return FanHouse's phone call on Thursday afternoon and answer some questions about the way the team looks to him so far.
When you go a whole season without winning a game, it's hard to fault people who don't want to watch you play anymore. So rather than grumble about losing season ticketholders, the Detroit Lions are doing something about it. The team sent e-mails to about 6,000 former season ticketholders a few weeks ago, inviting them to attend Wednesday's minicamp session. A few of them took the team up on it and attended workouts.
One of the reasons the Detroit Lions didn't prioritize linebacker at the draft was their belief that the Steelers were on the verge of releasing Larry Foote, and that the Detroit native and former University of Michigan star wanted to sign with them. If that was the plan, it worked. The team announced this morning that Foote has agreed to a one-year contract to fill its hole at middle linebacker.
