It's tough to be a Detroit Lions player, say Jeff Backus or Dominic Raiola who have had to endure almost a decade of losing seasons. It's even harder being a fan of the Detroit Lions, pay to see them live, and they falter in a different fashion year after year. 2010 has probably been the hardest for me to endure as a Lions fan.

In 2007, when they started out 6-2 and collapsed to a 1-7 finish en route to a 7-9 season, I thought 2008 would be the year that they get to the playoffs. Instead, I got to witness 16 straight losses in which half were blowouts that were over in the first half. In 2009, after Stafford played his rookie season and had that monster record breaking game against the Browns, I thought 2010 would be the season that he would transform into the Franchise QB that he appeared.

He probably would have had he not been injured all season.

It's heartbreaking to see a team that has a lot of talent, but not enough to get wins, struggle in the 4th quarter of every game and end up losing in the end EVERYTIME. Sure, when games were over in the first half of the last two seasons, I thought nothing could get worse than that, but when you actually think that your team has a chance to win everytime they play and they lead most of the game and lose in the 4th, that might hurt worse for some reason. It's hard being a die hard, but maybe next year when Stafford stays healthy all season, we get the missing pieces we need to win in the 4th, and the refs stop screwing us over, we might actually win some games.

Maybe. We will have the talent next year, but will they stay healthy and will the NFL give us at least a small break?

With the NFL, you just never know.