Larry Foote hopes for turnaround after bye

Lions linebacker Larry Foote hasn’t seen his team at the bottom of the league often, but he has seen it before.

In 2003, his second year with Pittsburgh, the Steelers went 6-10. Much like the Lions’ 1-5 start this season, the Steelers were 2-4 before their bye week.

“It was brutal,” Foote said. “It’s not fun when you’re losing. You win once, and you can just tell how happy the vibe is with coaches, everybody. Your mistakes are not blasted all over the place. You’ve got to win. Winning cures everything.”

Winning is the panacea of the NFL. Anything less leads to panic.

“You’re not happy,” Foote said. “In this league, when you’re losing, the feeling around this building, my household, even my wife, my dog, everybody’s just — if we were 5-1 it’d be 360 (degrees). But that’s what makes this league so good, because it’s real competitive. Any team, you look around the league, you see the Denver Broncos, they’re undefeated. You see those stories, but collectively we’ve got to make that decision that we’re going to turn this around.”

As the Lions take a few days off before returning for their final 10 games, Foote can only hope players return with a new resolve.

“Well, I can say that but we won’t know that till next Sunday,” he said. “We better. Hopefully these guys respond like I think they can, and they should, and we’ll come back rejuvenated and ready to go.”

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