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Lions coach Jim Caldwell has his team playing fast and loose. (Mike Mulholland | MLive.com)

ALLEN PARK -- Dominic Raiola is the Detroit Lions' elder statesman, a 14-year veteran who has seen a bit of everything.

Except cornhole.

That's a new one, even for him.

The game is exceedingly popular in backyards across America. It is a staple at summer barbecues, and the tailgates that encircle Ford Field on Sundays. And now it has penetrated the Lions' locker room.

Not the players' lounge. The actual locker room.

And this is serious business.

"Imma give you the business!" tailback Theo Riddick shouts at receiver Jeremy Ross as the locker room opened to the media recently. "You can't touch this. YOU CAN'T TOUCH THIS."

Cornhole, for the uninitiated, usually pits two teams of two against each other. Players try to throw a bean bag through a hole in a wooden platform. That's pretty much it.

Players aren't really sure where this cornhole set came from. It just appeared one day a few weeks ago, set up near where the receivers and tailbacks get dressed.

And it looks like some of them have serious game. That includes Riddick, who is normally soft-spoken in the locker room, but spits fire when he's playing cornhole.

"What can I say?" he said. "We fight."

Yeah. This team is loose.

The Detroit Lions lead the NFC North after blazing to a 7-2 start. They've conjured three straight fourth-quarter comebacks, and have won four straight overall. That's certainly a source of the good vibes around Allen Park these days.

"When you're winning, there's a lot more smiles than frowns, right?" Riddick said.

But whereas previous Lions teams would collapse under the weight of expectation at this point in the season, this one is playing it cool. That emanates from coach Jim Caldwell.

"I was reading the book '1776' some weeks ago, and (George Washington) told his troops to 'Be cool and determined,'" Caldwell said. "I think that was just an early way of saying exactly what we're trying to say, in terms of loose and aggressive.

"I think our guys have bought into that, and understand it."

Caldwell planted these seeds a long time ago, in the offseason, when he added a ping pong table to the players' lounge. That table in many ways has become the epicenter of action away from the practice field, with players such as Darius Slay, Rashean Mathis and Joique Bell slugging it out to determine who is best.

(Most players say it's Rashean Mathis. Darius Slay says it's Darius Slay.)

Caldwell also added an Xbox so players could fire up the FIFA, a favorite video game amongst the team. Now there's the cornhole.

Why?

"I do think that a team can't play well uptight. That's always been my philosophy," Caldwell said. "When you're loose, I feel that you're very confident and you know what you're doing. But it takes practice to do that."

The effects are unmistakable.

For example, players are actually staying later than required in the building just to hang out with each other.

"We engage a lot more with each other, I would say," Riddick said. "We stay here a little longer now. Practice is done by 4, but a lot of guys leave a lot later than that. Either playing video games or cornhole or things like that."

That, you have to understand, is not usual. Players have lives, and families, and money that allows many of them to do whatever they want in their free time.

But many of these guys choose to spend their free time with each other, which has helped fuse a bond stronger than anything these players have experienced in Detroit.

The offensive line is going out for regular dinners. So is the defensive line, including every Saturday before road games.

Golden Tate has had players over to his house to play video games and cards. Calvin Johnson has done the same. Matthew Stafford hosted a Halloween party, where best-dressed could have gone to him, for dressing like the Will Ferrell character from "Semi-Pro," or tight end Jordan Thompson, who hilariously dressed up like stairs.

You know, the stairs where Joseph Fauria chased his urinating puppy.

Stafford and Raiola have spent some quality center-quarterback time away from the field, including hopping a private jet to Cleveland on Monday night to catch the Cavaliers' game against the Pelicans.

Caldwell has created an atmosphere that allows his players to better understand each other away from the facility. Safety Glover Quin said that message has helped create a family-type environment in the locker room.

"You bring family around, you play games, and that stuff translates into the locker room," he said. "We have fun with each other, our families have fun with each other, the coaches allow us to do those things and bring our families around. And it's crept into the locker room.

"And when you go out there on Sundays, you're not playing with a co-worker, you're playing with your brother. You're playing for your brother. And you tend to do things a little more, and a little better, when you're playing for your brother and not just yourself."

This kind of approach might not work with a younger team, which needs more structure and guidance to help players avoid the trappings of the NFL lifestyle. But this approach suits a veteran team well.

It certainly suits the Lions well.

They are rolling, which means the stakes are rising. But nothing seems to faze them. Not even a cornhole board in the middle of the locker room.

"Our belief, our mind-set, on Sunday, is simple. 'Win, period,'" Raiola said. "I don't know if we're winning because we're loose, or if we're loose because we're winning.

"But every week, we find a way to win."

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