The traditionally unstartable Detroit Lions now think they are unstoppable. Out of the gate at 0-3 and left for dead at 3-6, they now face the Bears at 6-6 with the NFL’s No. 1-ranked offense in average yards per game.
“I can honestly say there aren’t enough balls to go around,” receiver Herman Moore said. “Not even for the quarterback.”
After quarterback Scott Mitchell found Moore, Brett Perriman and Johnnie Morton for more than 100 yards apiece and running back Barry Sanders also gained over 100 against the Minnesota Vikings on Thanksgiving, league officials were scrambling to find out if such a feat had ever been accomplished.
But get this: “I think we’re just scratching the surface,” Mitchell said. “We don’t feel we’re anywhere near what we’re capable of. We’ve had breakdowns and miscommunications we can eliminate.”
“(On Thanksgiving), we didn’t feel like we could be stopped, to be honest,” center Kevin Glover said. “But I’m sure if you ask San Francisco and Dallas, their offenses feel unstoppable on any day.”
“If you call the right play, the potential is mind-boggling,” Moore said. “You can’t stop everything and everybody. It’s impossible.”
Little Brown lie: New Packer Jim McMahon should have listened to his old Bear center, Jay Hilgenberg, before he signed with the Cleveland Browns.
“Hilgy told me they would flat-out lie to you, and that’s exactly what they did,” McMahon said.
Hilgenberg left the Bears for what he thought were the greener pastures of big-money promises in Cleveland. He was cut before those expectations were fulfilled. McMahon said he was told he would compete with Vinny Testaverde for the starting job, before rookie Eric Zeier got hot in preseason. McMahon said Zeier “got a little lucky” in his first start against Cincinnati when he “made some throws you just don’t make into coverage and came out smelling like a rose. He hasn’t played very well since.
“If I was named the backup, then I would have got a couple hundred thousand more. If I played at all, it would have cost them. I know that’s why I didn’t play,” McMahon said.
“Art Modell has no credibility,” Hilgenberg said of the Browns’ owner.
McMahon said he likes Packers coach Mike Holmgren because, “He’ll tell you like it is; he’s not going to lie to you.”
Holmgren remembered McMahon from high school in the San Francisco Bay area and became an assistant to Lavelle Edwards at Brigham Young the year after McMahon left.
“Lavelle said Jim was probably the best at knowing what was happening,” Holmgren said. “That’s saying a lot, because Ty Detmer was very good at that and Steve Young, Robbie Bosco and Marc Wilson all went to BYU. Lavelle thought Jim was the best.”
Team spirit: This is what happens when the community owns the football team: After 10.1 inches of snow fell in Green Bay hours after the Tampa Bay Buccaneers game Nov. 26, the Packers asked citizens to help clear off the Lambeau Field bleachers for Sunday’s game against the Cincinnati Bengals. They were paid $6 per hour. The Packers passed out shovels but asked people to bring their own too. Hundreds responded.
Gimpy Fontes: Lions coach Wayne Fontes suffered a sprained ankle when he accidentally collided with a player late in the Lions’ game against Tampa Bay Nov. 12 and is still in a cast. At first, he joked he was wearing it to get sympathy, but he’s hardly limping anymore, and wearing it became a superstition after he wore it against the Bears in Soldier Field two weeks ago and against the Vikings on Thanksgiving.
“We’re 3-0 in the cast, and it’s going to stay on,” he said.
Error, coach: LeShon Johnson was cut by the Packers to make room for McMahon, ending two injury-plagued years for the team’s 1994 third-round draft choice. He was claimed by Arizona.
“We were looking for a home-run hitter,” General Manager Ron Wolf said. “This kid was a home-run hitter. We struck out.”
Johnson was an I-formation runner who led the nation with 1,976 yards for Northern Illinois in 1994, but never fit into Holmgren’s offense and gained only 97 yards and caught 13 passes.
“I probably view it as more of a coaching error, that somehow I could have done more for him,” Holmgren said.
