National Football League

Lions, Redskins, Bucs and Titans hit the skids

Published Oct. 26, 2011 12:12 a.m. ET

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Here's an obscure bit of trivia: Only once in NFL history have Detroit, Washington, Tampa Bay and Tennessee made the playoffs in the same year.

That was in 1999. The Lions haven't been back since.

The Redskins and Buccaneers, meanwhile, have been absent from the postseason for three years. The Titans have been away for two.

So when all four teams held shares of first place in their respective divisions three weeks ago, they were deemed part of the fresh wave of rising teams. At one point, the Lions were 5-0. The Redskins, Buccaneers and Titans all reached 3-1.

Not so fast. Since then, they are a collective 1-8.

It's a lesson to be learned: Teams searching for a winning identity are often haunted by the ghosts of losing pasts.

''We obviously got off to a good start and we had some momentum,'' Detroit coach Jim Schwartz said after Sunday's 23-16 loss to Atlanta. ''It is a long season. We have a lot of players that understand that, a lot of players that have been through a lot of tough times. We knew there was going to be some rough spots that we had to persevere through. This is one of them.''

No one is saying the season is over for any member of the back-to-earth quartet. It's just as dangerous to bury a team after a two-game slide as it is to proclaim it a division champ after a four-game surge. The Lions (5-2) would make the playoffs if they started today, while the Bucs (4-3), Redskins (3-3) and Titans (3-3) are still very much in contention.

But if the NFL were a stock market, all four would have a down arrow next to their names. And momentum can be a hard thing to change.

''We've very disappointed in ourselves,'' Washington linebacker Brian Orakpo said following a 13-point loss to a Carolina team that had previously won only one game. ''On paper, we should be beating the teams that we lost to, but the good thing about it is there's always another week. There's 10 more weeks left and we can really make something happen.''

For Lions, it could be a matter of simply learning how to cope with success. The talented players they've accumulated in their recent drafts are young and hungry, but they're also trying to change a culture where losing had become habitual.

For the Redskins, it's still a matter of trying to settle on a franchise quarterback, a problem they've had for some two decades. Rex Grossman has been benched in favor of John Beck, whose job is made more difficult because of injuries to five offensive starters.

For the Bucs, it's largely a matter of getting young players to do something young players don't do very well - be consistent. Third-year quarterback Josh Freeman is a prime example: His four interceptions in Sunday's 24-18 loss to Chicago in London give him 10 picks on the season, putting him on pace to be more like the rookie edition of himself (18 interceptions) and less like last year's version (6) when Tampa Bay barely missed the postseason with a 10-6 record.

''We've just got to grow up faster,'' Bucs coach Raheem Morris said last week.

In case the message wasn't clear, he said essentially the same thing Sunday: ''We deserved the loss. We played unsmart. We got to grow up faster.''

For the Titans, it's a matter of rediscovering the running game that has been so integral to the franchise for a long time. They've had a 1,000-yard rusher each season since 1996, but this year they are averaging a mere 64.3 yards rushing per game - last in the NFL.

''It's new territory for us, for this team,'' Tennessee coach Mike Munchak said following a 41-7 loss to Houston, the worst home defeat since the Titans moved into their current stadium in 1999. ''We've had spurts in the run game over the years that we weren't running well for a period of time, we'd had two or three bad games, but usually we come out of it and the kind of the talk would go on to something else. ... We've just got to find ways to get more opportunities at it and improve it. Not being able to run the ball doesn't help.''

Now it's the job of the four coaches to make sure the skids don't snowball and ruin the season. Easier said than done. Asked how he can best address his team's mentality, Washington's Mike Shanahan offered a simple answer that's not simple to achieve.

''We have to win,'' he said. ''That's the nature of the game. We have to find a way to win.''

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AP Sports Writers Noah Trister in Detroit; Fred Goodall in Tampa, Fla.; and Teresa M. Walker in Nashville, Tenn., contributed to this report.

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Joseph White can be reached at http://twitter.com/JGWhiteAP

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