Justin Rogers, Bob Wojnowski, and John Niyo break down the Detroit Lions' 20-19 victory over the Carolina Panthers. Justin Rogers, The Detroit News
Detroit — It wasn’t the snow or the cold or the injuries or the coach. It was the losing,
That’s what really wears on an NFL player. And that’s what was starting to weigh so heavily on the Lions the last few weeks, as a .500 team started to go under and things started to go quiet.
Maybe not on the outside, where all the noise — the clamoring fans, the critical media, even some national ridicule — was building to an ugly crescendo.