The Monday morning quarterbacks were out in full force, questioning everything about the Detroit Lions following their alarming 32-26 loss to the Carolina Panthers on Sunday. Dan Campbell understands their concerns, particularly as they relate to the team’s beleaguered secondary.
“I know there’s some frustration and there’s a lot of worry, there’s a lot of anxiety over what it is,” the Lions coach told reporters Monday, Oct. 5. “But I’m a big believer [that] we can improve what’s here right now. ... So yeah, listen, I know what it is. I understand what it is, but I'm also not in panic mode. I've got to get these guys better. We have to get these guys better collectively. And some of that is the other two units picking up the slack in some areas.
It's not just one unit.”
Yet, it’s clear the most glaring problem that must be fixed is a defense that has surrendered the most points and yards per game in the NFL this season. Fans have pinned the blame for its poor performance on coordinator Kelvin Sheppard. But while Campbell never mentioned Sheppard’s name in his 12-minute news conference, he seemed to speak on his behalf by saying the team planned to exhaust every avenue internally – including personnel and scheme – to find solutions.
“We're still looking at everything that we've got here from our own roster to the practice squad, to people that are here that are playing, to push them at different spots, and then different calls,” he said. “There are some other things that we can try.”
Campbell refused to expound on the possible changes. Instead, he wanted to shift the conversation elsewhere by repeatedly emphasizing that the team’s issues extend into other areas.
“I look at it in all three phases,” he said.
He particularly lamented the lack of “complementary football,” as he put it.
“When we start scoring on offense, we can't stop them on defense,” he said. “We finally get a couple of stops and then we only score once or you're settling for a field goal. Those are the things that we've got to clean up. And it's really about winning. It's about finding a way to win. And that's what we haven't done consistently yet.”
It has prompted some soul-searching on Campbell’s part. With a road game against Arizona on Sunday (4:25 p.m., Fox), he wants his team to turn inward and dabble in some introspection.
“Our focus is really us right now,” he said. “It's not even Arizona. Let's just make sure we really take a good look at us and see where we can go over the next 24 hours here before we start getting ready for Arizona.”
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The first order of business is cleaning up the self-inflicted mistakes. The Lions were flagged 13 times against Carolina and nine of those penalties were enforced. During one messy sequence in the fourth quarter, the Lions went backwards on consecutive snaps for 10 yards, after incurring a delay of game infraction and committing a false start. They were then left in a fourth-and-long situation at Carolina’s 25-yard line, which led to a speculative hook-and-ladder play that ultimately failed.
“We imploded a little bit at different times, and we weren't able to counter because of that,” he said. “So, to me, that's the starting point with all of this.”
Campbell accepted responsibility for the unforced errors, saying that he must “get that cleaned up.” But he also asserted that everyone between the white lines has “got to play smarter.”
“You've got to put the work in, and you've got to do the little things right in practice,” he later added. “And then they've got to translate into the games. It's one thing to do it when we're out here, we're on the turf, we're on our practice field. But all of a sudden, when you get the same looks and it's full speed, you can't panic.”
Campbell isn’t.
He is trying to remain calm and keep everything in perspective.
“At the end of the day,” he said, “we’re 2-2.”
Contact Rainer Sabin at rsabin@freepress.com. Follow him @RainerSabin on X.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Unlike Detroit Lions fans, Dan Campbell isn't in 'panic mode'
