Detroit Lions Monday Morning Quarterback: Destruction of the Cincinnati Bengals

The Game

The Detroit Lions beat up on the Cincinnati Bengals to the tune of 34-3. It would have been worse if the No. 1 offense played more than five minutes. 

This was not much of a test, as the Bengals are a team trying to rebuild, while the Lions are poised to make a run at the playoffs.

The Good

Matthew Stafford

Matthew Stafford couldn’t have played any better. He was 6-of-7 for 71 yards and two touchdowns. His only incompletion was on a ball that bounced off the hands of a wide open Jahvid Best. The only concern here is that we still don’t know how Stafford will react to getting hit; the Bengals never got close to him

Special Teams

Good all around with the exception of some punting woes. The Lions showed just how well coached they are by getting the kicking units on the field and successfully executing a field goal with less than 15 seconds left.

Amari Spievey

His improvement on the practice field translated to the game. He looks like a different player in coverage. In my opinion he was most impressive near the end of the first quarter when he made a beautiful open-field tackle on Bengals tight end Jermaine Gresham, holding him to minimal gain.

Honorable mention

I could fill this entire article with what went right for the Lions, but I will just quickly mention the following things:

- Ndamukong Suh, for the second straight preseason, tried to dislodge a QB’s head from his body.

- Sean Hill showed that, preseason or not, if you smell the end zone nothing should stop you.

- The defense overall only gave up three points.

- All four quarterbacks led scoring drives.

- Jahvid Best looks quick again and was actually able to make a couple of defenders miss.

- A lot of the backups made plays. Final cuts are going to be hard this year.

 
The Bad

Derrick Williams

I just can’t ever figure this guy out. He has made every catch in practice, but in this game he dropped two passes that should have easily been caught. He made up for it by making a beautiful sliding catch right after the two drops. He also had one more nice catch that was negated by a penalty. The point is that in order for him to win a roster spot he needed to make all four of those catches.

The Ugly

Run Defense

It is only one game, but Cedric Benson averaged over six yards a carry against the first team defense. What was more of a concern is that the Bengals ran exclusively to the right side of their offensive line, right at Suh and Cliff Avril. Those two struggled at times against the run last year.  Lions fans have to hope this is more of a blip on the radar than the norm.

Misleading Stat of the Day

Only 71 yards passing for Stafford seems minuscule, but when you only play five minutes and you reach the end zone both times, that is a lot of yardage.

Quote of the Day

“I think we’re pretty exciting to watch when all the pieces are together” – Matthew Stafford in his postgame interview, courtesy of NFL.com

Play of the Day

This is going to seem a bit odd, but Stephen Tulloch getting a 15-yard penalty while defending Louis Delmas showed the rest of his teammates he is not here just as a one0year rental, but as a member of this team through the good and bad.

 
Overall Impression

This was the first preseason game, so not too much can be made of it, but the Lions did about as well as we could have hoped. We have to remember that Cincinnati is a bad team, and neither team gameplanned for the other. 

Next Week

The Lions hope to continue to beat up on teams from Ohio as they take on the Cleveland Browns.