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Dan Campbell knows NFL playoff failure well. Here's his message for the Detroit Lions.
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- Dan Campbell knows NFL playoff failure well. Here's his message for the Detroit Lions.
Dan Campbell got his first taste of the most powerful drug on the planet as a tight end with the New York Giants in 2000.
Campbell was a part-time starter in his second NFL season at the time, and the Giants were the toast of the NFL. They won 12 games in the regular season. They were the top seed in the NFC playoffs. They cruised all the way to the Super Bowl.
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"Being a young player and you go through that season and everybody's doing their part and put in all the work and I don't want to say it was easy, but it was, you just kind of felt like we could do no wrong," Campbell told the Free Press this week. "And you get to that point, we didn't win the Super Bowl, we lost vs. Baltimore , but yet you're like, 'Wow, I mean, this is going to happen every year. There's no way this doesn't happen every year.'
"And you come in the next year and you realize, 'Well, this wasn't as easy as it appeared to be.' You're starting over from scratch, things get off just a little bit, it's not the same players and pretty soon, I don't have another chance to get back until my last year and I'm on injured reserve with New Orleans , and that was basically nine years later at the end of my career. So that's – you try to get that across to young players. You don't know when your opportunity's going to be there, and so what it is, you've got to make the most of it."
The Detroit Lions open the playoffs Sunday against the Los Angeles Rams , and Campbell has impressed that message upon his players for weeks.
Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell on the sidelines during action against the Carolina Panthers at Ford Field in Detroit on Sunday, Oct, 8, 2023.
This could be your year, and if it's your one and only chance to summit the NFL's most exclusive mountain, don't let it go to waste.
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The 2000 Giants lost to the Ravens, 34-7, in one of the most lopsided Super Bowls of all-time, went 7-9 and missed the playoffs the next season and Campbell has been chasing a return trip to the game ever since.
He was on the Saints roster in 2009 when New Orleans beat the Indianapolis Colts , 31-17, in Super Bowl XLIV, but didn't get a ring that year because he spent the season at home in Texas rehabbing from an injury.
Campbell calls it "my own fault" he didn't get a ring, but also admits, "I didn't earn that."
"I would tell you this right now, had I stayed and been around the team and been a part of it, I would have gotten one," he said. "So I'm not bitter about that. Shoot, I made my own bed there. But I was also — look, I wasn't in a good place, either with it. I was frustrated and I just, in my own head, and it's not right, but I'm like, 'I didn't do anything to earn this anyway. I'm not here, I'm not a part of it,' so it's all good."
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As a player, Campbell played on two playoff teams in New York and one with the Dallas Cowboys . He lost back-to-back wild-card games in 2002-03, and didn't make it back to the postseason for another 14 years, until he was an assistant with the Saints in 2017.
Cowboys tight end Dan Campbell celebrates as he runs off the field after beating the Giants, 19-3, Dec. 21, 2003 to clinch a playoff berth.
The Saints split two playoff games that season in their first of four straight postseason appearances, and a year later, had a team Campbell and others felt was destined for the Super Bowl.
Drew Brees was nearing the end of his soon-to-be Hall of Fame career and the Saints won 13 games with a young, talented roster. Yet in the blink of an eye, their Super Bowl dreams went kaput when officials missed a late pass interference penalty that would have all but clinched the NFC title.
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"You fall short and it's devastating," Campbell said. "And, look, I'm not going to lie, especially when you lose the way we lost, it just crushes you. But it also motivates you. Once you get over it, it motivates you to want to get back to that and get a taste of that again, and not just get a taste and do it, to do it over and over and over. To be able to sustain and be competitive every year and have a shot every year, that's what it's about."
Campbell isn't the only one in the Lions locker room motivated by his own missed opportunities.
New Orleans Saints assistant head coach and tight end coach Dan Campbell during pregame of a playoff game against the Philadelphia Eagles at Mercedes-Benz Superdome, Jan. 13, 2019.
C.J. Gardner-Johnson was a rookie on that 2018 Saints team that lost to Jared Goff and the Los Angeles Rams in overtime in the NFC championship game. He said that loss is too hard to talk about even now.
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"If I reflect on what happened in New Orleans, (excrement's) going to piss me off," he said. "We was too good to (bleeping) fall short, but that's not on for me to really get into. That's like a deep, deep, deep, deep, deep conversation."
Alex Anzalone , another starter on that Saints team, said he's "still not over" the loss.
"I still get pissed off thinking about it," he said. "Just cause what was on the line. I think that you just – and it was so blatant. It wasn't like the reporting eligible and (the referee) got confused. It wasn't that. It was like completely blatant, game-sealing play. Yeah, it just sucked."
As obvious as the missed penalty was, Anzalone said he still beats himself up over other plays in the game, including a touchdown he allowed on a short pass in the third quarter when he was a split-second late reacting to the play.
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The Saints kicked a field goal one play after the missed penalty to take a 23-20 lead with 1:41 left, but the Rams tied the game on the ensuing possession and won in OT. Goff, receiver Josh Reynolds and long snapper Jake McQuaide were on that Rams team.
Rams defensive back Nickell Robey-Coleman very obviously interferes with Saints receiver Tommylee Lewis in the fourth quarter of the NFC championship game.
"My biggest thought process is having no regrets because I still have plays in my head from playoff experiences that are like, 'Damn, I wish I would have had that play back,'" Anzalone said. "I still think about it every now and again, so this is just how critical it is to, you don't necessarily have to play like an All-Pro player, you just have to do your job at a high level and it'll be enough."
The Lions had one of the youngest rosters in the NFL this season, with rookie or second-year players in key roles up and down the lineup on both sides of the ball. They also have veterans with extensive playoff experience at key spots.
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Goff is 2-3 in the playoffs with four touchdown passes and two interceptions . He started on the Rams team that lost Super Bowl LIII to the New England Patriots , 13-3.
Gardner-Johnson has played in six postseason games, including last year's Super Bowl with the Philadelphia Eagles .
Anzalone was on four Saints teams that made the playoffs, though he missed the postseason twice with injuries.
And Graham Glasgow and Taylor Decker were on the last Lions team that made the playoffs in 2016, when they lost to the Seattle Seahawks , 26-6, in a wild-card game.
Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford looks to pass while left tackle Taylor Decker, right, blocks Seahawks defensive end Michael Bennett during the third quarter of an NFL playoff game Saturday, Jan. 7, 2017 at CenturyLink Field in Seattle.
Campbell said the Lions intentionally built their roster with experienced veterans who can relay to the young players around them the importance of seizing the moment, and the Lions coaching staff is filled with hardened postseason vets, too, including special teams coordinator Dave Fipp, who won a Super Bowl with the Eagles.
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"My favorite thing about the playoffs, and everybody and every coach says it every single year, and they say it most games that they play in, but the truth in this one is you got to find a way to win one game," Fipp said. "And it's against those guys, it's going to be Sunday night at 8 o'clock and you only got to play them one time and you just got to find a way to win that one game."
To beat the Rams, the Lions will have to shut down Matthew Stafford and L.A.'s high-powered offense . Cooper Kupp and Puka Nacua form one of the best receiving tandems in the NFL, Kyren Williams finished third in the league in rushing despite missing five games, and Stafford, the former Lions quarterback, was named to the Pro Bowl on the original ballot for the first time in his career.
San Francisco 49ers assistant coach Anthony Lynn, left, talks with Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford after the regular season finale in Santa Clara, Calif., Sunday, Jan. 7, 2024.
The Rams also have one of the best defensive players on the planet in Aaron Donald , and a coach who has won a Super Bowl in Sean McVay.
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Campbell, in his third season with the Lions and 25th in the NFL as a player and coach, is chasing that ring himself with a keen understanding of what it takes to get there.
"Once you've had a taste of the playoffs and then once you get to that game, you have a whole different perspective on what it's about to play this game," he said. "It makes you do things different. It makes you, very quickly (realize) it's not about you, it's not about the paycheck, it's strictly being the best of the best."
Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com . Follow him @davebirkett .
Next up: Rams
Matchup: Lions (12-5) vs. L.A. Rams (10-7), NFC wild-card playoff.
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Kickoff: 8 p.m. Sunday; Ford Field, Detroit.
TV/radio: NBC; WXYT-FM (97.1).
Line: Lions by 3.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Dan Campbell knows NFL playoff failure. Here's his message for Lions.
