BYE BYE

It's "Bye Week" in Motown. Although the team will be off until Monday, September 26, the Lions practiced in full pads on the outdoor fields today at the team's headquarters and training facility in Allen Park.

Writers at the team's training facility wanted to know what Coach M thought about the early season break, speculating that the NFL had mysteriously given the team early season "bye weeks" for unknown reasons over the past few years.

"It wasn't as early last year, but you just take it when you get it and you make the best of it. You try to get some extra practice in, extra meeting time to do what you need to do. We try to give them a little bit of break. We have been together nine weeks, so to have a couple of days, there or four days, for the players to be off and away from us is a good thing. They are not going to get out of shape in a few days after all the training we have done. We have encouraged them to shut it down here and have them rest and heal their joints and their bones and their aches and pains and get treatment because we are always open. Some will travel and be back on Sunday, because we will have a busy Monday with preparation for Tampa."

So what's the team (and coach M) going to do with the time off?

"We have some meetings on various topics as a staff. We have work on Tampa. We have evaluations of this practice film and a self scout evaluation. We usually use our bye-week to do a really good self scout and see where we are. There are only a couple of games that we can evaluate, and some pre-season I suppose. We also use it on the next opponent."

So does a guy like this ever forget about football. No way.

"Forget about football? I don't know what that is. When you get into a season, you are always working and if I am home on a Sunday, we are watching the games of the teams we are going to be playing and taking notes. You might be in a different place, but you are still working and trying to get ready and watching what is going on and getting a little bit more information."

As for coaches wives: "Coaches wives - they go straight to heaven. They wear a lot of hats for a lot of years."