The Detroit Lions play their 2025 preseason opener in Canton, Ohio on Thursday, July 31.
It has been a while since they’ve played in the Hall of Fame Game. Not since 1991, in fact, and considering the Hall of Fame folks like to pick teams with alumni getting inducted or playoff relevance, you can easily figure why it’s been so long.
Maybe you’ve heard. No, not about the reason the Lions haven’t played in this game for decades. But that they are about to play the game – that the preseason is about to start.
Or maybe you haven’t heard.
Maybe you’re too busy thinking about the MLB trade deadline, and who the Detroit Tigers might acquire.
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Or maybe you’re thinking about the Tigers’ current four-game winning streak, and the padding they added to their American League Central lead. And … Troy Melton?
You’d be forgiven. The Tigers had lost 12 of 13 when the rookie pitched seven scoreless innings, his fastball a high-90s menace. And Melton’s immediate future, let’s face it, is more interesting than who is going to back up Jared Goff or start at center.
Well, perhaps not that last one, in time. Who will replace the retired Frank Ragnow is one of the biggest questions the Lions face (with Graham Glasgow apparently in the lead).
Still, you get the idea: The Tigers are the story of the summer, and their season – both the dominant start and their recent 6-game skids – have dominated our sporting psyche … and will until football arrives for real.
I can’t remember the last time the Lions began camp and didn’t steal the headlines. A Honolulu Blue season hasn’t started this stealthily in at least a decade, and that includes some seasons in which everyone knew the Lions were headed nowhere.
Oh, the headlines are coming, and Thursday night’s Hall of Fame Game (8 p.m., NBC) will help. But the Tigers are reminding everyone this is a baseball town, too.
Besides, the Lions don’t enter this season as The Little Franchise That Could – they enter as big cats who’ve come close, a squad that got within 30 minutes of the Super Bowl two years ago and followed that up with 15 wins in the regular season last year.
That doesn’t carry the same feel-good buzz. Not that there isn’t anticipation for the season.
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But the football-loving country is familiar with the Lions and their main characters. They know who Dan Campbell is. They know who Amon-Ra St. Brown is, and they’re getting to know who Jahmyr Gibbs is.
Part of the fun in any good sports story is the newness. The Lions are no longer new.
That isn’t bad necessarily, just different. Now, if they finally get to the Super Bowl, that will be new.
Until then, it feels more like business, and that’s a first during the Campbell/Brad Holmes regime. This is also a sign of expectations. As in: The Lions are expected to be good.
The Tigers, meanwhile, are still seemingly riding the miracle wave from last season’s run to the playoffs. If they get back to the postseason again and win another series and then lose, or win a couple series then lose – next year’s spring training might feel similar to this year’s Lions camp.
The high of coming from nowhere wears off. And everyone wants to know what’s next?
For the Lions, their first-round playoff loss to Washington at Ford Field in January, more than anything, curbed some of the buzz of this camp. Well, that and the early start – almost a week earlier than usual; maybe folks aren’t quite ready.
Camp still matters, of course. There are positions to be won and roster spots to be secured, not to mention critical reps for the regulars (especially those coming off injury – Aidan Hutchinson looks good so far).
But the postseason is everything around here these days, and that has subtly changed how folks feel about training camp. Call it the cost of relative success. Add in the Tigers’ summer takeover, and here we are, football on the doorstep, its knocks, hard or otherwise, only faintly registering.
Oh, that’ll change. This is the NFL. It rules just about every city in which it resides.
Still, it’s nice to see that the power of baseball can bring about a summer of feels.
And yet …
… the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game!
The Lions’ inclusion says something, too, about the franchise’s path the past few seasons, about how this organization is viewed within the game, about expectations for the upcoming season.
Turns out the Lions and the Tigers can be good at the same time.
Contact Shawn Windsor: [email protected]. Follow him @shawnwindsor.
