Now, It's The Fans Fault

It appears that in the Bizzaro World that is Detroit Lions football, George Costanza's favorite break-up line has been turned on it's head all season long. "It's not you, it's me" has been reversed in Allen Park, Ford Field and anywhere where someone wearing Honolulu Blue may speak. These Lions firmly believe that "It's not me, it's you" when suggesting where the team's problems lie.

Since the beginning of the year, guys like Jeff Garcia, Dre Bly, Roy Williams and Charles Rogers have been looking for answers to the team's shortcomings. All have made it clear that the problem is any one, but themselves. This week, the football crying game took an unanticipated twist. Instead of hinting or plain calling out their teammates, coaches or the media, Mr. Bly aimed his finger straight at you and me--the fans.

Seems, the Pro Bowl corner just couldn't get himself jacked up for last Sunday's encounter with Cincinnati because he was just terribly depressed about the Lions' fans "Orange Out" protest. Going out to warm-up in front of so many orange clad fans in the Lions' home facility made Bly less than excited.

To his credit, Bly also made it clear that he understood that Detroit's football fans were mad and they had every right to protest. However, wearing the other team's colors was just too much for him. Now, this alone was enough for me to start typing, but it gets better.

The next day on the radio both Chris Speilman and Bill Laimbeer, two of the most notable Detroit sports figures of the last twenty-five years, concurred with Bly. Both men thought it was over the line for fans to wear the colors of the Bengals. Hey, even Kevin Antcliff, Motor City Sports Mag guy, thought the same thing. Anyone else see a tiny problem here?

Bly and Garcia, in particular, have been calling out teammates all season long. That's apparently cool. However, fans calling out Matt Millen after posting the worst five year record in football comes across as non-supportive? Telling the NFL Network that Joey Harrington is the cause of all the Lions ills is a stand-up move, but wearing orange makes you a traitor?

Bly can't get up because a small percentage of fans show up in orange for one game, but fans that have been subjected to some of the worst football in NFL history for almost fifty years are supposed to stay upbeat continually?

Bly who now proudly defends the Honolulu Blue and Silver and Black with pride also donned the Blue and Gold of the St. Louis Rams. When his current contract expires, Bly could and probably would choose to wear an entirely different set of colors on Sundays. Yet, Lions fans who opted to wear orange on a single Sunday are the disloyal members of this arrangement?

Bly and anyone in the Lions uniform can leave and change alliances at a whim. Lions fans aren't seriously considering that option. How do I know? Because they continue to show up. They aren't at home rooting for their new team on NFL Sunday Ticket. Nope, they are showing up at Ford Field every single week. Sure, a handful or two might give up their season tickets, but should the team show even a glimmer of hope, they will be back in Honolulu Blue faster than Renee Zelwegger tossed aside Kenny Chesney.

I find it interesting that when players and management make decisions we don't like, like a player leaving via free agency or the team cutting a veteran for cap reasons, they trot out the old "It's a business" line. If that's is indeed the case, and the Lions are a business, their patrons have been getting some of the worst customer service in history.

If the Lions were your wireless provider, cable television company or corner pizza joint, you would have chosen to go with the competition's product decades ago. Yet, instead of opting to root for another NFL franchise, a small, but highly visible group of Lions fans wear the opposing teams color and some players, ex-players and media-types label this as crossing the line?

Why do I find it difficult to accept that all the parties who are getting paid to provide our entertainment--players, management and ownership--have carte blanche to do whatever they wish, which includes providing an inferior product and running the franchise into the ground, but the parties actually writing checks to the Detroit Lions Football Club are viewed as the traitors for taking a visible stance in opposition?

The team that has quarterbacks that can't throw, receivers that can't catch and lineman that can't block now blames the fans for their lack of enthusiasm on gameday? What about being a professional athlete? What about mental toughness? What about all those home losses when the fans were dressed appropriately in Honolulu Blue? What caused those defeats?

What I found doubly amusing this week was that Minnesota head coach Mike Tice called out Vikings fans for doing a similar thing. Seems Tice believes that tons of Vikings fans sold their tickets to Pittsburgh fans thus filling the Purple and Gold home field with Steelers supporters. Of course, Tice viewed this action as disloyal, as well.

The same guy that the NFL had to fine for illegal selling his annual allotment of Super Bowl tickets is calling out his fans for selling their tickets? The franchise that twice has forgotten it was "On The Clock" at the NFL Draft has a head coach with the audacity to question the loyalty of its fans? Priceless.

I wonder if Bly, and to a lesser extent, Tice, understand is that the fans in their home stadium were loyal fans. They just happen to be fans of the opposition. Something I never heard Bly, Speilman or Laimbeer admit is that a bunch of the folks dressed in Bengals colors were actually from Cincinnati.

See, it's a little known phenomenon called being a good football team. Good football teams get lots of support. Even on the road. If the Lions were about to win their division with a win in Cincinnati and looked like a possible Super Bowl contender to boot, do you know how many Lions fan clad in Honolulu Blue would fill the Bengals' home? Are you kidding me?

What I think a number of people in sport have missed is how the dynamic between fans and their teams has changed. And, no, it's not because of sports talk radio, internet sites or a hostile media. Although, all of those have moved the landscape. No, what has changed the most is the money. The huge amounts that the leagues, individual teams and players now accumulate combined with the astronomical costs of owning season tickets has altered the perspectives of all involved.

Indeed, while most of us don't openly recognize the change in our attitude, it's obvious. Fans are increasingly buying into the "It's a business" excuse. We have come to accept that players come and players go. We accept, although with mindnumbing awe, the contracts today's athletes receive. We embrace salary caps. We have learned to deal with free agency, even when our team is hurt by it.

Listen to sports talk radio for any extended period of time and you will hear the changing acceptance of sport as business. A number of fans talk about transactions while looking through the pane of budgetary constraints. They talk of the cost benefits of building via the draft. They know what their team's salary cap number is right this moment. These are not the wild ramblings of fanatics. It's an acknowledgement that they understand the financial side of the game.

Conversely, these same fans are far less willing to accept poor performance over a protracted amount of time. Fifty years ago, a prolonged losing skid was bad luck. Today, it's poor drafting, poor free agent decisions and a criticism of the general manager's ability to make the franchise a winner. It doesn't matter if fans spend thousands on season tickets or hundreds on cable television, they are less tolerant of a losing franchise in an era when parity and the ability to build anew are leveling the playing field for all teams.

Their increase in spending means fans are no longer just supporters, but investors. They invest time, money and energy into their team. As such, they aren't terribly interested in excuses for failure when it's their investment is going down the tubes. They are going to demand change. More accurately, they are going to demand steady progress. It's what investors have come to expect.

Perhaps, those who opposed the Lions fans in orange this past Sunday should understand that their temporary change in fashion was a financial decision, as well. They are tired of wasting their money without getting some return on their investment. After all, it's just a business, right? Or does that excuse only count when it's being spouted by those getting the checks not by those writing them?