Ok, I'm not at all going to approach this like I've seen a lot of Detroit Lions fans do it. I'm not coming from a fantasy football edge either. The biggest difference is that I'm not going to complain. I'm going to ask the question and then hypothesis the answer. Sorry certain Lions fans. If you're looking for some sort of thing where I say that Brad Holmes botched the draft and that the Lions could have drafted (fill in name of whichever rookie had a good game that week,) I'm sorry. That's not happening. 

Here's the thing. I don't think it's a bust pick after just four games. I don't think it was a bad pick at all. I am curious as to what the timeline is for Gibbs though. On Thursday night he played just 28 snaps. He was good on just about all 28 of them. He ran for 40 yards on eight carries. That's 5-yards per carry. He also caught four passes for 11 yards. If he's doing so well, why not let him play more?

I think there's a shot that I may have answered my own question back in April before the draft. I wrote for Pride of Detroit that Lions fans should temper their expectations for whoever the team picks.

The thought there was that the Lions are a really good team. They're good enough to a point where they don't need to just throw rookies right out there and hope for the best. They have a good enough team to take their time with their draft picks now.

Aside from Brian Branch, who is undeniable, the Lions have really taken their time with everyone. Jack Campbell is averaging 30 snaps a game, Brodric Martin hasn't played yet and while it seems like Sam LaPorta is always out there, he's not. They've been ramping him up as the weeks have gone.

Here's the thing. Everyone knows I like to get psychological with things. I dropped Baader Meinhof and frequency illusion on you a few weeks back. I think what we we have here is cognitive dissonance. It's all about beliefs and behaviors not matching up and the tension that comes along with that feeling. 

For years Lions fans have seen their rookies get thrown immediately into the deep end and become automatic starters for the most part. They've even seen it with this regime going back to 2021. So any behavior that strays away from that belief has to signal that some wrong has been done. The reality is the Lions are good enough to not have to rush their rookies. That's a good thing. 

The other thing is that this is notoriously the most impatient fan base of all time. They have the right to feel that way by the way. This team has put them through hell to get to this point. As for the fantasy nerds, I can't help you. You should have paid more attention to the team as a whole before you started drafting. 

Ok, now that we have that out of the way, when will the Lions start really pushing these guys? Hey, it's a long season. The Lions just played their fourth game of the season. And they've won three of them. What the team is doing right now is working. Wins are all that should matter. 

I think down the stretch is when you'll really see things open up for Jahmyr Gibbs especially. Maybe cognitive dissonance can apply to the way a team runs it's offense too. The league will get used to the way the Lions run their offense after a while. They'll believe that the behavior displayed will continue and then the Lions can throw the Gibbs wrinkle out there to cause a whole lot of tension. 

The time will come when you see Gibbs do all the things you've expected him to do, but the Lions just don't need him to do it right now like, say, the Atlanta Falcons do with Bijan Robinson. 

I think it's safe to say that you can probably expect the Lions to do this going forward unless a guy is undeniable and you just have to throw him out there. Brian Branch being that guy of course. Welcome to the new world Lions fans. Your team is good. 

Jared Goff told Packers veteran exactly how he schooled him

I love Larry Bird. I know I'm not supposed to because I'm a Pistons guy, but the dude was an all time smack talker. He used to tell guys what he was going to do before he did it. Sometimes he would tell them after he did it that he knew that he could. The […]