8 Detroit Lions Who Could Shock the World in 2012

The Detroit Lions, for better or worse, are full of surprises.

A winless season was a surprise in 2008.

Promoting people in the organization as a response to that season (Martin Mayhew, Tom Lewand)? Surprise.

Beating a Super Bowl team (Packers) with a third-string quarterback (Drew Stanton) two years later was also a surprise.

Becoming a playoff team and producing a 5,000-yard passer (Matthew Stafford) in his first full NFL season, a mere three years after a winless season? Huge surprise.

Having a rookie All-Pro defensive tackle (Ndamukong Suh) fall mostly off the map because of a combination of physical and personal (sometimes both) issues? Surprising.

So, if there's one thing you can't say about the Lions, it's that they're predictable—even when you want them to be. That goes for the team as a whole as well as individual players, and it's not likely to stop this year.

The 2012 season is only three months away, and we all know exactly what to expect this season, right? Of course not, and if you say you do, you're either a pundit or a liar.

That said, I'm now going to tell you what to expect next season. Make your own decisions about which category I fall into.

Here are the eight Detroit Lions who could betray our expectations in 2012.

Ryan Broyles

Some love it, some hate it, some laughed at it. But the Lions drafted another wide receiver toward the top of the draft this year, and controversy ensues.

But buried beneath the controversy is the fact that Ryan Broyles is really, really good—like, record-breaking good.

There are exactly two things standing between him and greatness in Detroit. One is the ACL injury he's currently recovering from. The shocking thing is it actually might not limit him at all this season.

The other is the simple fact that Broyles is a rookie, and wide receiver is a difficult position that is especially tricky for rookies. Even Calvin Johnson wasn't even close to dominant in his rookie year (48 receptions, 756 yards, four touchdowns).

With all this, expectations are bound to be relatively low for Broyles this year. But that's what will make it so easy for him to exceed them. If Broyles works hard to learn the system and get his timing right with Matthew Stafford, Broyles could easily be the third receiver by season's end.

Ndamukong Suh

I would love to say that Ndamukong Suh has nothing to prove to Lions fans on the field and that his issues stem only from some isolated poor decisions and a bad on-field temper—except that I would be lying.

I still think Suh is an exceptionally talented athlete, but plenty of guys have come out with exceptional rookie years, then fizzled out when there's enough game film to effectively neutralize them.

Suh won't be able to sit back and allow his talent to let him coast. The NFL doesn't work like that.

Of course, I don't expect Suh (whose work ethic has been repeatedly lauded) to have any intention of lazing around for the next few years. The Lions are already working on new ways to use him in the defense, and Suh himself is motivated to change his image.

I wouldn't bet against a motivated Suh in any arena, so anybody looking for Suh to come out and decline or live up to his reputation of dirty play might be shocked to see a model citizen playing great football.

That doesn't mean Suh will be completely immune to penalties or punishments. Suh is still a freakishly talented and strong player, to the point where even his legal hits look like mob hits. But if it's between taking 15-yarders on bad calls and taking them on post-play nonsense, Lions fans will take the former 100 times out of 100.

Jim Schwartz

Jim Schwartz has a bit of a reputation as a hothead.

It's tough to find a Lions fan that doesn't appreciate his fire, whether dealing with his own players or refs. Some Lions fans would, perhaps, like to see a little less of it unleashed against opposing coaches.

But it's for precisely this reason that the spotlight will shine bright on the Lions' Week 2 matchup against the 49ers, and not because of the strength vs. strength matchup that will be Lions offense vs. 49ers defense.

No, the story will be about what happens after the game, and both these guys know it. And that's why, with everyone expecting a cage match at the 50-yard line, we'll all be shocked when the two shake hands like normal human beings and move on with their seasons.

No shirt-flipping. No "slap-push." No shouting matches. No controversy.

Even if these guys hate each other (and it's hard to imagine either of these guys not rubbing a lot of people the wrong way), they're both smart enough to know how the media will eat it up if either of these guys so much as blinks wrong in the postgame.

It isn't so much that they care about any sort of backlash, it's more that they'd rather avoid the barrage of questions about something that has nothing at all to do with their football team. The sooner they can bury this story, the better off they both will be.

Jahvid Best

The good news is that Jahvid Best is symptom-free from concussions.

The bad news is it took him about eight months, and nobody has been beating on his helmet since then. Despite his own personal confidence, Best was a risk coming out of college because of his concussion history, and his sophomore season proved that concern to be a valid one.

Being this type of injury-prone is different from the fluky injuries that happened to Matthew Stafford in his first two years. Best's concussions are long-term, cumulative injuries that get easier to suffer the more times they happen.

That's why the expectation is for him to get carted off the field the first time he gets tackled. Running backs are, after all, magnets for injury.

But then again, what if he plays 16 games healthy? With the Lions likely to use him less as a grinder up the middle, it's possible he avoids some of the impacts from guys twice his size that cause some of those injuries.

Of course, he also opens himself up to hits from kamikaze linebackers and safeties flying at him full speed if he's mostly taking swing passes and stretch runs to the outside. No place on the field is even close to safe.

So if Best manages to finish the season even relatively healthy, it will be as surprising as it is exciting.

Calvin Johnson

Speaking of people not expected to finish the season healthy, here's the new Madden 13 coverboy.

Calvin Johnson has two ways he can shock everybody in 2012, and both are incredibly likely.

One is that the Madden Curse plunks off Johnson like a cornerback with poor tackling technique.

Two is that his statistics dip somewhat from 2011 and the Lions offense gets better.

It's possible that a statistical drop will amount to Johnson "suffering from the Madden Curse," and maybe, that's what it will take to keep the legend alive.

But it will more likely be linked to the Lions' passing game becoming more fluid, Matthew Stafford spreading the ball around more to players in the intermediate range and a healthy stable of running backs.

In other words, Johnson will become the offense's most dangerous weapons, rather than the man who carries the offense.

Johnson's numbers were ridiculous in 2011, with 98 receptions, 1,681 yards and 16 touchdowns.

Johnson finished the year with more touchdown receptions than all but 20 quarterbacks (including Matt Schaub, Jay Cutler, Tim Tebow and Colt McCoy) had touchdown passes. For reference, Donovan McNabb finished the year with 94 completions for 1,026 yards and four touchdowns. 

But crazy as Johnson's numbers were, they were inflated by the simple fact that sometimes, Stafford had nowhere else to go with the ball, and Johnson simply made a good play out of a bad situation.

The Lions' offense does not want to have to rely on Johnson's unparalleled ability to come down with a jump ball, and this season, they likely won't.

Titus Young

Yes, another receiver. Lots of shocks to be had there, and frankly, I have reason to put Maurice Stovall and Patrick Robinson on the list too, but I'll refrain.

But of the players on this list, Titus Young has the most opportunity to truly break out. After spending a good portion of the 2011 season learning the Lions' offense, his performances became bigger and more consistent.

Now, Young is wowing his coaches in OTAs. Now, you can take what you will from non-padded practices (not much), but Young's offseason training program last year was basically the regular season. This is the first time Young has actually gotten in with his team to get properly prepared for the regular season, and it seems his abilities are shining through as a result.

Lots of people see Young and think he'll be good. Not a lot think of him as the Lions' other 1,000-yard receiver. But that's just what he could be as soon as this season.

The Lions haven't had a 1,000-yard season from a No. 2 receiver since the heyday of Johnnie Morton, who accomplished the feat four times from 1997-2001 across the field from Herman Moore.

But the Lions are loading this team up with weapons, and Young looks like the top budding star. Somebody is going to break that threshold, and Young is the safest bet right now.

Aaron Berry

One of the biggest questions surrounding the Lions' 2012 season was whether they could fix the pass defense.

Even if you, like me, thought the run defense was actually the bigger problem until the Packers and Saints flooded the schedule, a big part of the reason for that was Eric Wright, who is now a Tampa Bay Buc.

The most obvious selection for Wright's replacement was Aaron Berry, but much of that was simply because he was the least bad selection available.

Now it seems like he might be the best possible option, regardless of what the Lions did in the offseason.

So for all the talk about the Lions drafting or signing a new cornerback in the offseason, I'd like a show of hands for who expected the Lions' secondary to improve because of a guy already on the roster.

Granted, it hasn't happened yet, but there should be a reasonable amount of shock if the Lions' knight in shining armor actually played for them while they were giving up 900 passing yards in two games.

Riley Reiff

Riley Reiff is among a number of players making positive waves in OTAs.

Offensive coordinator Scott Linehan says, according to MLive, that Reiff is "on track to play a lot of football for us really early."

He also says on the team's website that he wants to keep Reiff at tackle, the "position [he's] going to play."

Those things combined mean that either Jeff Backus or Gosder Cherilus is on notice. Conventional wisdom says it's Cherilus—the less-proven player at the lower-impact position.

Until we look at this whole thing from another angle, the Lions are impressed with Reiff. They want him to play "really early." And Linehan likes keeping guys at the position they'll ultimately play.

The position the Lions want Reiff to ultimately play is left tackle. And if he's really good right now, it's not out of the question that the Lions would trust him with the blind side as a rookie.

The Lions are not going to cut either of their starting tackles, and they're both too good to sit on the bench, which means it's likely that whichever tackle gets replaced moves inside to guard (presumably replacing Stephen Peterman at RG). And Backus projects much better to guard than Cherilus does. In a weird way, it all adds up.

Of course, this is all premature. The Lions haven't even seen Reiff in pads yet, and the last thing they want is to throw him into the fire before they're sure he's ready. That egg can't be unbroken.

But something big is going to happen if Reiff plays as well as his early looks suggest, and while most assume Cherilus is the guy on the chopping block, Reiff and the Lions could stun us all by naming a new starting left tackle for the first time since Backus left the University of Michigan.