One of the first things the NFL media gets tasked to do following the schedule release extravaganza is to go through each game and project wins and losses. Those projections tend to be quite optimistic, created through “homer” eyes. Typically done in haste, most of the projections are snap reactions to the opponent.
Those snap reactions reflect the general national perception of the NFL teams. And based on the reactions and projections from the team beat writers at ESPN, the perception of the Detroit Lions is that they’re bound to be terrible in 2020.
ESPN’s own Lions analyst, Mike Rothstein, projects the team to finish 8-8. But for a broader look at how the Lions are perceived, I decided to check what the game-by-game predictions involving every Lions game were forecasted by the ESPN analysts for their respective teams.
Reverse engineering the predictions for the individual games from the ESPN analysts who cover the other teams that play the Lions, it seems that most teams are pretty confident in chalking up a “W” when their teams play the Lions.
Here is what those other reporters projected in the Lions games. This is what each forecasted for their respective games with Detroit:
Week 1 – Bears: loss
Week 2 – Packers: win
Week 3 – Cardinals: win
Week 4 -Saints: win
Week 5 – Bye
Week 6 – Jaguars: win
Week 7 – Falcons: win
Week 8 – Colts: win
Week 9 – Vikings: win
Week 10 – Redskins: loss
Week 11 – Panthers: win
Week 12 – Texans: win
Week 13 – Bears: win
Week 14 – Packers: win
Week 15 – Titans: win
Week 16 – Buccaneers: win
Week 17 – Vikings: win
The ESPN reporters covering the other teams projected a 14-2 record going against the Lions. Only the Bears in Week 1 and the Redskins in Week 10 saw their teams losing to Detroit.
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