With the group outing just over a week away, it's probably time we start putting together a plan for the tailgate.

We have 18 people sitting with the group this year, but the tailgate is open to anyone. If you aren't sitting with the group and plan on attending the tailgate, please mention it in the comments below so we have an idea of how many people to plan for.

I plan on parking in the same location as last year unless there are any objections or better ideas (Woodward between Henry and Sibley). There is plently of safe parking in the area for $20 and there are a couple $5 and $10 lots if you are daring and don't really care too much about your car's well being. I know the last time I went, the parking attendant asked me if I needed to save any parking spaces next to me for others in my group...I'm not going to try to get them to save a ton of spots, but it would be nice to have 1 or 2 other vehicles next to me so we have a little more room to spread out. I will be getting there at 9:30am. Are there any volunteers to get there that early to get those parking spots?

I will bring a grill, a couple tables and a big pot of chili. I know Enforcer is bringing some food...I think burgers and brats. We need people to bring plates, bowls, plastic ware, condiments, buns, chips, cups, beverages, and anything else you can think of. Please don't offer to bring something and then show up at noon!

Tickets will be handed out at the tailgate. If you don't know if you can make it, email me your address at shernandez3@yahoo.com and I will send them to you.

Looking forward to seeing everyone there!

I talked to the account rep today.  I still don't know if Monday Night Football will be available, but we need to make some decisions here....group tickets will be going on sale Aug 3rd.  He confirmed something I have been worried about for a few weeks...if MNF is available, we will need to pay in full immediately to make sure we don't miss out.  I was considering floating the payment for everyone, but that would require me knowing the exact # of people going without having any cash to back up those claims.  Considering we had over 40 people claim they were interested last year and 9 show up, I'm not willing to take that chance.  I don't mind getting stuck with a few extra tickets, but 20-30 would suck.

I have been talking with Enforcer about our options and we decided we should put it up to a vote.  Both options will require payment by Aug 2nd! 

Option 1)  Just plan on going to the Falcons game on 10/23 and forget about MNF

Option 2)  Still keep MNF open as an option.  This would mean people who only want to go if we get tickets to MNF will still have to pay by Aug 2nd.  When you purchase tickets you would send me an email stating your intention...you only want them if we go to MNF or you bought 4 but only want 2 if it is for the Falcons, etc...  I would keep track of how many to get in either scenario and would also keep a list of people who have a refund coming if we don't get MNF.  I am pretty sure I can refund directly to your credit card on PayPal, but if not, I will deposit the money from PayPal into my bank account and write you a personal check.  I have your mailing address once you order, so I can just mail the check to your house.

However this poll stands at the end of the day tomorrow (let's say 10p.m.) is the final decision.  Then go to www.podgroupouting.blogspot.com and get your money in.  If you already know you are going either way, you can pay now.  Let's make sure we have enough to get the group rate this year...we have 6 committed already, we need at least 15.  If option 2 is selected, email me at shernandez3@yahoo.com to let me know if you only want the tickets if it is MNF.  I assume the people who already bought their tickets are in either way???

Tomorrow is the day I was told we would find out if the Monday Night tickets will be available to groups.  I have a feeling it will be delayed until the lockout ends, but that hopefully is coming soon as well.  Either way, everyone needs to be ready to head over to the paypal link and buy their tickets.

www.podgroupouting.blogspot.com

You can buy tickets now if you are going whether we get Monday Night or the backup game (10/23 Falcons)

We need to have 15+ to get the group price and be able to buy in advance to the individual game tickets going on sale.

I will update everyone as soon as I hear from our account rep.  Unfortunately, I have been unable to access POD at work the last couple weeks (it's not our firewall, it just doesn't work for some reason), but I will either text Enforcer and/or Profiler with the update so they can post it, or I will post it from my phone (I'm sure I can, I just haven't tried before).

If the Monday Night game is available, they will probably be in high demand, so we may need to collect money quickly.  Be ready and check for updates!

We had a tie in our voting so let's vote again with only the top 2 vote getters as options.  I was going to throw the K.C. game in there as well since it only lost by 1 vote, but there were only 3 votes total for anything other than the top 3 vote getters, so not much would really change. 

Here are the results so you don't have to go looking for the old post:

K.C. - 6 votes

San Fran - 1 vote

Atlanta - 7 votes

Carolina - 0 votes

Minnesota - 7 votes

San Diego - 2 votes

Whatever the result is this time will be our backup plan if there is a group restriction placed on MNF.

I haven't heard any news on whether or not we will be able to purchase group tickets for the Monday night game yet, but I did talk to my account rep and they are still saying they won't release any info until June.  He also said group tickets will go onsale in June.  Due to higher than usual ticket sales, we really should get our tickets as soon as possible.  Just so we are ready, let's pick a backup game in case we can't get the monday night game.

In the mean time, I will work on getting our paypal link up.  The price will be the same no matter which game we pick. (approx $48) At this point, I only intend to give 1 week to get your money in, so just assume you will need to pay by June 8th or 9th.  There are a lot of unknowns right now, so let's just plan for the worst case.

I left Thanksgiving out on purpose.  Our account rep said they may be implementing the same 'no group' rule for thanksgiving as they are considering for Monday night.  also, keep in mind, if we are tailgaiting, the later season games have the potential for crappy weather. 

Please don't vote if you don't have any intentions to go.

I've been talking with Enforcer about this years group outing.  He expressed some interest in trying to get a group together for the Monday Night Game.  If we get 15+ we can buy tickets before the individual game tickets go on sale.  I was wondering what every thought about it.  Should we do the Monday night game as the group outing, or does that make it difficult for some people?

The two of us decided we should just make the decision to sit in the cheap seats so we don't eliminate anyone because of price.  We should be able to get tickets for about $45 with service charges and paypal charges. 

Let's not do what we did last time....if you have no intention to go, please don't vote on the poll.  We had over 70 votes last time and only had 9 people go.  I know things come up for some people, but not 61 out of 70.

I know this isn't football or Lions related, but I am excited and extremely concerned and want to let everyone know and want to ask for your thoughts and prayers!

Caiden Hernandez born 12/2/2010

Caiden is in the Neonatal ICU at UofM and has a brain aneurysm, an enlarged heart, slightly underdeveloped lungs, and is having seizures.  We are confindent in the team of doctors here, and know he has the heart of a Lion!

Hey guys, we are only one week away from the Jets game so we are running out of time to plan our tailgate.  8 of us purchased tickets together, but I recall seeing a few others mention that they wanted to get together with us.  I guess the first step in planning this is getting an idea of how many people we should plan for.  We also need to figure out what time we should get started and where we should have it.  I haven't done a tailgate before so I don't really know the best place to have it.  I normally park along woodward near sibley.  It is $20 and easy to get in and out of without having to deal with traffic.  I have seen some tailgating in those lots in the past...I will pay closer attention when I go down there today to see where exactly they allow it.  I know that most of the 8 people are coming together from the Grand Rapids area, so I am guessing you guys won't have a ton of room to bring stuff with you.  I will have room to bring a few things.  I can probably get a hold of a couple of small propane grills and could also bring a table or two.  My personal feeling is to keep the food simple...maybe some brats, hot dogs, and chili or something like that.  I don't mind being in charge of that stuff considering the fact I owe the people that already bought tickets $6 each because they ended up overpaying for the tickets...hopefully if I supply that stuff we can just call it even.  I figure others can be in charge of chips, condiments, drinks (I don't drink and never have, so you don't want me in charge of booze), etc.

Let's just start getting some ideas out there and figuring out how many to plan for.  I am open to any food suggestions as well as suggestions on a better location since I have never done this before.  See you guys next week!!!

I will be purchasing the tickets for the so called Group Outing tomorrow morning.  If you want in, go to www.podgroupouting.blogspot.com and buy your tickets tonight.  The price on the link (group rate) is only accurate if we get 7 more people....otherwise, you will owe me an additional $10 the day of the game.  We should get pretty good seats because tickets don't really go on sale until Thursday...today and tomorrow are season ticket holder presales.  All of the info icluding date, price, location of seats, etc. can be found at the link.

I've got some bad news and some good news.  First the bad news....I just found out why I haven't been hearing back from our account rep for the last couple of weeks.  He no longer works for the Detroit Lions.  He was the ticket sales manager and was a big help figuring all of this out and he was the guy that offered to get a couple of us on the field.

The good news is that our new account representative is the Director of Ticket Sales and will help us out in getting all of this set up.  According to him, we need to wrap everything up by the end of the day on Thursday July 29th.  I will purchase the tickets on the 30th.  He said group ticket purchases are coming in strong for the Jets game and if we wait beyond the end of the month it will be hard to find a block of seats together the size we need (60-75 hopefully).

here is the link to the PayPal account:  www.podgroupouting.blogspot.com

Hey everyone, there wern't any objections to the $64 LL Endzone seats so I have opened up the PayPal link. 

Just go to http://podgroupouting.blogspot.com/ and follow the directions on the site.

We should be able to keep this open for payment until early July.  The account rep is going to let me know when we really need to start thinking about getting the order in.  I will give everyone a couple of days notice before I shut it down.

Also, I don't do a whole lot of posting on here...I wanted to make this a new post so everyone sees it, but I don't want all of the recommended fans posts to be on the same subject.  Do I need to do something to put the other two posts back in the regular fanpost section or is that something Sean needs to do?

Here is a link to the group seating chart on the Lions website
http://www.detroitlions.com/tickets/group-sales.html

Our account manager said it would be safe to leave the PayPal account open until early July and still get good seats.  Sometime in July Individual tickets will go on sale and it will get a little tougher to get large groups of seats together.

Also, he said there is some talk that the Jets game is going to get moved to a primetime slot by the NFL!  He will let us know immediately if that happens.

I talked to the ticket sales manager about the possible group outing.  He said there shouldn't be a problem getting up to 50 seats together (doesn't matter which game) if we purchase them when the group tickets go on sale in about 2 months.  He suggested the all you can eat seats...they include Brats,hot dogs, nachos and cheese, popcorn, chips, water, and soft drinks. 

$79 will get us in sections 236-246 or

$89 will get us in sections  118-121

I can get some more info from him once we have a better idea of how many, which game, etc.