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Are the Lions evil? Players call it another case of 'media hype'

Good vs. evil.

Yeah, that was a stretch.

Still, these Detroit Lions -- suddenly ferocious after a decades-long nap -- have built a rep for playing physical football.

Look, they're just not a cuddly bunch, but "evil" -- to Tim Tebow's "good"? Lions players had a field day with that headline, posted this week on NFL.com in preview of Sunday's Detroit-Denver tilt.

"(Defensive coordinator Gunther Cunningham) showed us something today," Lions linebacker Stephen Tullochtold the Detroit Free Press. "It was funny. It was on NFL Network, on the website. It said 'Good versus evil' and they had Tebow and they had (Ndamukong) Suh on the front cover.

"... Obviously, the media has kind of looked at the team as a 'dirty team' at some point. But that's not the way we play. We're just a physical team that loves to go out there and play hard."

Wide receiver Maurice Stovall laughed it off.

"It's just media hype, and if you're the type of player to succumb to that hype, then you need to sit down and look at yourself in the mirror," he said. "I think it's more of a joke, more funny than it is serious, and we don't take that serious. And I'm sure the Broncos don't take that serious, either."

Not unlike the NBA's "Bad Boy" Pistons so many years ago -- led by a madman -- these Lions aren't about to apologize for beating up teams.