Dan Campbell is the best Detroit Lions coach in living memory, and it's not particularly close. His current .490 winning percentage is the best by a Lions coach since Wayne Fontes went 66-67 (.496) from 1988-96, and once he pushes the till above .500, he'll be the first Lions coach to do so since Joe Schmidt went 43-34 from 1967-72.
And neither Fontes nor Schmidt talked about biting peoples' kneecaps, cried when they talked about how meaningful the Lions are to them, nor did they star in their own Applebee's commercials.
Long story short, Campbell is -- while not technically the winningest -- the most beloved Lions coach ever, and certainly the coach with the highest local and national approval rating in college or professional football outside of perhaps Andy Reid and Kirby Smart.
But even all that hasn't made Campbell immune from the crazies in the Lions fan base.
Campbell told a local business publication in Detroit that he was forced to sell his 2-acre home because fans found his address online and visited after Lions losses.
"There's plenty of space. It's on 2 acres. The home is beautiful," Campbell told Crain's Detroit Business, via ESPN. "It's just that people figured out where we lived when we lost."
The home, a 7,800-square foot Cape Cod-style build in the Bloomfield Hills area of Detroit, was listed for $4.5 million and sold within a week, Crain's reported.
The Fox affiliate in Detroit reported that after the Campbells' address was posted online, pranksters sent a number of contractors to the home to perform repairs that weren't needed. Then, "pranks" graduated to harassment after the Lions lost the NFC Championship to San Francisco this past January. The Campbells eventually filed reports with the Bloomfield Township police department.
"I love our fans. Our fans are unbelievable," he said. "There's nowhere that I would want to be or any other team that I'd want to coach for. It's rare to have an environment like we have and to be able to coach here, play here and I tell our guys that all the time. This is a rare spot, and you better enjoy it because not every place has it like we have it."
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.