Super Bowl Appearances & Major Moves

The Den
1

So again the Lions added virtually no outside help this season. Not just at the deadline but over all.

It gets brought up from time to time. But teams that MAKE the super bowl, do make major moves. Not necessarily at the deadline but at some point during the season.

The last 11 Superbowls is what I looked at. So 22 rosters. But i removed the 9 teams lead by Brady or Mahomes. Leaving 13 total rosters.

2016 ATL: One of the biggest spenders in FA. Emptying the bank to go all in. Spending $125+m on free agents in the offseason. Plus a few minor trades. Highlighted by C: Mack and WR: Sanu which accounted for $78m of the new money.

2017 PHI: 2 major moves. During the preseason, they traded away a depthWR and a 3rd for CB Darby. Then at the deadline traded a 4th for RB Akayi.

2018 LAR: Traded away a 1st and 6th for WR Cooks before the draft

2019 SFF: Traded away 3 & 4th for WR Sanders at the deadline.

2021 CIN: Traded backup center for DT Hill during training camp

2021 LAR: Traded for Goff before the draft and DE Miller at the deadline for a 2&3

2022 PHI: Traded for WR Brown for a 1&3 during the draft

2023 SFF: Traded for Young at the deadline for a 2&3

2024 PHI: One of the biggest spenders that year. Highlighted by DE Huff, DB CJGJ, RB Barkley totaling $120m in new money.

2025 NEP: The biggest spenders in NFLFA history. $365m new money spent. On just 16 players. $180 guaranteed at signing.

2025 SEA: Traded a 4&5 for WR Shaheed at the deadline.

So every team that has made the superbowl in the last 11 years either had a GOAT at QB, or went out and improved the roster with MAJOR outside help at some point during the season.

This year, for the NFC: SF, SEA, LAR, MIN and CHI all made major trades and or signings. Green Bay and Detroit made no major trades or signings this season.

What that tells me, is theres only 2 possible reasons why Brad did virtually nothing.

He either is high on his own supply. Loves his own guys only. Draft develop and sign. Don’t mortgage the future. Stay good for a long time. Sell tickets. Rather than go for it.

OR

He could be smart and seeing what ive been thinking. Its a gap year. Only slightly restructuring contracts. Keeping more cap room open for 2027. Not mortgaging future picks. No long term deals. Uncertainty with Branch and Kerby. Then go harder to bring in outside help next year.

Its frustrating. I dont want to be the Steelers. Making the playoffs virtually every year but doing nothing. (In the last 15 years) Be the Eagles, Be the Rams, be the 9ers. You have super bowl caliber years then a few rebuilding years

And miss me with the “best lions era in team history since 1957” im sorry but being the best era when the other 60 years are the worst in NFL history is a very low bar.

2

I read that Lions have one of the higher money in dead cap around the league. Eagles are by far the #1 in that category but I think we are top 3-5. So it’s not like we haven’t been spending money.

Personally Id love a superbowl but I also genuinely enjoy rooting for this team because of the players and staff. You make a comparison to Steelers but you could do a lot worse than a team like the Steelers (ie lions history).

Ive also seen fans of those superbowl winning teams like Eagles and Rams who obviously enjoyed their superbowl run but the very next year they are just as whiny and upset with coaches and players like the rest of the league. Grass is always greener on the other side. Enjoy the ride.

Superbowl is fluky. You could invest a ton on a team and one injury to a key player could set you back a few years.

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3

Kinda demonstrates the opposite.

Very few deadline deals move the needle or determine who won the Super Bowl.

The other moves? Sure, but the Lions have been active every offseason and draft. Just maybe not making a million trades and signings like it was Madden franchise mode.

Another interesting venture would be to find every team who acquired players at the deadline and then how they fared in the playoffs.

If you look at most of the deals near the deadline, many were huge overpays. That isn’t what Holmes does, especially in season.

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4

Thats the straw-man argument tho.

The very apparent trend. GoatQB or Adding talent to the roster with trades and FA. Every single one. Not most. Not some. ALL.

Brad didnt do anything in FA. Didnt make a major move during camp. So deadline was his deadline to move them to contender. Didnt.

No you dont win the superbowl in April, July, November. BUT.

You do NOTHING you have 0% chance to make it. Doing something gives you a chance.

ie those 5 teams (Rams, SEA, SFF, Chi, MIN) odds are one of those will be in the sb. One of them vs the field is likely -20,000 or more.

Then you have JAX, DEN, BUF, making major trades. Cin near the top in FA spending. Then KC with mahomes.

Give me those 10 teams vs the field to win the superbowl its probably -100,000

But yes that means 8 teams that made moves wont make the superbowl and 9 that made moves that didnt win.

But the other 22 teams didnt make moves and very likely wont make it

5

I get it. Everyone wants All-Pros at every position and backups who would start everywhere else.

That ain’t reality.

If winning a Super Bowl were so easy, everyone would do it every year.

Then there’s this pesky salary cap everyone has to deal with.

To say Holmes didn’t do anything this offseason is just off base.

Lions fans primarily griped about two major holes in the roster: DE and O-line. Both areas addressed.

The (very distant) third was CB. I’d argue fourth, because lot of folks were more concerned about safety with the status Branch/Kerby.

The Arnold thing happened after the draft and most of free agency. Before that, CB wasn’t high on the list, and certainly well below DE and OL in the mind of fans and pros alike.

I get the frustration. But reality helps.

(Also, it’s a Rakestraw-man argument) :rofl:

6

Of interesting note, many of those teams were SB contenders before they even made any moves. Take what you will from that, but I take away that those moves didn’t necessarily move the needle enough to separate anyone from the pack.

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7

I don’t even have to read this to know these stats will be cherry-picked to support your point while the ones that don’t will be ignored.

1 Like
8

Exactly my thought process and IDK which way Brad leans.

He knows they arnt just 1-2 players away from a SB. So why make a move if it wont get them to that point.

Or

He likes being good every year. Draft develop sign.

9

You employed so, so many fallacies with this argument, I actually had to go to AI to get them summarized. Here they are:

Here’s a breakdown of the distinct fallacies at work, roughly in order of how they appear in the text:

1. Survivorship Bias / Cherry-picking
Only examining teams that made the Super Bowl. The 30 rosters that didn’t make it — many of which also made “major moves” — are invisible. The sample is pre-filtered to the winners, so of course every team in it “made a move.”

2. Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy — The author looks at what each Super Bowl team did, then draws the circle around “major moves” to fit. A 3rd-round pick for a depth WR (2017 PHI) and a $365M FA haul (2025 NEP) are both labeled “major,” while the Lions’ actual moves (or lack thereof) are judged by a different, unstated standard. The definition of “major” is set after the data is observed.

3. Hasty Generalization — 13 rosters (already a self-selected subset of 32) are used to assert a universal rule: “every team that has made the superbowl in the last 11 years either had a GOAT at QB, or went out and improved the roster with MAJOR outside help.” That’s a very small, non-random sample being treated as law.

4. Post Hoc / Causal Confusion — The implicit claim is that the outside moves caused the Super Bowl appearances. The more likely reading is the reverse: teams that are already built to win (with cap space, draft capital, and a young core) are the ones able to make splashy moves. The moves are a symptom of a championship trajectory, not the cause.

5. False Dichotomy

“What that tells me, is theres only 2 possible reasons why Brad did virtually nothing.”

Only two options are offered: Holmes is either arrogant/incompetent or strategically waiting for 2027. Other explanations are excluded — no good targets available, cap structure already optimized, the team is genuinely competitive as-is, the available packages were too costly, etc.

6. Ad Hominem

“He either is high on his own supply. Loves his own guys only.”

This attacks Holmes’ character and motives rather than engaging with whether his roster-construction strategy is sound.

7. Straw Man

“being the best era when the other 60 years are the worst in NFL history is a very low bar.”

“Best era since 1957” is a relative, historical comparison. The author reinterprets it as an absolute claim that the bar is low, then attacks that mischaracterization.

8. Appeal to Emotion

“Its frustrating.”

Emotional language is used as a supporting premise for the argument rather than as a separate expression of feeling.

9. Non Sequitur / Single-Cause Fallacy — Even granting all the premises, the conclusion that Holmes should have made a major move doesn’t follow. The argument reduces Super Bowl success to one variable (outside help) while ignoring draft, development, coaching, scheme, health, and luck.

10. Begging the Question — The argument assumes its own conclusion: that major outside help is necessary to make the Super Bowl. The “evidence” (Super Bowl teams made moves) is only probative if you’ve already accepted that premise, which is exactly what’s in dispute.

The core structural problem is that the argument is built on a survivorship-biased, self-selected sample with a retroactively defined standard for what counts as a “major move,” then uses that to assert a causal rule, and finally presents a false binary for explaining the Lions’ inaction. Each fallacy reinforces the others.

2 Likes
10

I said outside help.

The point of the post is every team thats made the superbowl has gotten outside help during the season.

But i think there were too many holes in the foundation this year to make a move like that.

1CB and 0.5 a safety going into the draft. (Everyone and there mother knew TA was at a minimum gonna miss 6 games)

Needing DE and OL help. And needing a RB2 and LB2/3

And he added some place holders. (League min deals) and added some nice draft picks. But too many major holes to go and get more help

11

You cant compare seasons going to much further because drafted contracts were WAY different. And before that there was no salary cap.

Please dont use AI and prove my point wrong. Every team in the Super Bowl has either made a major move or had a first ballot Hall of Fame quarterback.

Yes, it might be a cause-and-effect scenario. Where are the teams that were already contenders then made moves to make themselves more of a contender.

But then you’re just telling me that Brad does not think this roster is a Super Bowl contender team.

Or he thinks he’s the smartest guy in the room and wants to do it with his guys.

Those are the only two options.

12

I will add a third possibility. If all the other division teams are also good and just pushed their chips in, can we keep our picks and remain favorites in the nfc north while they eventually reboot?

I just did a very rough ai search asking what our current odds of winning SB (+1900) and what they were a week ago (+1900) and 14 days ago (+1900). All of these other moves don’t seem to hurt our chances any. Pick up a top player for your first rounder maybe moves you to +1700. Is that worth losing your first? Or more?

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13

I think it all just boils down to “why not get better now?”

That’s a fair place for fans to diverge. We know that teams sometimes trade for a star who gets hurt immediately or just underperforms. We also know that sometimes one nice move can put a team over the top.

I dont know whether I’m fully in either camp, i suspect I’m not.

We aren’t Minny who had to move or die, and we aren’t the Rams or eagles who are always active in the trade market. We also obviously aren’t sellers right now.

The only thing that will tick me off is if we find out Brad wasn’t even shopping.

14

Thats how i have felt since March. Gap year. Dont go all in. Wait for Philly, sf and MIN to fall off. The go all in next year when the Lions have a more complete team.

But it has hurt a little and its only been 1 day.

Just to make the Super Bowl (NFC Champ)

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MIN saw a MASSIVE spike this week still trending up.

Seattle passed the Lions again.

And Chicago trade fallowed by destroying the Seahwks on the road shot them to 2nd