Monday, December 25, 2006

Ford Field

Merry Christmas!

This is the second time I have spent Christmas in Detroit (which, if you ask me, is two times too many). Why the heck would I do that? Well, both times it has been football related. The first time was in 2003, when Northwestern went to play in the Motor City Bowl (quit laughing, for NU, a bowl game is a bowl game). The second time was this year, when I went up to shoot the Bears against the Lions.

Ford Field, home of the Detroit Lions, is a pretty nice stadium. It's easy to get around, and has a nice retro feel to it despite being a new stadium. For the fans, there seems to be a great selection of food, and all the seats are built close to the action. Finally, it's a dome! So it keeps the cold, bitter, Detroit winter outside!

OK, so it was pretty awesome shooting a game in the winter without a jacket... 30 degrees outside, 75 degrees inside! However, I think as a photographer, I would take shooting outdoors anyday because shooting indoors sucks! It's a noon game, it's sunny outside, and I'm shooting at ISO 1000. Even darker in the end zones. Boooooo. Well, I guess that's what I get for not being cold...

Anyways, to the game. It was a pretty meaningless game. The Lions(2-13) suck and sure as heck aren't fighting for anything, other than the #1 overall pick in the 2007 NFL draft, and the Bears have home field wrapped up. So although the game meant nothing for Chicago, they find themselves in a dilemma. If the Bears pack it in and take it easy, they might lose their competitive edge come playoff time, and end up laying an egg in the playoffs like they did last year. So that's one argument to play hard, and they did for the first half.





Of course, in the second half, they relaxed (and also pulled a bunch of starters to prevent pre-post-season injuries) and the Lions roared back and gave the Bears a real scare!




If the Lions weren't being the Lions, turning the ball over and dropping a lot of passes - including a potential game winning TD (below) on the last play of the game - the Bears would have actually lost this one!

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