Blackouts Loom for Detroit Lions

In the NFL, teams that don't sell out their home games at least 72 hours before kickoff are blacked out on local television. For fans in Detroit, that means that the only way to watch a lot of Lions home games this year will be to buy a ticket.

Last season, the Lions sold out only four of their eight regular-season home games. The year before that they sold out only three. This season it could be even worse, as USA Today reports that the NFL is projecting a league-wide decline in ticket sales.

USA Today surveyed all 32 NFL teams to ask whether they expected to have blackouts, and it's telling that the Lions were one of only three teams that declined to respond to the survey. If the Lions had good news to share about the pace of ticket sales for the 2010 season, they'd likely trumpet that news. Instead they're clamming up.

Realistically, there's not much hope for the Lions selling out all their home games. The first home game, Week 2 against the Eagles, stands a good chance of being a sellout because its the home opener. But the second home game comes Week 5 against the Rams, and the Lions will very likely be 0-4 (or at best 1-3) heading into that game. Are fans really going to pay their hard-earned money to watch a losing team (in all likelihood) play another losing team (in all likelihood)?

Between the lousy economy and a lousy football team in Detroit, it's hard to see how 60,000 people are going to fill up Ford Field on Sundays.