Jim Caldwell has been a good enough coach for the Detroit lions, and he has earned a big contract extension because he is a stable coach. Caldwell got fired in Indianapolis because he could not sustain the success of the Peyton Manning era, and he went to Baltimore to win a Super Bowl before he got another job up in Detroit. Detroit has been stable under Caldwell, and his offense has been very good. He is not the problem in Detroit so much as his defense has been an issue, and this is why he earned his new extension.
But the Lions are not great
The Detroit Lions are not great because their franchise is not great.
They have wasted the best years of two of the best offensive skill position players of all time. Calvin Johnson and Barry Sanders both retired early from this pathetic franchise, and that is all the proof you need that the Lions are not fit to even to have a team at all. However, we will not be contracting teams anytime soon, so the Ford family gets to own a team that they do not know how to manage. William Clay Ford has proven time and again that he is one of the worst owners in professional sports, but surely someone will come out and claim that Caldwell needs to be fired. No, the owner needs to be fired.
A sale would help
One wishes that the Ilitch family could purchase the Lions and give the Lions some direction.
Not all rich people who can afford teams can manage them, and that was proven with Donald Sterling was forced to sell the LA Clippers. He was a dreadful owner, and he simply was allowed to keep the team because he was rich. We need to stop assuming that rich people can manage any business because that is not the case. If you can make the best players of a generation retire because your franchise is really bad, you are not a good owner.
What needs to change?
The management needs to fix the defense and get a much better defensive staff. This is an easy fix, but they, too, are probably blaming Matthew Stafford and Jim Caldwell while also paying them a lot of money. Spiteful and unsuccessful people have a knack for doing things that make them look good even if they do not like doing it.
The Lions could easily let the defense remain poor, not pay anyone on the defense, and all the team to get worse and worse. All the while, they would be expected to maintain the Steelers philosophy, and they would keep Caldwell and Stafford around. A team that has been blessed with mountains of talent would waste it due to stubbornness.
