The Odyssey of Tom Lewand

The big news this past week(well, other than the dreaded Willie Young signing his first contract) was Tom Lewand's drunken drive to oblivion. Yes, as soon as the story broke, I knew that I had to say something about it. You see, it's my responsibility as a Lions blogger to show you these things. It's not like I want to do it. I have to. It's in the Constitution. You can check. John Adams didn't think we needed it, but Thomas Jefferson was all "Oh no, motherfucker. That shit is the bedrock of freedom." Then they went whoring. Ben wrecked some plain old French lady, but old Tommy went buck wild on a Burundian whore named Sha'Quilla. But that is all a story for another time. Anyway, back to Tom Lewand.

Today, the dashboard video from the cop car was released and man, to be honest with you, it's pretty great. When I first heard about the arrest, I figured the dude was barely over the limit. You know, the whole "Well, officer, I had a couple of beers, but I feel fine . . . oh shit, I blew a .09? That's like four beers, officer. Come on, now, this is bullshit," kind of thing. Then I heard the dude blew a .21 and I knew this shit was wild. I mean, .21 is college drunk, you know? That's "Fuck it, just give me the whole bottle," kind of drunk, the kind of drunk that leads you to do stupid things like flicking on a lighter, taking a swig of Everclear and then accidentally burning your house down with a giant fireball Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat style. That kind of drunk.

So when I watched the video today, I think I was expecting some hilarious shit, like poor Tom Lewand stumbling all over himself, falling down, maybe puking on a cop. There are those who will tell you that that shit isn't hilarious at all, but tragic and sad, and well . . . sure, yeah. But those people need to lighten the fuck up. For our purposes, they are hilarious, and like I said, I have a responsibility as a blogger to dissect and point and laugh at this shit. It is my duty as an Ambassador of Truth and as a Defender of Freedom. I do not take it lightly. I mean, I could join the parade of sad sacks shaking their heads and scolding poor Tom for his unfortunate life choices, but that is the way of the average man, the way of the square. It is boring as hell and my chief responsibility as a blogger, even more than my responsibility to truth and freedom, is to be interesting.

Anyway, that is all spinning in a different direction than I meant to go and I apologize. Back to the Tom Lewand America's Funniest Home Video entry. Like I said, I was expecting some crazy hijinks with that level of drunk, but instead I was surprised by what I saw.

I mean, the tape starts up as you would expect, with Tommy Boy swerving all over the damn place and in my mind, I was thinking "Well shit, here we go." I admit, it was ghoulish, but I felt a sort of gleeful anticipation. It's wrong and shameful as all hell, but fuck it, there's no time for self reflection here, there's a drunk exec on the loose. Anyway, things continue in a hilarious direction when the cop comes to his door and is all WHOA. I mean, it probably smells like a brewery in there, you know? And things perhaps reach their peak when Tommy reasons that the officer must be smelling A BREATH MINT because he hasn't had anything to drink in a year and a half. Well, Goddamn. I mean, a breath mint, Tom? A FUCKING BREATH MINT?

Indeed. Apparently, Tom Lewand enjoys sucking on Jack Daniels flavored breath mints and hey, why not, you know? But really, come on now. The cop then asks him what he's been up to and Tom stammers some incoherent bullshit, some gibberish about picking some other chump up from a bar or hotel or restaurant or from the zoo or from who the fuck knows where. The cop of course then asks him to get out of the car and Tommy complies like the good citizen he is, and then things take a bit of a turn.

You see, Tom Lewand was drunk off his ass. You don't blow a .21 without being legitimately hammered. I mean, there's no mistake there. There's no "Gee, officer, I guess I must have had one too many." At that point, you are fucked up and you know it. But good ol' Tom gets out of the car anyway, knowing he's doomed and gets ready for all the dreaded field tests that half the population would fail stone cold sober. He takes them and it's still pretty obvious that the dude has been drinking, but damn it all, I was impressed by Tom's ability to maintain. He held his shit together the best that he could and didn't really do anything all that embarrassing. There were a few fuck ups but nothing so egregious as to suggest that this dude's piss could probably be set on fire.

That's where the story turned for me. I felt a strange sort of admiration for Tom Lewand. Look, I know that's wrong and irresponsible of me to say and a bad example for all of the kids who read this blog.(I'm sure you all sit around and read this blog as a family, don't you? Like back in the '30's, how they used to sit around and listen to the radio as a family. Sure, why not? I mean, you've got Dad sitting in front of the computer, reading this out loud to the wife and kids, trying his damnedest to approximate my voice, or whatever he imagines it to sound like - maybe Frank Booth after huffing a bunch of ether, I don't know - and the kids all laugh and clap and get excited whenever I bring up monkeys or werewolves and shit. It happens. I'm sure of it.) But even though it's irresponsible and wrong according to the accepted standards of this Great Society to admit something like that, I can't help it. It's the wild rebel in me. He doesn't come out all the time, and I can even reasonably pass for human most days, but he's in there and he can't help it.

By the time the field tests were all wrapped up, I was actively rooting for Tom. Fuck yeah, man, you're gonna do it! I knew it was ridiculous and wrong, but to hell with all that, I couldn't help myself. And then the cops had to go and haul the breathalyzer out. Game over, Tommy Boy. Shit.

Of course, this then leads into a comical "Oh shit, if I take it, I'm fucked," bit of legendary stalling from Tom, who even invokes the old "But what if I get a false positive?" That last desperate gamble of the doomed drunkard is brought into play, along with shit like "I'm just trying to figure out my options. I'm a lawyer." It just keeps going and going and going and the cops just keep getting more and more pissed off until Tom is finally all "Okay, shit, let's do it," and the cops are all "Man, you better. If you even hesitate, we're hauling your ass to jail and getting a warrant to test your blood." The moment of truth arrives and they get out the breathalyzer, stick it in his mouth and then Tom, my hero, is all "Well, I don't know guys." I laugh, and the cops say fuck it and arrest him. And that's it.

That was the twenty minute scene. But what led to that? I mean, it's pretty obvious that Tom Lewand probably has a drinking problem. First of all, there was the whole "I haven't had a drink in a year and a half." That sounds like the proud ravings of the recovering alcoholic. Then there is the fact that he decided to drive with a .21 hanging over his head. I mean, shit, you don't do that unless you've probably done it before, you know? You just don't get that level of drunk and think that you can pull it out without some experience. That was no rookie drunk on that tape. His ability to semi-maintain was near Jedi like. Only a dude who has spent great portions of time as a functioning drunkard can pull that off. I mean, again, .21. That's seriously fucked up. Dude is lucky he could even speak English by that point.

So, what we seem to have here is the case of a recovering alcoholic who slipped up and went for a joy ride. It happens. But as it so often happens, this wasn't a case of a dude having a drink or two and thinking "What the hell am I doing?" before heading out into the night. No, when a drunk falls off the wagon, he fucking falls forever. The wagon rolls over his besotted ass and then backs up and rolls over him again. The horses even kick him a few times for good measure. By the time he's finished, he's broken into a million pieces, dirty, wrecked, and in no condition to do anything other than lay there and hope someone scrapes his ass off the road and tosses him back onto the wagon.

But still, how does a dude who's managed to stay clear of the demon juice for a year and a half find himself blowing a .21 on the side of the road while cops search his car? Well, here, for the first time, I present to you a possible scenario:

[Open on a suburban bar. A neatly dressed middle aged man peaks his head into the door. He seems nervous.]

Bartender: Can I help you?

Nervous man: Uh, well, I'm supposed to meet some people here. I think I'm supposed to give them a ride home.

Bartender: Playing designated driver tonight?

[The nervous man chuckles uneasily.]

Nervous man: Uh, I guess so. I don't see them anywhere, though.

Bartender: What do they look like? Maybe I can tell you if they were here.

Nervous Man: Uh, well, they look like . . . ah, um . . . maybe I should just come inside and check around.

[The bartender shrugs.]

Bartender: Okay, sure, whatever you want.

[The nervous man enters the bar. He runs a hand through his hair. He's starting to sweat. He shouldn't be in here. He needs to leave. He doesn't, though. For some reason, he finds himself moving closer to the bar. He rationalizes that his friends might still be there, that he just needs to wait it out. He's tired though. He needs to sit down. He's had a long day and it shouldn't be a big deal just to sit at the bar for a while and wait. I mean, it's not like he's going to be drinking or anything. He nods to himself and then resolutely sits down at the bar.]

Bartender: Can I get you something?

[Oh shit, the nervous man thinks. He wasn't expecting this.]

Nervous Man: Uh, I'll . . . uh . . . [Get a grip, he thinks to himself. Shit. Just order something. It will be a test. Yeah. That's it. A test. If he can sit here and stare at a full glass without touching it, he'll prove, once and for all that he's beaten this thing.]

Bartender: Sir?

Nervous Man: I'll have a vodka tonic. Go easy on the tonic. [Shit. Why did you say that? Relax. It's just force of habit. It doesn't mean that you'll actually be drinking it.]

Bartender: Alright man, here you go.

Nervous Man: Thanks. [Jesus. This was a mistake. God, my heart is pounding. I'm so nervous. My finger tips are tingling. I just need to calm down. Relax. You're fine. Shit. It's not working. I just need to get it together. What if . . . no. That would be a huge mistake. But . . . no. I can't do it. That would just defeat the purpose, wouldn't it? Then again, I'm not doing anyone any good this nervous. I'm a wreck. Isn't that why you stopped drinking in the first place? Maybe just a sip. Maybe just something to calm the nerves. Okay, here goes . . . damn. I missed you, baby.]

Bartender: You got a name?

Nervous Man: Tom . . . Tom Lewand.

Bartender: Huh. That name sounds kind of familiar.

Tom: Yeah, I work for the Lions . . . you know, the Detroit Lions. Team President.

Bartender: The Lions?

[A flash of disgust crosses his face. He tries to hide it, but can't help himself. Both men realize it and each looks away. Tom looks down and takes another drink. His life is tough. I mean, he should be able to feel proud of himself, but he gets that same damn reaction every time he tells people he works for the Lions.]

Bartender: Can I get you another one?

[Tom looks down and is shocked when he realizes that he's finished the drink. Wow. He needs to leave. Now. This isn't good. But without even thinking about it he motions for another one. The bartender is already pouring it and . . . shit, just drink it man. Just finish it and get the fuck out. You've already crossed the line. Don't be weird. Just maintain and then get home. You can deal with this in the morning.]

Tom: Thanks.

[Tom takes a drink. He just wants to finish this one and leave. He pounds it. Goddamn. Feel that burn. It's so familiar, like an old friend. I remember you. Feels good too. Oh, this is nice. Fuck it, what's the difference between two and three . . .]

[Several drinks later, Tom staggers off of his stool. He's finally willed himself to leave. It's too late and he knows it. He's fucked up. He shouldn't drive but he can't call a taxi. That would be admitting, both to himself and to the rest of the world, that he made a mistake. He's a public figure, a prominent executive, an important man. He's famous. He can't admit something like that. Shit. He's only a couple of miles from home. He can do this. He's done it before. It's been a while, but what the hell, it's like riding a bike.]

[Tom takes a deep breath as he starts his car. Shit, he thinks. Maintain. You can do this. He pops a breath mint. He belches and then exhales, slow and long. He turns the radio off. It's a distraction. You have got to focus, Tom. Maintain.]

[You're doing it, Tom! You're gonna make it. Shit, this isn't so hard. Tom starts to relax. He laughs. He just remembered the time Ernie Sims brought his monkey to the team Christmas party and it went wild and attacked Old Man Ford's wife. That shit was hilarious. The little guy shit on the floor and everyone got worried when Jason Hanson slipped in it because it looked like he pulled his groin but he came up laughing and so everyone else started laughing and the monkey started hooting and then tried to fuck Matthew Stafford's date. She looked horrified and Matt just laughed and said it wasn't like she hadn't done worse and she got all offended and stormed out and Dominic laughed at Matt and said it looked like it was "a night of self reflection" and then made a jacking off motion with his hand. Everyone laughed and Matt pretended to scold the monkey and . . . oh shit, oh fuck. Sirens. Maintain, motherfucker. Maintain.]

Okay. Maybe it didn't happen exactly like that, but then again, maybe it did. Who's to say? The only one who knows for sure is Tom Lewand. All I know is that it's June and thank God something happened. I know it's cruel and ghoulish of me to think like that, but these are strange and terrible times and we must find salvation wherever we can. If that is at the bottom of a bottle or in the story of a Lions exec run amok then oh well. I'm not proud of it, and I'm sure many of you think that I have behaved irresponsibly in this post, but this is the cross that I must bear as a Warrior of Light, an Ambassador of Truth and as a Defender of Freedom. I am a blogger, damn it, and as such I have a responsibility to provide both news and analysis. Some dude on Twitter said so. It may be ugly, but this is just the way of things. Vaya con dios, Tom Lewand. Vaya con dios.

My 5 Favorite Lions Teams

As Lions fans, there is precious little in our immediate past that can make us smile. That is a hysterical understatement. Really, for the last 50 years, Lions football has been a barren and uninhabitable wasteland. Only the truly insane and the masochistic would choose to live in such a world. Unfortunately, I - and many of you - did not choose to live in this wasteland. We were born here, and we have been forced to survive on a diet of shit and the bones of unsuspecting travelers. Wait . . . what? Never mind that last part.

But occasionally - very, very occasionally, we are allowed a modicum of joy on these hellish plains. They are not moments that would pass for joy in any other land, but we are like the child who has nothing and if he is given a couple of sticks and a marble, he gets embarrassingly excited. Everyone else has video games and iPods and concubines and all we have are a bunch of sticks wrapped in hay that we call a doll. Horrible, just horrible.

But they are our sticks and we love them for reasons that no one on the outside can understand. It is with that in mind that I have chosen my five favorite sticks, or to take this beyond the realm of dumb and tortured metaphor, my five favorite Lions seasons. Naturally, this will only cover the last 20 years or so. It wouldn't make much sense for me to rave about the 1983 team since I was three when that shit went down. And, strange and mystical as I am, the powerful Lions teams of the '50s are well before my time. No, this is about my own personal journey through this terrible world, and therefore, these are the five seasons that mean the most to me as a Lions fan. It is kinda sad - very, actually - and as usual, whenever I do something like this, it ends up strangely making me more depressed than when I discuss the bad shit, but what the hell, I am a warrior of light and a champion in my heart and I can take it. And besides, this is easy content, and there is nothing else to write about.(Well, there is Tim Toone, but even though he is by all accounts a very good guy, my procrastination when it comes to discussing him is so epic that it has given me a complex, and that complex has caused me to loathe him before he even gets a chance. So sad, but this is our reality and, after all, these are strange and terrible times and these things happen.) Okay, Jesus, enough rambling, let's just get on with this shit.

5. 2008

RECORD: 0-16

PLAYOFFS? UH . . .

KEY PLAYERS: DAN ORLOVSKY, DAUNTE CULPEPPER, KEVIN SMITH, CALVIN JOHNSON, THE FAILURE DEMON, THE HOUNDS OF HELL, LENNIE SMALL

HEAD COACH: ROD MARINELLI

Wait, what the fuck? I know this doesn't make any sense. This was 0-16, the Year of Unnumbered Tears, Hell on Earth. What the fuck am I talking about?

Okay. There is really no way that I can justify this, and it is a dark and shameful thing to admit, but 0-16 was indeed my fifth favorite season as a Lions fan. I will wait for you to stop rioting and throwing shit at your screen before I explain why.

Okay, done? Good. Also, you shouldn't throw shit at your screen. It just marks you as a barbarian, and besides, that is your monitor. Unless you are reading this at a friend's house or at the library or whatever. In that case, go nuts. Piss on the keyboard while you're at it. Fuck it.

But after you're done with all that, sit down, shut up and listen to me. 0-16 was not a good feeling. Let's just get that out of the way. Really, it was also my least favorite season as a Lions fan. So what the hell is it doing on this list? Well, you see, 2008 was when I began this absurd little adventure in blogging. The first game that I wrote about was the epic and terrible shitkicking the Lions received from the Falcons to start that season. Go back and look. My first post on this site came in August, on the eve of that terrible and savage season. And now, here I am, almost two years later, and I'm still writing about the Lions despite all reason.

In a way it was fun. That may sound heretical, but what the fuck, the rules are different for Lions fans. That is where everything began for me here, where all the weirdness, the fucked up imagery, the stupid nicknames, the irrational love for certain players, the unreasonable hatred for others, began. Through writing about the Lions, I became almost obsessed with them. They became a dragon I had to chase and then slay. I'm still chasing that fucking dragon and I'm still trying to drag it down and kill it. It opened up a whole world for me to explore, a whole story that is absurd and terrible and strange and fascinating and heart wrenching and complex and simple all at the same time. I love telling it, even as painful as it is to actually live it.

Perhaps that doesn't make sense to anyone else but me, but that's because I'm the one wrapped up inside of it. I make no apologies. Throughout the 2008 season, I felt like Slim Pickens riding the A-Bomb like a bucking bronco in Dr. Strangelove. If I had to sum up what that season felt like, that would be it. It was strange and dark and terrible and also bizarrely fun. It was a hell of a ride, and even though I knew we were all just hurtling towards certain and terrible doom, I rode that fucker to the bitter end and I am both proud and mortified by that fact.

Not only did I live through 0-16, but I feel like I comprehensively told the story of that season better than anyone else out there. That is a powerful statement to make, bold and egotistical as all hell, but fuck it, I don't pat myself on the back often, and I feel like it's true and I don't mind saying it. 0-16 was unique, singular in its notoriety, and I told that story while the world burned. If you were here then and you came along with me on the journey, then you know. If you didn't - and most of you probably weren't here yet - you missed out on something that was both terrible and oddly enjoyable. I was on fire. Again, this probably all sounds like the ravings of an ego driven asshole, but fuck, I never do this so hopefully you'll indulge me here a bit. 0-16 was unique and strange and terrible and utterly without redemption. And somehow, someway, in the midst of all of that, whatever this is that I do here was born. And that's not nothing, you know?


4. 1999

RECORD: 8-8

PLAYOFFS? YES

KEY PLAYERS: GUS FREROTTE, CHARLIE BATCH, GREG HILL, GERMANE CROWELL, JOHNNIE MORTON, DAVID SLOAN, STEPHEN BOYD, ROBERT PORCHER, LUTHER ELLIS, JEFF HARTINGS, RON RICE

HEAD COACH: BOBBY ROSS

The 1999 season was a strange one, an oddly noble last stand before the world collapsed. The Lions had gone 5-11 the season before, and St. Barry floated out of town on a river of tears, riding a raft made of broken dreams. The mood was decidedly grim. On top of St. Barry's untimely demise, Herman Moore also chose the 1999 season to fall apart. With the Lions two iconic weapons of the '90s dead and dying respectively, it seemed fitting that the decade would come to a close with a funeral for the team that never quite made it over the hump.

But then a funny thing happened. The Lions went out and they fought their asses off. They played hard all season, despite a lack of star talent, and they didn't stop fighting until they were finally dropped by the Redskins in the first round of the playoffs. It wasn't a great season - hell, it was very, very average - but everyone involved with the Lions knew that death was at hand, that the day was coming, and coming soon, the day when the world would cave in on itself and the only thing that would remain would be the stench of death and the buzzards picking the scraps of the corpses of the fallen. It was unavoidable. It was going to happen, but these dudes stood up anyway, and every week they marched onto the field and in the twilight of hope, they stood on the precipice of doom and they lived another day.

Gus Frerotte and Charlie Batch were both adequate at quarterback. Neither was spectacular but they survived, and that was all anybody on the team could do that season. Germane Crowell came out of nowhere to replace Herman Moore and for a brief moment, he stood proud and tall in the sun before he was dragged into the shadows and forgotten once again. The few blue chip talents still on the team, like Robert Porcher and Luther Elliss, helped will the team to remain relevant against all odds, while Stephen Boyd played like an absolute warrior in the middle of the defense. He was overmatched and undertalented, a shadow of the great he replaced, Chris Spielman, but that made him the perfect avatar for this team. He managed to overcome all of that, and in the face of overwhelming darkness, a darkness which would finally descend two years later, an inevitability which could have paralyzed the entire Lions world, which could have - which should have - beaten everyone, he and the Lions survived, and with that survival came a grim sort of pride. And that's something that we can look at today, and although it won't make us smile, it will let us lift our heads high and remember that there is worth in fighting, even when there is no hope.

3. 1989

RECORD: 7-9

PLAYOFFS? NO.

KEY PLAYERS: BARRY SANDERS, BOB GAGLIANO, BARRY SANDERS, RODNEY PEETE, BARRY SANDERS, RICHARD JOHNSON, BARRY SANDERS, CHRIS SPIELMAN, BARRY SANDERS, JERRY BALL, BARRY SANDERS, BENNIE BLADES, BARRY SANDERS, LOMAS BROWN, BARRY SANDERS, KEVIN GLOVER, BARRY SANDERS, ERIK ANDOLSEK, BARRY SANDERS, HOPE, BARRY SANDERS

HEAD COACH: WAYNE FONTES

From the end of an era to the beginning. The Lions only finished 7-9 in the 1989 season, but it was the first season where I really started to understand the bigger picture, where I started to pay attention to how the Lions fit into the overall picture of the NFL. This was also Barry Sanders' first season, and with him came a knew emotion: hope. It was the first time, as a young Lions fan, where I felt that twinge, that "maybe we can do this" feeling. It was the first time that I really invested myself emotionally in the team, a time when I stopped being a fan of the Lions simply because I was born into it and started being a fan of the Lions because my heart made me.

It was a bad season, really. The Lions started an atrocious 2-9, but behind St. Barry, they won their last five games of the season to finish 7-9. I remember thinking that they were on their way, that no one could stop my favorite team and that the next year they would surely kill everyone and become the best team in the league. After all, they were my team, and so they had to win, right? And they had the most exciting player in football, Barry Sanders, St. Barry, the player who was so good that he almost seemed like an alien. He was quiet, humble, so outrageously good that as a rookie he had to pull himself out of the last game of the season so he wouldn't win the rushing title, which would have embarrassed him. Who does that? I mean, really? In a way, Barry's humility only made him seem even more badass. He was the gunfighter who would draw before his opponent could even move his hand. And then Barry would stalk his opponent down, stick the gun in his face and then turn around and walk off while his opponent stood there with piss running down his legs. In a way, Barry's humility was almost arrogant. He was so good that he embarrassed other people by letting up. He beat them, made them think they were going to die and then just walked away, leaving them to live with their own shame. That shit is fucking cold.

It was with that in mind that I thought the next season was ours for the taking. Hope was born in my heart. Of course, the Lions ended up going 6-10 the next season and the young me learned my first lesson in Lions fandom and the nature of hope. But the seeds were planted, and for the next decade, it always seemed like it was possible, it always felt like we were so close to turning the corner. That's what made the 1999 season so grim and yet so noble - that hope had finally died - but in 1989 that hope was born, and it sustained me for a full decade as a Lions fan.

2. 1995

RECORD: 10-6

PLAYOFFS? YES.

KEY PLAYERS: BARRY SANDERS, SCOTT MITCHELL, HERMAN MOORE, BRETT PERRIMAN, CHRIS SPIELMAN, BENNIE BLADES, WILLIAM CLAY, LOMAS BROWN, KEVIN GLOVER

HEAD COACH: WAYNE FONTES

1995 was arguably the height of the Barry Sanders era, a season where the Lions, for the first time, emerged as legitimate Super Bowl contenders, a season where the promise of the past had finally ripened into present possibility.

The season actually started off kind of shitty. The Lions lost their first three games. But then, on Monday night, against the badass 49ers, the Lions won 27-24, hinting at what was to come. The 49ers managed to shut down St. Barry, but for the first time since Barry had been in Detroit, the Lions were able to respond. Scott Mitchell threw the ball all over the field, to a receiving corps led by Herman Moore, who set the NFL's all time single season reception record with 123, and Brett Perriman, who caught 108 passes of his own. It was the first time that the Lions made people pay for ganging up on Barry Sanders.

The Lions continued to stumble after that game though, and after nine games were only 3-6. It seemed like a typically frustrating Lions season under Wayne Fontes. But then the Lions went crazy, winning their final seven games, and winning them in a way that made them suddenly seem like they were destroyers of the world. They just started whipping on everyone. They weren't just winning, they were beating teams. There's a difference. The last two games of the season, the Lions combined for 84 points and gave up only 10. They beat Jacksonville 44-0, a game that was so lopsided that Fontes ordered his team to start taking a knee with several minutes left to go in the game so that the score wouldn't be even worse. It humiliated the Jaguars. They bitched after the game, saying that what Fontes did was even more embarrassing to them than if he had run up the score. I loved it. This was my team, just playing with people.

It was our moment. We were there. We had arrived and now it was time for us to kick down the door and finally ascend to the throne that had been waiting for us from the day that St. Barry arrived. The playoffs started, the Lions played the Eagles, and . . . lost, 58-37. Whoops. Well, shit. It turns out that Scott Mitchell was, well, Scott Mitchell. His implosion in the first round was spectacular, and so utterly Lionsesque, that it has become a part of the team's legend. It is ingrained in our collective psyche, imprinted on our brains forever. Scott Mitchell is what happens to us when we allow ourselves to believe.

Still, after the playoffs were over, and the Cowboys had won the Super Bowl, I remember an analyst on ESPN talking about how the Cowboys had gotten lucky, about how some were questioning whether they really were the best team in the league. After all, in the playoffs, that didn't have to play the 49ers and they didn't have to play the Lions. Wait . . . what? The Detroit Lions? Indeed. It is the only time, in my entire life as a fan, that the Lions were put in that category, the one time that they were treated as anything other than a punch line to a bad joke. I'll never, ever, forget that moment. It didn't happen on the football field, and really, it was just a throwaway line by some dude in a studio in Connecticut, but for the briefest of moments, a moment so brief that it never even translated to the actual field of play, the Lions lived in that world, that strange and beautiful place that has always seemed so unreachable, so unknowable. The Lions were winners in spirit, were winners for a moment so ephemeral that it barely existed, a moment that sparked to life, flickered and then died before even a second had passed. And yet, it existed. There is both a lingering sense of pride and a terrible sort of wrenching pain caused by that moment, and it is in that, that mixture of pride and pain, of hope and sorrow, that the story of the Detroit Lions in my lifetime becomes all too clear.

1. 1991

RECORD: 12-4

PLAYOFFS? YES. THEY EVEN WON A GAME!

KEY PLAYERS: BARRY SANDERS, ERIK KRAMER, RODNEY PEETE, BRETT PERRIMAN, ROBERT CLARK, WILLIE GREEN, MEL GRAY, CHRIS SPIELMAN, BENNIE BLADES, JERRY BALL, RAY CROCKETT, LOMAS BROWN, ERIK ANDOLSEK, KEVIN GLOVER, MIKE UTLEY, MIKE UTLEY'S WHEELCHAIR, MIKE UTLEY'S THUMB

HEAD COACH: WAYNE FONTES

Well, here it is, my favorite season as a Lions fan. 1991. The Lions had finished 6-10 the year before, but this was only Barry's third season, and hope was still young and still fresh. The Lions lost their first game 45-0 to the Redskins, which foreshadowed the disappointing end to the season, but in between, the Lions won and they won often, finishing 12-4 thanks to both the amazing grace of Barry Sanders and the emotion spawned by the crippling of Mike Utley and his famous thumbs up from the stretcher. That grace and that emotion combined into one overwhelming wave, a wave which crested with the Lions winning the NFC Central division and serving notice that they planned to be the new lords of the league, the team of the '90s.

Of course, that all turned out to be wishful thinking, an illusion spawned by that cruel trickster known as Hope, but for a season at least, anything and everything seemed possible. There wasn't rampant cynicism, no feeling that death was imminent, no lingering suspicion that the whole thing was a fraud. Even in that 1995 season, people were well aware that Scott Mitchell was in fact Scott Mitchell and we had already been burned by hope enough times by then to not fully trust it. But in 1991, hope was a new thing, a beautiful and pure and innocent and wonderful thing and we embraced it wholeheartedly.

It all culminated on January 5, 1992, in Pontiac Michigan, at the fabled Silverdome, where the Lions dismantled the young Dallas Cowboys, 38-6, in the NFC playoffs. The Lions had earned a bye thanks to their record, which was the second best in the NFC. They awaited the winner of the Wildcard game in the second round, which turned out to be the Cowboys. It was a match-up of young teams, of two teams with star running backs, Barry and Emmitt Smith, It was the battle for the future of the NFL, a battle which promised to tell us, once it was over, who was for real and who was just a pretender.

It was an awesome game, a game which is the apex of my fandom. I was there. I was at the game, and I remember the unbridled excitement in the crowd, the feeling that we had arrived, that the future was ours, that our fandom in the Detroit Lions had finally paid off. I remember watching Barry disappear completely into a pile, only to reemerge like some sort of magician on the other side. He was stopped, the play was over, and then there he was, running wild and free towards the endzone. He was amazing, and he was ours. Fuck Emmitt Smith. That grinder wasn't special. He wasn't a magician like our Barry. Barry was mystical. Barry was on loan from heaven. He wasn't a football player, he was St. Barry, our patron saint, our savior.

That is how we felt, watching him and the Lions on that day. The question was answered. The Lions were the real deal, the Cowboys were the pretenders. The future was ours. As always, reality ended up laughing at us and then punting us in the balls over and over and over again. A week later, the Lions went into Washington for the NFC Championship game and were annihilated, losing 41-10. At the time, it just seemed like a blip, a stumble on a long and beautiful road to glory. After all, we were young, we were good and our time would still come.

Of course, it never did, but such is the tragedy of the Lions in my lifetime. The story is long and complex, but these five seasons were all important chapters in that story, necessary to understand if anyone has any hope of comprehending the larger story. They are seasons that all affected me deeply as a fan, seasons that are burned into my brain, for good or for bad. I called this my five favorite seasons, but in retrospect, perhaps I should have called this the five most important seasons in my Lions fandom.

This post ended up being long, full of heartache and pain, and in many ways, like I said at the outset, it is infinitely more depressing to do something like this than it is to point out all the bad. The sheer mediocrity of the so called good does a better job of anything else of telling the story, of explaining just why things have been so horrible for us over the years. I mean, the combined record of the five teams above is 37-43. That's fucking horrible. True, the 0-16 season does skew things a bit, but two of my other favorite seasons include an 8-8 campaign and a 7-9 season. That means that there are only two winning seasons in my entire lifetime that stand out to me as memorable. That's depressing as all hell, right?

In any event, I actually enjoyed writing this post. Once it got going anyway. It was meant to be a filler post, something to throw up here in lieu of anything substantive. But, I think, in its own way, it ended up being an important post to write. That may sound absurd, but to hell with all that, being a fan is in itself an absurd thing most of the time. Really, this post explains a lot of what it means to be a Lions fan. I am surprised by this. But as this post has shown, I am often surprised by the Lions, in ways both good and bad. Maybe what we should take away from all of this is that sometimes, when it seems like the future is shining bright, there is a horde of failure demons waiting just over the horizon to ambush us. And sometimes, when the world seems utterly black, light can emerge from the strangest of places.

Oh well. Vaya con dios, mi amigos. The journey is still ongoing, and while it may be strange and terrible, at least we are all in it together.

This Post is Meta as All Hell

Before I do anything, I should apologize for having not posted anything here in the last two weeks. That is the longest I've gone without writing something Lions related in the two years I've been doing this, which is a sad and terrifying statement now that I see it in front of me. The truth is, is that I was feeling a bit burned out. I love writing about the Lions - when there is something to write about. But there is nothing going on right now. I mean it. There is jack and shit to write about right now. I think it seemed more interesting last year because everything was new, Matthew Stafford was a rookie, we were coming off of 0-16 and everyone was desperate to see how things would shake out. This year, it is just the usual pap about players being hungry and quotes about how people are going to be surprised and blah blah blah.

Frankly, I think twitter has started to get to me. The mind numbing repetition of boring ass quotes and anecdotes has caused a sort of resentful fuck this attitude in me. I don't want to write about this shit because I'm sick of hearing about it. That doesn't mean that I don't like writing about the Lions, because God help me, for some fucked up reason I do. It just means that I don't want to get dragged into writing a bunch of stupid empty bullshit because there's nothing else to write about. I could have probably written another "And that's why I'm a fan, folks" posts, but fuck, I can't just whip those out assembly line style or else they just end up fake and processed. The reason I enjoy writing those kind of posts from time to time is because I feel like the things said in them are worth being said, not because I have nothing else to write about. I also have a Tim Toone breakdown to do, but following that weird piece of business with Willie Young, I have no idea how to approach that shit. I mean, I think I need to play this one fairly straight. The Willie Young thing should stand on its own, you know? The only problem with that is I'm just not all that interested in doing a straight breakdown of Tim Toone.

That's the thing. I'm not interested in reporting/breaking the news. That's Sean at Pride of Detroit's thing. I'm not even that interested in doing analytical work. Ty at The Lions in Winter does that better than anyone else writing about the Lions.(Yeah, yeah, I know, get a room.) I'm still not sure exactly what it is that I do, but I don't want to become a slave to convention. I don't want to fall in line and start writing about the Lions the same way everyone else does. I mean, why bother? If I can't bring something original to the table, then I should just stay the fuck out of it all together. The good news, I think, is that I do bring something original and fun and compelling to the table. It might not be all that reputable and people might think of me as the drunken asshole of an uncle of the Lions family or the half-mad cousin who lives in the attic and nobody talks about, but to hell with all that. Basically, I don't want to do this just because I feel like I'm compelled to do it by anything other than my own desire to write and I don't want to write about certain things just because I'm supposed to write about them. I want to write about what interests me, and only when I think I have something worth saying.

Okay, that's a lot of bullshit, but I think the air needs to be cleared from time to time if we are to have a healthy relationship. The good news(or bad news depending on your point of view)is that soon, things will ramp up and I will start writing more and more about the Lions. During the actual season, I plan(probably somewhat ambitiously and insanely but what the hell) to have something up here every day of the week. I almost pulled that off last season, but I would usually fall a day or two short every week. But fuck it, if it's not there, it's not there. I think that, this season, I'll have enough to talk about and enough original and regular features that I can make it work. Hell, I'm hoping and praying that Willie Young makes the team so I can do a weekly serial following his adventures through time.

This has been meta as all hell, but like I said, sometimes these things need to be discussed. Just as an aside, even if I don't put up anything new for a couple of days(or weeks I suppose)here, I'm still around. I post on twitter. You can follow me there. My user name is armchairlb. Sometimes it's about football. Other times it's about weird nonsense, which shouldn't be all that surprising. I have noticed that I tend to go on weird runs that span anywhere from 5-10 tweets(Jesus . . . tweets. I feel like a fucking goon writing that word, but this is what society has come to.) Anyway, follow me and we will conquer that world together.

I also get paid real, legitimate currency to write regularly for heavy.com, so you can check me out there. I have several articles up each week there, about a variety of subjects. Seriously, I have written about everything from Brian Cushing getting nailed for being, well, Brian Cushing to shit about Betty White to stories about British Parliament to stuff about the Continental/United merger. They are all vaguely ridiculous, all pretty funny, and, well, basically everything you would expect an article written by me to be.

Okay, okay, okay. I didn't mean for this to turn into a public attempt at self fellatio and if you are annoyed, I don't blame you. I hate self promotion. I'm not comfortable with it and I'm not good at it. Unfortunately, for a blogger this is not a good thing. I much prefer to just put my shit out there and let it speak for itself. So when I do hype my shit, it often ends up coming out in a vomitous fountain of drivel rather than as anything smooth and/or relevant. I just close my eyes and start bellowing. It's unseemly and I apologize.

On to slightly more relevant shit. As I said before, the season is fast approaching. Keeping with the meta nature of this post, I though I would take this time to ask anyone reading to please feel free to e-mail me if you want to write for this here site. There is no reward, monetary or otherwise as we are a tiny little thing. We are a gang of heathens, a small pirate ship floating along, scaring the hell out of proper folk, raising hell and having a good time as we careen towards oblivion. If you would like to be a part of that, hit me up at neilabfree@gmail.com. I'm pretty much open to anything. I mean, obviously we don't want ten people all writing about the same team, but a duplicate here and there isn't going to hurt anything.

We're pretty laid back here, despite all appearances to the contrary. I mean, I'm not sure if we need another dude ranting and raving about the Lions, but what the hell, you know? I'm not territorial and if you can bring something different to the table that you think people might want to read, then shit, say something. Of course, if you are a fan of a team that is not covered by anyone here then fuck, send me an e-mail ASAP. I don't care if you just want to post the occasional paragraph bitching about or celebrating your team. It doesn't need to be some grandiose expression of your fandom or whatever. It just needs to be words about your favorite team. That's it. Say how you feel. Don't worry about what anyone else is doing and just do your thing.

Well shit. I originally set out to write about the Lions in this post and never quite got there, did I? But there were some things that needed to be said, some air to be cleared and some site business to attend to and I'm glad we got that out of the way. The Tim Toone breakdown, whatever I decide to do with it, should be coming soon, and then I'll probably come up with a couple of different things, some quick top five type posts that I kinda want to do(My 5 favorite Lions seasons, 5 favorite players, etc.), and then the season will be upon us and there will be a flurry of bullshit every day.

If you take away anything from this mess of a post, I suppose it is that I want this upcoming season to be a fucking blast, and part of that is getting more people to holler about shit. So, yeah, if you want to write about your favorite team, e-mail me at neilabfree@gmail.com. Hell, e-mail me if you just want to tell me that I suck. I don't care. This whole thing is about community and about getting each other through our own tortured relationships with our teams. E-mail me, comment on the posts, write your own damn posts. Armchair Linebacker is a pretty laid back place. We're just dudes who like football and like writing about that football from time to time. Join us.

Willie Young

No one knows when Willie Young was born, only that history first records his presence sometime around 1738 in rural Georgia. Already an expert carpenter when he first came into the consciousness of his neighbors, Willie was left alone, both on account of the fact that he worked cheap and because there were whispers that he never aged on account of being the result of a union between the daughter of an African Chieftain and a Cheetah Spirit God whose name, unfortunately, has been lost to history.

During the Revolutionary War, Willie at first refused to fight, claiming that no Englishman ever called him a [racial epithet]. When he was reminded that technically, every one of his neighbors was an Englishman, he figured to hell with it, and took to butchering anyone he caught wearing a red coat. This earned him the nickname William the Bloody, a name which followed him throughout the war.

William the Bloody disappeared from local annals towards the end of the 18th century and it was assumed that he had either finally passed away or that he had simply moved on to find more redcoats to slaughter. It would seem that, oddly enough, the idea of killing redcoats had become personal to Willie. This could never be explained, but there were rumors that despite his initial reluctance to fight the British, it was in fact a Sir Lawrence Henry, an Englishman, who butchered Willie's father, the aforementioned Cheetah God after he had taken shape as a cheetah, while on a hunting expedition. According to legend, Sir Lawrence was seen wearing a red coat when he shot and killed Willie's father, the Cheetah God, and later took his mother as his personal concubine back to London. However, that is all rumor and it conflicts with the initial accounts that Willie killed redcoats because of their inherent racism so perhaps it is not true. This should not be attributed to lazy writing or to the writer simply making shit up as he goes along, but rather to the vagaries of history, in which reality and legend are often intertwined, creating a hazy world in which truth and fantasy are often indistinguishable from one another.

Willie next popped up in Florida in the early 19th century, and it is here that he first acquired the surname Young, which seems to have been a joke perpetrated by those who were acquainted with his growing legend. He joined up with Andrew Jackson and spent years hunting and scalping Indians in the Everglades and throughout the Southeast, and at night he would regale his awed compatriots with tales from his previous exploits during the War of Independence.

Willie earned a great deal of respect despite the racial climate of the day, both on account of his commanding personal presence - he was and is a very large man - and because, according to a diary account from a Chester Smalls, a young volunteer from South Carolina:

"No one took a Red Man scalp like Big Willie. He seems to take an inordinate amount of pleasure in the destruction of the Red Man. At times it seems frightening and even our superiors seem taken aback by his frenzied blood lust. Nevertheless, he is an effective ally in these horrible wars, and a true friend. He once saved me from the arrows of the savage when he buried his hatchet in the Indian's face. I couldn't find the words to thank him, but I later brought him a cup of fine ale, which he downed in one gulp. I found the courage to ask him why he took such delight in the subjugation of the Red Man, and he answered me thusly: 'Chester, never trust the color red. It is the color of true evil, the color of that scandalous motherfucker who killed my father.' He then went into a sort of trance, in which he spoke in strange tongues. I left him alone for the rest of the night and when day broke, I was told that he had moved on as an advance scout. I never saw Willie again, but I would occasionally hear stories of his exploits and while they made my blood shiver, it did my heart well to know that he was on my side."

It would seem that at some point during these brutal Indian wars, Willie Young saved the life of Andrew Jackson. Jackson was so grateful that he granted Young vast lands in the bayous of Louisiana. It is here that the Willie Young legend took on new life.

For several years, Willie lived a prosperous albeit mysterious existence in the Bayou. He had amassed a personal army consisting mostly of runaway slaves and illiterate Creoles, whom he guided on raids of the many plantations throughout the South. For years, farmers and businessmen searched for his base of operations, but almost all of them were stymied by the oppressive Louisiana Bayou. Seeking help from the government, they were told that when he became President, one of Andrew Jackson's first acts was ensuring that the federal government would never interfere with the actions of one Willie Young.

Enraged and confused - especially since by now, Willie and his army had begun hijacking shipments down the Mississippi, earning him the nickname The Dread Pirate Willie - the Southern farmers and businessmen created a league designed to stop him. Incidentally, the seeds of the Confederacy can be found in this league, and while that it is a fascinating story in its own right, it is not particularly relevant in this case and therefore no more will be said of the subject.

This league was headed by one Lamar T. Beauregard, a particularly colorful New Orleans businessman who, despite the warnings and protestations of the other members of the league, decided to lead a foray into the Bayou. Accompanied by a team of French mercenaries and armed with the latest in weaponry, Beauregard was never heard from nor seen again. The only record of his expedition came from the recovered journal of one of the French mercenaries, a certain Jacques de Martin. Loosely translated from the original French:

"They are coming. At night, we can hear strange noises, laughter in the trees, howling and ghostly echoes which seem to rise up from the earth itself. Half of our squad has already gone missing - a man here, two men there, seemingly swallowed up by the swamps, disappearing into this unearthly hell. The men are scared, but Mr. Beauregard tells us that we are superstitious fools, that what we are hunting is a mere man of flesh and bone. But the others tell of a legend of a man who does not die, who cannot die, and although I pride myself on being a man of reason, I fear that this horrible place and the witch king who rules it have made me question the validity of reason. What point is there in logic when the very fabric of existence seems to be mocked by this . . . this Willie Young? I can hear them in the trees now. It is awful. They are coming."

Little is known of Young's life over the next century. There were scattered reports during the Civil War of a giant man stalking the back ranks of the Confederate armies, slaughtering men by the hundreds while a fine mist descended, obscuring both him and his personal army of escaped slaves and illiterate Creoles. There can be no doubt that these accounts refer to Young, although they never state him by name. Interestingly, it would seem that Young had an informal meeting with General Sherman during his march across the South. One Union soldier claimed that no one heard what the two men discussed, but that when General Sherman returned to his men, his face was ashen and all he did was whisper that they had permission. One man reportedly asked "From who?" And all Sherman could do was shake his head and mutter "From the devil himself."

It would seem that Young lived as a veritable King, the Bayou of Louisiana his own personal realm, inviolate, until he was finally betrayed in 1930 by a subordinate named Louis Terrell, who was reportedly bribed by agents claiming to work for Huey Long, the man nicknamed Kingfish, who ruled the state of his Louisiana as his own personal fiefdom from his post as Governor. Naturally, the presence of two such gigantic personalities made conflict inevitable. Thanks to the betrayal of Mr. Terrell - whose body was later found hung from a cross made from alligator bones, probably in retribution for his betrayal - a team of mercenaries, armed with flamethrowers and accompanied by ninjas with shotguns, took Willie Young unaware, while he was in the midst of sexual congress with no less than 14 servants. The servants were taken and later sold to a New Orleans whorehouse, while Young's men were butchered in front of him.

In tears, he pleaded for the life of his number two man, James "The Reaper" Arlington, but he was laughed at by The Kingfish's men, who slaughtered Arlington in front of Young and then horsewhipped Young and bound him in chains. They took him to Baton Rouge, but before they could deliver their prize to The Kingfish, Young miraculously escaped, even though it was said that not even Houdini himself could have escaped the many chains wrapping Young.

It was then that Young seemed to disappear from the public record once again. It wasn't until 1944 when Young turned up in a village in France that he was heard from again. There, he saved a young French girl from the advances of a debauched Nazi Colonel. Grateful, the family and its village named Young as their Mayor and Lord Protector, and it was he who greeted American soldiers as they fought their way to Berlin. They relayed his story, and with great interest and fanfare, Young was brought to Washington where he dined with President Harry Truman following the war. It is reported that the two stayed up for long hours over many months, discussing both Andrew Jackson and foreign policy. It would seem that Young was instrumental in the formation of NATO and also advised the President that immediate warfare with the Soviet Union would be a mistake.

Unfortunately for Young, powerful men often breed powerful enemies and it wasn't long before he fell under the microscope of Senator Joseph McCarthy. Rather than being dragged through the mud as a Communist sympathizer and valuing his privacy, Willie disappeared once again. It is rumored that he found his way to San Francisco where he was a key figure in the rise of the hippie culture but that cannot be confirmed as anything more than conjecture. Others state that he went to Vietnam, where he fought against the Vietcong because they had adopted the communist color of red, which awoke ancient grudges in Willie. However, that is also unconfirmed.

What is known is that Young reappeared in the Public Eye when the movie Highlander was released in 1984. A controversy soon erupted when Young claimed that the movie was written by a man who had gotten him drunk in a bar in New Orleans - where he had reportedly settled down with the descendants of his former personal army - and stolen his life history. The ensuing movie was a worldwide hit, spawning several sequels and multiple television series. While wildly inaccurate, most experts agree that the central character of Conner Macleod is based on Young. A legal battle ensued, and after several years of legal wrangling it was decided that enough of the details had changed so that Young was entitled to little if any compensation. In fact, the only thing that Young received was a replica of a Katana sword - which he still has - with a note attached to it from the writer of the movie, which stated "I did it for my ancestor, the honorable Lamar T. Beauregard. Shove this sword up your ass, old man."

Enraged, Young felt powerless in this new and modern world, and although he received ample compensation when his story was again remade, this time as the hit film Forrest Gump, it was still wildly inaccurate and, Young felt, incredibly offensive. A controversy erupted when Young was caught attempting to break into the home of Tom Hanks, where he planned on "butchering that motherfucker like he was a Goddamn Red Man." It was unclear what that meant, but police speculated that he planned on beating Hanks with the Oscar he won for his performance as the titular Gump.

The only weapon Young had on him at the time he was apprehended was a can of red spray paint and so his sentence was kept light. After spending six months in county lockup, Young emerged claiming to be a new man, and he set about getting himself the formal education that he always wanted but never had. After many years spent in the public school system, Young found that he a natural talent for the game of football. Earning attention from several schools, Young chose North Carolina State University, mostly because one of their chief colors is red, and Young felt that it would be an empowering form of rebirth to don the colors of the man who killed his father. When he was asked if it overwhelmed him to finally come to terms with the color red, Young could only respond by saying "Huh? What the fuck you talking about? That sounds like some queer bullshit to me."

Indeed.

Several years later, after proving himself time and time again on the football field, Young was drafted in the seventh round of the 2010 NFL Draft by the Detroit Lions. On being told that he was going to the Lions, Young reportedly wept and said it was worse than the day that motherfucker Kingfish killed his boy, Reaper Arlington.

HOW HE FITS WITH THE LIONS

Well, Young has decent size and athleticism and his years spent hunting Indians and redcoats show that he has a natural predatory mean streak. However, the Lions are pretty stocked along the defensive line for a change, and so Young is really going to have to show something to the coaches if he wants to earn a roster spot.

However, there has been speculation that Young seems to look like a young Julian Peterson - although, we all know now that he's technically a very, very old Julian Peterson, but we'll let that slide - leading some to believe that he could be used as a big outside linebacker. This is interesting, as the Lions certainly need help there more than at defensive end, but such an adjustment would be a large one, even if Young has shown an obvious versatility during his long and colorful life. He likely lacks the coverage skills to play linebacker in the NFL and his future would seem to lie strictly at defensive end. Whether the Lions have room for him there - I don't think they do - remains to be seen.

Even if they do have room, Young is slightly smaller than what the Lions coaches seem to be looking for in a defensive end. But, I suppose he is a natural to keep around in case the Lions have to play the Redskins or the Chiefs. He claims to be a reformed man, but let's see what happens when he sees the face of an Indian looking back at him once again or an arrowhead mocking him from a helmet.

WHAT IT MEANS FOR THIS SEASON

Because of the Lions depth at defensive end, it's highly likely that Young is either cut or sent to the practice squad this season. I doubt that he'd make the team over, say, Jason Hunter, but who knows? The man is certainly an experienced warrior and in these strange and terrible times that can't be discounted.

WHAT IT MEANS FOR THE FUTURE

There is a chance that the Lions could develop Young into a useful part, but let's face it, this is but a blip in Young's life. Who knows what the future holds for him? There are some who say he is destined to be the man who delivers mankind from the evils of a coming apocalypse. I don't know about that, but it's possible that in the year 2685, people will be writing rapturous odes to him and his mighty deeds. I wish I could tell you what the future holds for Willie Young, but alas, you are all mere mortals and men like Willie Young and myself both pity you and piss on your mortal dreams.

I suppose all you can do is hope that, while your fleeting time on this planet is still in its prime, Young succeeds as a member of your favorite football team. The man may be tomorrow's savior, but today he is just a man trying to sack the shit out of the quarterback. So it is. And what shall be is unknown to all but the wise and those motherfuckers like to keep shit close to the vest. As Willie Young once told Andrew Jackson: "It's a tough world, hoss, and sometimes even the best of men don't make it. But that doesn't mean the story's over. It just means that this chapter is closed. Tomorrow is another chapter, so go to sleep, Andy, we'll kill some more Red Men in the morning."

Indeed.

Goodbye, Daunte Culpepper

I was going to write about Willie Young, the Lions first 7th round pick, today, but then I realized that I would rather have my scrotum super-glued to the back of a bullet train right before it leaves the station than write about Willie Young. No offense to Willie, and I'll get to him later, but I'm just not feeling it right now. After all, I wrote over 12,000 words on that fucking show LOST over the weekend in exchange for dollar bills tossed at my feet and stuffed in my g-string and I was left feeling both feral and drained, a wild dog forced to crawl into a ditch to rest up before he runs again. I hope you all understand.

I then considered writing another round of gibberish about fandom and the Lions community of fans on the web and I might do that later on, but I'm not so sure I want to do that so soon after writing a similar piece last week. Obviously, as you can see, there isn't a whole hell of a lot going on.

It is to the point where Sean over at Pride of Detroit is breaking down undrafted free agents, most of whom will take one step off the bus at training camp before being executed by the Turk. If something doesn't happen soon, I fear that poor Sean will start providing scouting reports for the hot dog vendors at Ford Field.

But something did happen today, and while it doesn't directly impact the Lions, it does close the door on an awful, rancid chapter in our ridiculous and sordid history. Daunte Culpepper just signed with the Sacramento Mountain Lions, where he will reunite with his old head coach, Dennis Green. By the way, whenever I type Daunte Culpepper I have to fight the initial urge to write JaMarcus Russell. Take that however you want. Also, when I typed "the initial urge to write JaMarcus Russell", I initially typed "the initial urge to fight JaMarcus Russell." I feel, taken as a whole, that those two anecdotes are telling.

You see, that is what Daunte Culpepper is synonymous with to Lions fans - failure. And not just ordinary failure, but failure on a JaMarcus Russell level, which as my boy Harpo can tell you is somewhere between the ninth circle of hell and the devil's anus. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that thinking of Daunte Culpepper makes me write things like the word fight instead of the word write. The pen may be mightier than the sword, but when I think of Daunte Culpepper, I just want to take that pen and jam it somewhere unpleasant.

Obviously, this is not a love note to Culpepper. Not that you could have expected anything else. My feelings about Culpepper are well documented here and I won't go through the vast litany of offenses he committed while wearing a Lions uniform, and hell, even before he put on the uniform. I mean, the most distinguished things he ever did were lead my team to a Fantasy Football championship a million years ago and attempt to purify a bunch of whores in the waters of Lake Minnetonka. I'll just say that he was an utter failure, an unmitigated disaster and trust that you can just accept this without having to resort to troubling things like statistics.

You see, statistics are useful tools, necessary tools, and they do indeed bury Daunte. But they don't show the other shit, the 300 pound Daunte waddling onto the field because he couldn't be bothered to take care of himself during his brief time away from football even though he claimed that he was obsessed with getting back to the NFL to prove he was a starter. And they don't show Culpepper throwing a fucking hissy fit on the sideline on national television, arguing with Martin Mayhew because he wasn't going to start the game even though daddy promised.

Daunte Culpepper is representative of everything that we hate as Lions fans, of everything that makes it tough to be a Lions fan. He's exactly what we think of, what everyone thinks of and makes fun of, when they think of the Detroit Lions. He is a walking, talking, living, breathing Jay Leno joke. He is not a loveable loser. He's just a loser.

That may be harsh, but so what? Daunte Culpepper is a millionaire who has provided me with nothing but misery throughout his career. I don't weep for him. It's not like he's out on the street rummaging through dumpsters so that he and his family can get by. Then again, it's possible that he can be found rummaging through the dumpster outside of the local McDonalds. That wouldn't surprise me and if you say that it would surprise you, then you my friend are a liar.

Daunte Culpepper is everything that has been wrong with the Detroit Lions for a decade now - hell, for longer than that, really. He's a washed up piece of scrap(note the "s" on that word. I called him a piece of scrap, not a piece of crap. I am a gentleman, after all.) that was picked off of the heap and signed because once upon a time he used to be pretty good - or at least he had shiny stats and was kinda famous. For a long time, that was all it took to be signed by the Detroit Lions. The shit merchants who ran this franchise were always behind the curve, always looking for what was hot yesterday rather than searching for what will be hot tomorrow. Teams don't win that way. Teams win by identifying talent that will blossom under their watch, not by desperately trying to preserve whatever is left of a fading and dying rose.

Daunte Culpepper wouldn't shut the fuck up about how he was still a capable starting quarterback. Well, congratulations Daunte Culpepper, you got your wish. Have fun in Sacramento. Maybe you can throw for 4500 yards and your team can finish 8-8 and then in five years you can take over as the starting QB for the local Pop Warner team. Because, damn it all, you're Daunte Culpepper and you once had stats, man.

This has all been mean and vitriolic, but sometimes these are the things that need to be said. Does any of it matter now that Daunte is officially out the door? No, not really. But holding anger inside is bad. It will just end up misplaced and you don't want me inexplicably bitching out Cliff Avril or something in November just because I never took the opportunity to get this shit off my chest, do you?

The way of the gentleman is a tough one and it isn't always noble. Occasionally, you will stumble and be found lying in an alley way, drunk, vomit on the front of your shirt. It happens. Especially to those gentlemen who are also Lions fans. We fall off the wagon sometimes and we brutalize and eat the dead and while it may not be pretty, it is just the way it must be in these strange and terrible times. I should apologize, but I am too wild with malice and insane with bloodlust and I cannot be counted upon for reason. Tomorrow is a new day, but today, let us gnaw on the bones of the wicked, for this is the only way to appreciate true justice.

Jeff Backus, The Detroit Lions And You

In my breakdown of Jason Fox, I got a little carried away with rambling on about Jeff Backus and the broken marriage that is his relationship with Lions fans. I couldn't help myself. The man makes everyone crazy in one way or another and it got me thinking that Backus really is the perfect example of a Detroit Lion. Jeff Backus is the Detroit Lions. Or rather, he's a good litmus test when it comes to figuring out what kind of fan you are.

You see, there are three types of Lions fans. There are the Fuck It, These Dudes Suck And They Will Always Suck Until The End Of Time type of fans. Let's call them Group A. There are the Look, I Know These Dudes Have Sucked But For No Rational Reason I Think This Year Will Be Different type of fans. Let's call them Group B. And then there are the They Suck But I Hope They Won't Suck And I'm Cautiously Optimistic But Let's Try To Stay Rational type of fans. Let's call them Group C.

When it comes to Backus, Group A decided he sucked a long time ago and no matter what happens, they'll always think he sucks. He could pick up Julius Peppers and powerbomb him all over the field for an entire game and they would just shake their heads in disgust because he got flagged for a false start on one play.

Group B on the other hand so badly wants to see Backus do well that they will excuse a game filled with a million false start and holding penalties and point to the one time where he kinda sorta managed to push a backup defensive end around as proof that he deserves all the accolades shot his way by coaches and scouts.

Group C looks at Backus and sees a flawed player, incapable of saving the day all by himself but also a player who can be satisfactory if he just gets some damn help. They want to believe that Backus, despite all his flaws can survive if he has some backup. However, they are also willing to admit that he isn't as good as the coaches try to pump him up as or as solid as Group B likes to pretend that he is.

If you look at your perception of Backus as a player, what you see can tell you a lot about what kind of a fan you are. He is a perfect avatar for the Lions as a whole. Group A is never happy and is forever spouting the same bullshit about Matt Millen and the Ford Family years after it has ceased to be relevant. Group B is always convinced that if one or two magical things happen, the Lions will soar to the Super Bowl and will contort themselves in absurd and obscene ways to get you to see this, torturing logic to the point that Idi Amin would have to look away in horror and disgust. Meanwhile, Group C recognizes the horrors of the past but don't allow it to define them completely as fans. It's always there, but it's not something that needs to be wallowed in all the time. They try to look at the situation as rationally as they can and admit when someone sucks while also pointing out ways that the team has slowly gotten better.

I like to think of myself as someone who belongs to Group C. Then again, I think we all probably like to think of ourselves that way. The truth, of course, is that I have found myself living with the members of all three groups. There have been times - far too many times - where I have scoffed at the optimists and screamed for all the world to hear that my team is made up of inveterate shitheads with no hope for the future. But I have also found myself amongst the members of Group B, screaming All Is Well like Kevin Bacon at the end of Animal House while the parade through the center of town goes all to hell. I am not particularly proud of either of those things, but what the hell, that is the simple truth and I would be completely full of shit if I tried to pretend that I was a coldly rational machine passing dispassionate judgment on everything Honolulu Blue.

And that's the heart of Lions fandom, I think. We all want to be members of Group C, that group that can look at a situation for what it is and react accordingly. No one wants to be a crazy asshole. It can be fun to be a member of Group B for a while, and revel in illogical hope based on the high you might get from, say, Matthew Stafford staggering back onto the field to throw the game winning touchdown against the Browns. That shit will make you high. It will make you forget logic and reality and make you blather like a goddamn buffoon. It's cool to be there every once in a while. In fact, I don't really trust you if you can't allow yourself to go there every once in a while. But you don't want to live there, or else you end up becoming the village idiot and no one wants that.

It's also fine to wallow occasionally amongst the members of Group A. Look, it's fucking hard to be a Lions fan sometimes. It can beat the shit out of you. And sometimes you need to just tell everyone and everything to go fuck themselves and rant and rave about shit that doesn't even entirely make sense. Is it productive? Hell no. But it's also entirely necessary if you want to maintain any semblance of sanity. This is what happens when you watch Daunte Culpepper flop around the field like a beached whale in Lambeau Field while the other team practices high jumping into the stands with alarming regularity. You can't help but feel that the situation is hopeless and that it will never get better. It's okay to feel that way. It is. But if you live there permanently, you just become a crotchety old asshole whose view of the world is permanently distorted and thus, worthless.

The thing about being a Lions fan is that we swing between these different groups like fucking maniacs. One day we're safe in the cozy womb of Group B, enjoying a Candy Land filled with Sunshine and Blowjobs, and the next day we're lying at the bottom of a chasm of hatred and despair, whipping one another and ourselves with chains and whips made of failure and broken dreams, all while a horde of cackling Failure Demons run amok. And then the next day, we step back and assess the situation like we're fucking Spock. It's bipolar as hell and we should probably be collectively institutionalized.

I'm not sure how we smooth that ride out. But I'm not so sure that I want it to either. There is something powerful and unique about it, something that is ours, that we can share and all understand. People on the outside say that it is the losing, the horrible, never ending losing, that defines us. But it's not. What defines us is the fact that we keep getting up even after we get knocked down. We let ourselves feel it all. There's a stupid sort of bravery in that, an absurd nobility. It's utterly foolish and the members of Group A and outsiders will scoff at us and tell us to quit fucking around and just embrace death already, but fuck that and fuck them. I love hoping despite all reason. I love crashing and burning with my team. Because they are my team and that's what having a team means. It's awful and it feels like shit, but at least it's real, at least it's honest, and that's what lies at the heart of all true fandom. It's brutal, it's mean, but it's real and it's honest and sometimes it's wonderful and sometimes you feel like you just got shot in the balls. It is what it is and there is a purity in that that is almost impossible to find anywhere else in this fucked up world.

I look at Jeff Backus and I see a dude who has pissed me off way too many times to deserve the benefit of the doubt. And yet, here I am, ready to give it to him like a moron. And you know why? Because I have to. Because I have to believe that the coaches - my coaches - are right. I have to believe that if he finally gets some help next to him at left guard, that he can be the player who was drafted in the first round a decade ago. That's part of the fun of it, part of being a fan, putting yourself out there every once in a while even though you know you could tumble horribly to your death.

But it's not like I'm just waltzing out onto the ledge, drunk and stupid. I have my reasons for thinking it will be okay. With a functioning left guard lining up next to him for the first time, I actually believe that there is a chance that Backus can be okay. Not great, but okay. I know that doesn't sound like much but it's a leap of faith for Lions fans, and it's one that defines us. Some of us will make it and if we tumble for a million miles because of it, then okay. That's our fault. We made the decision and now we have to own the consequences. Some of us won't even bother to amble out onto the ledge. They'll just sit back and mock those of us who are out there. If we fall, they'll just laugh and say I Told You So and they can pat themselves on their smug little backs. But if we don't fall, if we somehow stand there and reap the rewards of faith, they'll just have to stand there hating themselves for not having the guts to actually come with us. Sure, a lot of them will celebrate right alongside of us and pretend that they were there all along, but deep inside they'll know that they don't deserve it, that they never earned it. Those will be our bandwagon fans.

So, you see, in a way, Jeff Backus is indeed the Detroit Lions. How we see him is the same as how we see our team, is the same as how we see everything as fans. It's too simplistic to break it down into a simple war between optimists and cynics because we're all optimists and cynics. We all feel the pain, and we all feel the hope. What it all comes down to is allowing yourself to feel the hope while also respecting that pain. That's Group C. That's the ultimate goal. Or at least it should be. You can't let yourself get carried away in either direction. It will happen. On some days you'll find yourself babbling about hope and on other days you'll find yourself screaming about failure. This is unavoidable. The trick is to learn how to recalibrate when you find yourself doing those things.

I don't know how to get you there. I'm just some asshole who tries to make sense of all this. I'm just a dude who's a fan of the Detroit Lions, absurd as that may be at times. Don't follow me. Just let yourself be a fan and you'll be fine. Don't let The Fear own you but don't let yourself get tricked by The Hope either. They are mortal enemies and you are just some poor idiot trapped in between. Don't let them own you. After all, you are a Lions fan, which means you are a son or daughter of Detroit, at least on some level, and the sons and daughters of Detroit don't give a fuck about The Fear and they know better than to trust that trickster known as Hope.

I have babbled too long already, and this has devolved into nonsensical gibberish, but that is what I do. Being a Lions fan does this to a man, but that's okay, because it's part of the package and I wouldn't want it any other way.

Jason Fox

I am not feeling creative at all, so if this thing sucks, well . . . now you understand. Perhaps I am just shook up by the stunning news that Brian Cushing may have tested positive for a PED because he had just blown his load. Of course, this has already led to a stunning amount of jokes about Cushing being busted for jacking-off, but my favorite little note was from someone on Twitter who said that the only way the Ejaculation theory holds up was if Cushing pulled out literally seconds before pissing in the cup. I don't even really have a joke here. Just read that again. Right now, there is a serious controversy going on in the NFL in which it is speculated that a player either jacked off or boned someone mere moments before his drug test. This is such a ridiculous league sometimes.

Anyway, I think the news overwhelmed me, if only because my brain started searching for the best punch line to this whole thing because that's just kinda how my brain works. Now, writing about Jason Fox seems kind of prosaic and it's hard to write when you don't feel that interested about what you're writing about. Once again, this is probably just something that I should deal with on my own. I mean, not many writers or bloggers or whatever the fuck people are calling themselves these days will explain to you why their post or column or whatever sucks copious amounts of dick. They'll just write it and hope no one hates it too much. But that is some selfish bullshit, right there. We are in this together, you and me. I am the writer and you are the reader and I owe it to you to explain why things aren't going so well. I am secure enough that I am comfortable admitting when my shit stinks. Perhaps I should just wait until the mood strikes but I made the idiot mistake of promising my followers on Twitter a post today and I am nothing if not an honest gentleman. If I went back on my word now, then what would we have? Anarchy. That's what. There would be people killing each other in the streets and whipping dogs with chains made of hatred and broken dreams and I cannot be responsible for that. Sure, you might say that is all ridiculous and no one would give a shit whether I posted or not but I am a ridiculous man sometimes.

Okay, I'm not entirely sure what the hell I am even talking about anymore, so let's just get on with this thing before I end up writing 5,000 words about Jason Fox.(Well, 500 words about Jason Fox and 4,500 of utter gibberish. By the way, yeah these things have been kinda long, which is making me worried that my season preview posts will be mini-epics that will turn into Crime and Punishment, only with slightly less murder and more insanity. But what the hell, we are warriors in our hearts and champions of virtue and we can handle such things. I believe in you. I believe in us.)

Anyway, yeah, Jason Fox. If you ask most Lions fans what needs to be fixed in order for the team to be relevant again, you will get a bunch of foaming at the mouth dissertations about the offensive line. Seriously, if you want to see utter hatred, dark and without reason or pity, ask a Lions fan about Jeff Backus. You will think that the dude ate their children or got caught fucking their dog. It's unseemly.

So, naturally, Lions fans were eager to draft a young, stud offensive lineman in this draft if only because they are eager to draft a young, stud offensive lineman in every draft. It doesn't even matter who at this point, if he's not Backus then he's okay. Lions fans have gone utterly retarded when it comes to this point. They are completely incapable of reason and honestly, they should not be listened to anymore. Their endless braying has made their hideous noise forfeit. Seriously, you sound like a bunch of dumb assholes now, so stop it.

No, the offensive line is not perfect, nor is it very good. In fact, it still kinda sucks, but Jeff Backus is not really the problem. The problem is the twin holes known as guards that lineup next to the tackles. I have gone into this before and so I won't go too far deeply into it again, except to say that Backus would magically seem like a different, better player if he had anyone remotely competent lining up next to him at left guard. Thankfully, he seems to have that with Rob Sims coming into town. But that won't stop Lions fans. Backus could cause the entire defense to explode using only his mind like Dr. Manhattan and Lions fans would still say he needs to be replaced. The damage has already been done. It is a sadly unsalvageable relationship.

The good news for Backus is that his coaches are in his corner. The bad news for Backus is that this means that the coaches ignore the caterwauling of the fans year after year, which only makes them even angrier at Backus when the team passes up a Russell Okung or a Michael Oher. It has passed the point of reasoned desire for change into utter madness. No one really gives a shit if the dude who replaces Backus is actually any good or not. They just want to see Backus hauled down and beaten like that statue of Saddam Hussein in Baghdad a few years ago. They want to see him dragged through the streets and tossed in the Detroit River and floated off to Canada. This is not a movement that embraces hope or that is looking to the future. Instead, it is a movement motivated purely by hatred and vile revenge. It is mean, it is stupid and it is pointless.

Look, I have also at times said foul words about Backus. I do not deny this. And it's not like he's a great player. He isn't. But he's a serviceable player, and while that may not be inspiring, it's certainly not deserving of the incredible vitriol which dominates any discussion about him. This is a matter of perspective. I don't really care all that much if you think that the Lions could do better than Backus. There are a lot of days where I'd actually agree with you. It's just that the argument against Backus has passed over into the realm of the absurd and so I'm forced to sit here and defend the dude like he's Lomas Brown. It makes fools and assholes of us all and it has to stop. Let us all try to be reasonable about Backus from now on. Let us recognize his limitations while also acknowledging the things that he's actually good at.

See how this shit gets out of hand? This post isn't even about Jeff Backus. Well, not directly anyway, and yet it is threatening to turn into a post wherein I break down all of Backus' strengths and weaknesses. If I had an editor here, he would be screaming at me right now, telling me to get to the point, but fuck that, he wouldn't understand what it's like to be a Lions fan, the insane madness that it causes and the crazy paths we are pulled down because of it. This is what anger and hatred and The Fear do to us. They make us rant and rave about shit that isn't even material to the point. They make us weak and foolish, gibbering and lost in a wilderness of stupid noise and tangled malice. It isn't even about football anymore. It becomes a dumb war that we fight within ourselves, screaming and fighting with each other, slandering one another just because we have so much anger and disappointment and stupid sports rage. It becomes a pissing contest, a way of forcing one another to acknowledge that we are fans of a horrible team. This post somehow got caught up in the middle of all that and while it has made this a wildly unfocused screed that I should probably delete, I won't, because it is honest and it is important to acknowledge. It may be clunky and it may mar the rest of the post, it is still all too real, and it is something that must be understood if we are to understand our own pain, our own sports anger, and we must come to terms with that if we are going to move on.

Okay. I sorta turned into an insane Jedi there, didn't I? I was like Yoda if Yoda had finally just cracked and started shit talking everyone and then shit on the floor or something. I apologize, and let's just move on.

Okay, Jason Fox. All of the above gibberish is important to understand if you want to understand why it is that Jason Fox doesn't just seem like an ordinary fourth rounder to a lot of Lions fans. He is a fresh start, a new hope, someone who can one day take over for Backus and heal these violent riffs that lead to such epic craziness as the weird bullshit above. It's a lot to ask from a fourth round pick. Too much. And it has already skewed his career before it has started. That is the poison of The Fear, of venom run amok. Hating Jeff Backus like many fans do has made it so that even the people who could potentially replace him are tainted by it. They suddenly are drawn into a whole stupid maelstrom of desperation and weird anger. Jason Fox is no longer Jason Fox. He's Jason Fox who could one day supplant Jeff Backus. That's his identity in the mind of a lot of Lions fans and it's unfair.

But just who is Jason Fox? Who is he independent of Jeff Backus, independent of the whole stupid drama his name has already been pulled into? Well, I'll tell you.

Jason Fox was a four year starter at Miami. That, by itself, says a lot. Sure, Miami hasn't quite been Miami for a few years, but they still haul in an incredible amount of talent year after year and for Fox to step in and be the man for four straight years is impressive. You don't get to start for four years at Miami without having some obvious gifts.

What are those gifts? Well, Fox is a very good athlete, a former tight end turned tackle. He has the ability get out on the corner and take on pass rushers, and he also has the ability to get up the field in a hurry, getting out to the second level to make blocks to spring a running back. He has good footwork and should be able to handle edge rushers better than your average stiff.

All that sounds pretty good, so why did Fox fall into the fourth round? Well, he had some injury issues, particularly a nagging knee injury that he finally had fixed a few months ago and even scarier, an irregular heartbeat.

Thankfully, doctors told him the irregular heartbeat was likely a one time thing and the knee has healed up enough so that he's considered ready to go, so I'm not sure if we should really be worried about those. All things considered, it feels like we kind of got a steal here.

Of course, none of this means that Fox is a perfect player. He doesn't seem to be the sort of player who's going to beat anyone up. He might not have that bit of nasty to him that all great linemen have. He'll want to use his athleticism to redirect defenders rather than bashing them backwards. That's fine, but the problem is that in the NFL almost everyone is a great athlete, which means that the edge will go to the person who's willing to kick the other guy's ass. I'm not so sure that Fox is willing to do that.

Fox seems like the sort of player who has all the tools to succeed but he might not have the attitude. He might be too delicate, too unwilling to latch onto a guy and just beat him up for four quarters. I am this close to making a clichéd It Ain't Ballet comment here so I'll just stop. You get the point.

All in all, I love Fox as a fourth round pick. He's a talented player with a ton of experience at a big time program who fell simply because of bad timing with an injury. He's someone who you can either choose to develop as your left tackle of the future or he's someone who can probably step in and play right away without getting completely overwhelmed. His technical and athletic ability will allow him to survive and perhaps even eventually thrive, but I fear that he'll never be as good as he could be unless he develops a meanness to him that, from just about every scouting report I've seen, he just doesn't seem to have. I like Fox. I do. But to be honest with you, I think there is a good chance that he washes out of the league. On the bright side, though, I think there is just as good a chance that he becomes a starter down the road. But this is what you get with a fourth round pick.

HOW HE FITS WITH THE LIONS/WHAT IT MEANS FOR THIS SEASON

The team has already said that it plans on using Fox as their third offensive tackle, meaning that he will slide between the left and right side depending on where the team needs help. It's possible that he could steal the right tackle job away from Gosder Cherilus if Cherilus doesn't step up his game or if his recently revealed knee injury isn't healed up.

Backus is the starting left tackle. Let's just get that out of the way right now. And I think that the team likes Backus enough that he'll be the left tackle for a few more years. They aren't looking to replace him so we might as well make our peace with that.

WHAT IT MEANS FOR THE FUTURE

Well, it means that Fox is likely primed to be Backus' successor when Backus finally does get the boot. Of course, that's all contingent upon Fox actually making it as a viable NFL offensive tackle.

In the meantime, I wouldn't be surprised to see Fox push Cherilus. I have a feeling the team would like to replace Cherilus and if they can get away with sticking Fox there for a few years, then I think they'd like to do that. That way, when Backus finally does leave, they can either slide Fox over to left tackle or keep him on the right side and take another stab at an elite prospect on the left side. Either way, if Fox works out, the Lions are well positioned for when Backus does finally leave town.

Of course, there is always the possibility that Fox doesn't make it, in which case the team needs Cherilus to make it and then they need to start searching for Backus' eventual replacement all over again.

This post was weird. I will admit that, but I warned you up front. I didn't expect it to turn out quite like this. The first half or so was fairly volatile, all charged up but unfocused. The second part, the Fox part, was listless and half-assed. I will admit this. I was on auto-pilot and should have given more to it, but fuck it, even the best of us are beaten sometimes. Perhaps it is weird that I have essentially critiqued my own post, but it is important to be self critical. It is the only way to stay on top of things in an ever changing and absurd world. I think I hate this post, and yet there is enough in it that I think it is still worthwhile. That may not be an inspiring statement, but like with Jeff Backus, sometimes, you just to have accept the situation for what it is and not get all pissed of because it's not what you want it to be. This post is my Jeff Backus. Hopefully, the next one will be better but for now, I suppose this is good enough. Blah.