The Lions Will Live Or Die Off Chance

Everything about that fourth-and-1 play by the Detroit Lions against the Green Bay Packers seemed ill-conceived, starting with the fact that they only needed a field goal to put the game away in the first place. Even with the defense getting lit up, 30-something seconds should be enough to hold firm. Then there's the fact that Jared Goff slips immediately upon trying to hand the ball off and nearly blows the play up. But it worked. Dan Campbell's gutsiness prevailed once again.

The thing about guts in sports is that you only get credit when it works. Campbell has built his reputation on gutsiness, and because he tends to hit his number when he rolls the dice, people love it. "More like Dan Gamble," they might say, approvingly. Other coaches have similarly benefitted from risky decision-making, like "Riverboat" Ron Rivera and John Harbaugh. In those cases, though, the coaches had exceptional playmakers like Cam Newton and Lamar Jackson to trust to come through in big moments. Goff isn't exactly of that lineage. In the other direction, you have a coach like Brandon Staley, who also tried to build his reputation on gutsiness but often came up short. Now he's out of a job, and I can't think of another NFL team that would trust him to be their coach.

But I am ultimately a believer in putting your cards on the table to win a game. Jordan Love had been torching their defense all night—his numbers (12-for-20, 206 yards) don't accurately convey how easily he was able to take his Packers up and down the field. It's not crazy to think that trying to get one yard and definitively winning the game is a better bet than taking the field goal and giving the ball back to the Packers. Does that make Campbell's decision a smart one? Probably not. But it makes it a Dan Campbell decision, and this team has reaped the rewards of following their coach's guts in big moments.

His trademark lightly psychotic but also somehow still charming energy was on full display in his postgame locker room speech, which reached its inspirational apex when he spotted offensive lineman Dan Skipper on his haunches, head over a trash can, and chirped, "There you go, Skip, keep throwing up! Whatever you're doing over there!"

The players are clearly buying what Campbell is selling, and his approach is working. Still, it only takes one time for this to go badly, as it did in last year's NFC championship. This feels like a team that will win the Super Bowl or crash out horribly based on Campbell's gambling, but at least they'll be consistent—and compelling.