Just about every single season, there is an NFL team that finds a way to go from worst to first in their division and more and more people are beginning to mention our Detroit Lions as a team that could do that in 2022.
On Monday, Peter King released his latest Football Morning in America column, and though he did go as far as predicting the Lions will go from worst to first and dethrone the Green Bay Packers, he did give them a higher spot than most in his latest 2022 NFL Power Rankings.
Despite the Lions finishing with a 3-13-1 record in 2021, King currently has them ranked as the No. 20 team in the NFL.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that King has the Green Bay Packers as his No. 5 ranked team and the Minnesota Vikings at No. 20. As far as the Chicago Bears go, he has them ranked all the way down at No. 28, which seems about right for a team that actually got worse during the offseason.
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Here is what King has to say about the Lions, including a quote from Jared Goff, who told him that he and his teammates are “feeling good” about their chances in 2022
20. Detroit Lions (3-13-1, out of the playoffs)
I did some reporting on the Lions in Detroit this month, and I’m higher on them than most. Consider how hard they played in a disastrous rookie year of coach Dan Campbell, and how, despite winning only three games, they were 11-6 against the spread, indicative of a team outperforming expectations. Consider a schedule that includes eight games against the NFL’s netherworld (Giants, Jets, Carolina, Jacksonville, Washington, Seattle, Chicago, Chicago). Consider a team that entered December winless and finished 3-3, though the last one was against the Pack playing out the string. “There’s a lot of reasons for us to be very optimistic,” Jared Goff told me this month, “and I can tell you the guys in the locker room are feeling good about our chances.” Of course, it’s Goff who has to be more productive for the Lions to play meaningful December football, and to stave off the team looking for a new quarterback in 2023. This is one of the most interesting teams in football—and, their starved fans hope, for the right reasons.
Nation, where would you rank the Detroit Lions heading into the 2022 season? Do you think they have a shot to go from worst to first in the NFC North?
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