Tom's Takeaways from Lions loss to Cleveland

A last-minute field goal sealed the seemingly inevitable fate of the Lions Friday night, who played an uninspiring half of football with their third and fourth units.

The energy in Ford Field was high as the night began and most fans are smart enough to know a 19-17 loss is nothing to lose any sleep over. 

There were enough positives to build on and enough negatives for head coach Jim Schwartz to spotlight in an effort to make his team better before they head to Baltimore next Friday night.

Positives:

1) Joique Bell and Keiland Williams will take the headlines, but you have to be pleased with how the offensive line blocked for the running backs all night.  The Lions rushed 33 times for 198 yards, led by Bell's 89-yard effort on 16 carries.  Any semblance of a running attack and this offense can be downright scary.

2) Everette Brown - Playing with his fourth team in four years, Brown got to the quarterback four times tonight, finishing the night with 1.5 sacks and another tackle for a loss.  Defensive end will be a tough position to win a spot, but Brown put his best foot forward Friday night. 

3) Bill Bentley - The rookie cornerback was thrown to the wolves and handled himself well on the island.  Was it good enough for a regular season game?  No, but with so much concern about how the secondary will get better, it was nice to see some confidence, size and ability to tackle from Bentley.

4) Shaun Hill - Mr. Consistency.  Love him even more when he's put in hurry-up situations.  8-12 with a touchdown pass against Cleveland.  Thank your lucky stars Hill signed up for another go-round in Motown to back up Matthew Stafford.

Negatives:

1) The lack of execution in the second half was disappointing.  Kellen Moore finished 4-14 for just 40 yards and he also threw an interception to end any remote threat of a long field goal attempt as time wound down.  Good thing Joique Bell was on his game, otherwise the offense would have done nothing.

2) Brandon Pettigrew dropped a ball down the field that should have been caught.  That's something Brandon has admitted he's working on and knows he needs to fix.  After the first drive, the training staff was working on Brandon's neck on the bench.  I figured he might be done for the night, but he returned to play. 

3) The referees - A lot of missed calls and bad spots.  The penalty on Ricardo Silva was ridiculous at best.  A blatant facemask was seen by everyone on the sideline except the guys wearing stripes.  An illegal motion was missed and exacerbated by a bad spot that would have been challenged during the regular season.  Get the real refs back to work.