A few years ago when the Lions made the trip to St. Louis to take on the Rams, then-Offensive Coordinator Mike Martz made a point to mention how big this game was for him personally. Immediately making that game more than an average regular season game, he looked to use his offensive schemes to prove the nay-sayers wrong.
When Isaac Bruce found the end zone late in the fourth quarter, Scott Linehan’s Rams had just pulled off a 41-34 victory and Mike Martz and company had dropped to 0-5 in their initial season with Rod Marinelli.
Move ahead three years and the fans at Ford Field were looking to a game for the first time in two years where they were considered to have at least a 50-50 chance of winning. Plus, Linehan was in Mike Martz’s same role looking for revenge against his former squad. The saying that ‘defense wins games/championships’ must be spot on, even if the Lions still have not gotten the message.
In Sunday’s 17-10 loss to the Rams, poor tackling was the story for the Lions as short gains turned into long ones and long gains turned into touchdowns. The result should not have been a loss to a team that’s only connection to its glory days are by name alone.
The Lions looked a team that was just on a bye week — their first points came off a mistake that should have resulted in 7 and not 2. Unlike Martz’s Lions of 2006 that put up 34 on the road against a better Rams team, this Rams team broke a 17-game losing streak (sound familiar?) while holding the Lions to 10 points.
Maybe a few years from now, future Lions defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo will have better luck against the Rams in his “revenge” game.