Well, I have realized that this whole season's disaster so far has been ol' Fritzy's fault.

As you long-timers know, I'm a pessimist. Usually I am busy explaining to all of you why the Packers will probably lose the game they're about to play. And of course the Packers have won, mostly - and so you can see how in the past I have helped by my pessimism. And it's not a put-on, where I'm secretly thinking the Packers will win but pretend that I'm pessimistic because I'm superstitious. No, I am most often genuinely pessimistic - and lord how that has helped this franchise. Yes, I have put past Packer teams on my back and carried them through long stretches of playoff wins, though I've only ever once gotten them to the Super Bowl.

This year, as you probably also know, I was strangely optimistic. I love a good defense, and I thought they finally, finally had a dominating defense in place - one that could carry this team the first half of the season while the offense figured it out.

Clearly, I was wrong. My optimism has thus also destroyed this team's chances. Arod must look no further than ol' Fritz when he seeks to blame someone, anyone, for this poor season.

Now that the team is floundering, I see that they really are not what I'd thought they would be. And when I look at this Lions' team, I see a very, very good offensive line and some reasonably talented running backs. This means, of course, that Detroit will be able to ram it down Green Bay's throat and control the clock. Throw in some key passes to the talented St. Brown receiver in the family, and you're looking at a Lions team that will put up a lot of points today. And their defense - well, it's been very up and down, but given how poorly the Packer offense has been, it sure seems the Detroit defense is going to do just fine today.

So I really, truly feel pessimistic about today's game. I just don't see the Packers winning this in Detroit - a place they've struggled in, even when they're playing well.