The Detroit Lions are the greatest trick play team in the NFL, and it feels like they unveil a new one every week. We have seen Detroit score with the “hook and ladder.” We’ve seen them find the end zone on a reverse flea flicker. We’ve seen the Lions throw touchdowns to linemen.
The Lions’ fake fumble touchdown pass is their best trick play yet
The Lions always have a new trick up their sleeve.
Ricky O'Donnell has covered basketball at all levels for more than a decade at SB Nation. He’s currently the Associate Director of Programming.
Lions offensive coordinator busted out a new trick play when his team took on the lowly Chicago Bears in Week 16 at Soldier Field, and I’m honestly not sure I’ve ever seen this one before. With the Lions already up big early in the second half, the Lions called a fake fumble complete with the running back diving on the ground before launching an open touchdown pass.
The creativity here is a 10-out-of-10. Watch Detroit’s latest trick play here:
Just watch the running back take a dive and pretend like he’s jumping on a loose ball. This is genius.
Here’s an alternate angle of the play:
This play legitimately faked out the Bears defense. Chicago defensive back Jonathan Owens — aka Mr. Simone Biles — bit on the fake, and it left Sam LaPorta with enough space to break free and score.
Ben Johnson always has a new play up his sleeve. The Bears always find creative ways to embarrassing themselves. Chicago fans are clamoring for the team to hire Johnson as its new head coach in the offseason, but for now he’s doing just fine running circles around them with Detroit.
Post-game update
Lions players talked about how the play was designed and implemented during the week. It was indeed a “designed trip” by Goff on the play. Johnson set the whole thing up during the week of practice ahead of the Bears game.
Here’s Jahmyr Gibbs and LaPorta talking about the play design. Detroit is calling the play “stumble bum.”
Johnson was inspired by watching the Green Bay Packers succeed on an actual QB stumble last season against the Bears.
Here’s the Packers play from last season that inspired Johnson to create this new trick play.
“Stumble bum” is another feather in Johnson’s cap. Poor Bears.
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