Yes, Matt Patricia's Detroit Lions tenure was as bad as you think
Matt Patricia's Detroit Lions tenure came to a end Saturday, when he was fired along with Bob Quinn after two-plus seasons of bad football.
By numbers alone, Patricia will go down as one of the four worst coaches in franchise history by winning percentage, and he's the only full-time Lions coach to neither beat the Chicago Bears nor the Minnesota Vikings since Detroit began playing each franchise twice a year in 1961.
Here's an inside-the-numbers looks at just how poor Patricia's coaching tenure was:
Kings of Woe-town
Patricia's 13-29-1 record gives him a .314 winning percentage, fourth worst in franchise history in the Super Bowl era. The five worst coaches in franchise history:
1. Marty Mornhinweg
Tenure: 2001-02
Record: 5-27-0
Win%: .156
2. Rod Marinelli
Tenure: 2006-08
Record: 10-38-0
Win%: .208
3. Darryl Rogers
Tenure: 1985-88
Record: 18-40-0
Win%: .310
4. Matt Patricia
Tenure: 2018-2020
Record: 13-29-1
Win%: .314
5. Steve Mariucci
Tenure: 2003-05
Record: 15-28-0
Win%: .349
Bear-y, Bear-y bad
Patricia's failures in the rugged NFC North underscore his downfall.
His tenure ends with a 0-5 record against both the Bears and Vikings, an infamous statistic considering even Mornhinweg and Marinelli, who had two of the worst coaching tenures in NFL history, were able to beat both of the division rivals.
Patricia's only redeeming effort in the NFC North: a 2-3 record against the Green Bay Packers. Neither Mornhinweg nor Marinelli beat the Packers.
Blown leads and a long skid
The Lions never had Super Bowl-winning talent under Patricia — and a back injury to Matthew Stafford in 2019 magnified some deficiencies — but Patricia still had more to work with than Marinelli, who oversaw the first 0-16 team in NFL history in 2008, when future Hall of Famer Calvin Johnson was a rookie and Stafford still was playing college football at Georgia.
Under Patricia, the Lions lost nine games in which they held double-digit leads, the most in the NFL since 2018, and they suffered 11 straight losses between the 2019-20 seasons, the third-longest streak in franchise history.
Marinelli's tenure overlapped with the Lions' longest losing streak — 19 games, third-most in NFL history — and Mornhinweg contributed 12 of the 13 straight losses between the 2000-01 seasons for the franchise's second-worst mark.
Double trouble
Patricia's Lions lost 15 games by double digits, or nearly 35% of the time during his tenure. The double-digit loss percentage ranks as the second-worst among the five worst coaches in franchise history. The ranking:
1. Rod Marinelli
Losses by double digits: 20 in 48 games
Double-digit loss percentage: .417
2. Matt Patricia
Losses by double digits: 15 in 43 games
Double-digit loss percentage: .348
3. Marty Mornhinweg
Losses by double digits: 10 in 32 games
Double-digit loss percentage: .313
4. Darryl Rogers
Losses by double digits: 18 in 58 games
Double-digit loss percentage: .310
5. Steve Mariucci
Losses by double digits: 13 in 43 games
Double-digit loss percentage: .302
Chris Thomas is the sports editor at the Detroit Free Press. Contact him at cdthomas@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @bychristhomas.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Yes, Matt Patricia's Detroit Lions tenure was as bad as you think
