Anyone Can Win--Except Lions

Nine months after hoisting the Vince Lombardi Trophy in Tampa, Fla., Trent Dilfer can now be seen caddying for Matt Hasselbeck in the Seattle-Tacoma Mike Holmgren Invitational, where Hasselbeck finally made the cut Sunday by doing what Dilfer does best: Give the ball to someone else.

In so doing, Hasselbeck achieved three career milestones:

a) He assisted Shaun Alexander into the Seattle Seahawk record book, handing Alexander the ball 35 times and watching him carry it for a club-record 266 yards and three touchdowns.

b) He won for the second time as a Seahawk quarterback, following Alexander’s vapor trail to a 34-27 upset of the Oakland Raiders.

c) He kept Dilfer, the winning quarterback of the most recent Super Bowl, on the bench for at least another week, reminding us again how mundane an accomplishment that was for Dilfer.

Now, anyone can win a Super Bowl.

The event has lost its luster. Before Dilfer, Steve McNair almost won one. Before McNair, Chris Chandler actually played in one. Before Sunday, tens of thousands of wind-chilled Chicagoans had convinced themselves the Bears just might be headed to one.

Super Bowl? Says who?

On the other hand, no one has ever finished a regular season 0-16 before. A year ago, the San Diego Chargers gave it their best shot, playing Ryan Leaf as much as they could, distracting Coach Mike Riley with rumors of eminent exile to USC, shanking field goals in the clutch. Yet, all of that added up only to 1-15. Once again, the perfect, winless NFL season remained ever elusive.

This must explain, because something has to, why Tampa Bay kicker Martin “Overdramatica” Gramatica went Roberto Benigni after kicking a 35-yard field goal to defeat the Detroit Lions in overtime, 20-17.

Kick goes up and splits the uprights.

Gramatica goes up and nearly splits his spleen sprinting to the sideline, jumping for joy, screaming with delight, pumping both fists triumphantly in the air.

All this for a field goal that sends the 0-7 Lions to 0-8?

Exactly.

Keen student of NFL history, Gramatica knows that someday we could be looking back at Nov. 11, 2001 and his kick as the moment that sustained the streak and saved the Lions, who couldn’t hold 0-10 and 7-17 deficits, from themselves.

The streak lives. The Lions are halfway home. Gramatica, understandably, felt the urge to go over the top.

(In contrast, in Arizona, Gramatica’s younger brother Bill converted a field goal for the Cardinals with 8:05 left in the third quarter and no one present said or did much of anything. The Cardinals went on to lose, 17-10, to the New York Giants. Nothing new about that.)

Going in, the Buccaneers knew the gravity surrounding the proceedings in Detroit. Defensive tackle Warren Sapp called it the most important game of his seven-year NFL career, prompting many to question Sapp’s memory--Tampa Bay played for the NFC championship in 1999--or his sanity or both.

“If we lost to an 0-7 team, where is the morale of this team?” Sapp reasoned amid the post-Gramatica delirium. “All the nuts and bolts could’ve come out if we fell flat here in Detroit.”

A few still might have come loose. Sizing up the opposition, Sapp said, with a straight face: “That is an excellent 0-8 team.”

So the Lions have that going for them, which is nice, and six days to regroup before taking the streak to Arizona for a game in which the Cardinals could be favored. After that, it’s heavy sledding for Detroit: Green Bay, at Chicago, at Tampa Bay, Minnesota, at Pittsburgh, Chicago and then ... kettle drum roll ... a season finale against the Dallas Cowboys, who, already preparing to play the spoiler’s role, started Leaf against Atlanta Sunday and lost, 20-13.

Unfortunately, there will be no relegation battle between the Lions and the 1-8 Carolina Panthers, who also have lost eight straight and are decomposing right in front of George Seifert’s bloodshot eyes, which had to watch third stringer Matt Lytle flail helplessly against the Rams while emergency retread Jim Harbaugh gets up to speed on the Panther playbook.

(What’s taking him so long? Page One: Run For Your Life. Page Two: Pitch Out And Pray For Him. Page Three: You’re On Your Own. Page Four: We Punt.)

Buck up, Lion fans, it could be worse:

Lions vs. Rams, 2001: Rams, 35-0.

Panthers vs. Rams, 2001: Rams, 31-0. In the first quarter. Followed by Rams, 45-7, in the third quarter and Rams, 48-14, at the final gun. Total offense for Carolina: 146 yards. Net rushing yards for Marshall Faulk, who played only the first half: 183. Net rushing yards for Trung Canidate, who replaced Faulk in the second half: 145.

“Now that I look back on it,” said a shell-shocked Lytle in the grim aftermath, “that’s embarrassing.”

A year ago, Detroit went 9-7, same as Green Bay and four games ahead of 5-11 Chicago. This prompted the Lions to change general managers and coaches during the off-season, whereas the Packers and Bears stayed with what they had, changed a few players instead, and wound up playing for first place in the NFC Central on the second Sunday in November.

The Packers won, 20-12, primarily because they have Brett Favre and the Bears have Jim Miller. This is not meant as disrespect for Miller, who is certainly an improvement over Charlie Batch, Mike McMahon and the rest of the Detroit rotation. But as soon as you saw Favre’s insta-touchdown strikes to Bill Schroeder and Antonio Freeman, you realized the Packers were operating with DSL and Bears were still fumbling with the directions on their modem upgrade.

Against Favre, four Paul Edinger field goals aren’t going to get it done. Unlike the Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland, where five Kris Brown field goals were enough to beat the Browns, 15-12.

But those are the Steelers for you. Still stuck with Kordell Version 1.0.