Now that we've had a couple days to sit with the Detroit Lions' escape in their season opener, it's clear that the season is over.
Finished.
Done.
So don't bother watching: The new offensive coordinator is bland (and probably not any good), and the secondary is obviously a mess, and the third receiver can't get open, and Ben Johnson darn near hung 60 on Carolina.
Fifty-nine, to be exact, and if Johnson's prediction/hope for the highest-scoring offense in NFL history back in the summer turns out to be true, and the Chicago Bears – the BEARS – have a new place in the history of the NFL, then turn off the lights at Ford Field right now.
For good.
Everyone knows
that what happens in the first game of the season is what happens the rest of the way, which means Chicago will win the Super Bowl – probably by scoring 70 on the Buffalo Bills – and the Lions' former offensive coordinator will unleash an expletive-laced, all-time gloat.
Also, did we mention that the Lions secondary struggled Sunday?
Yeah, good. Because it did, especially in the fourth quarter, when the defensive line got tired, and New Orleans Saints QB Tyler Shough kept running around extending plays, and the defensive backs had to cover for 3 seconds, 4 seconds, 5 seconds, 6 seconds. ...
Not that covering NFL receivers for that long is hard. Wait ... it is? And the defensive backs actually depend on the fellas up front to not let the quarterback run around all day?
Now, this isn't to downplay the lack of playmakers in the secondary, especially at safety with Brian Branch and Kerby Joseph still out. Rather, it's to point out that the secondary played solidly until the big boys wore down, in part because the offense got stagnant.
That's a no-no around here, seeing as the Lions are built around their offense, for better or worse. The defense is better when the offense doesn't go three-and-out in the second half, or five-and-out, or whatever you want to call a drive that goes nowhere and doesn't chew up the clock.
They had too many of those Sunday, Sept. 13, at Ford Field. As Dan Campbell said, though, until those happened: "We were playing pretty good defense."
Why?
"We possessed the ball a little bit more in that first half," he said "and then we fizzled on offense. And so, if I'm going one way or another, I'm like, man, we got to be more efficient on offense. We kind of spit and sputtered there, and then they get more cracks at it. Then they've kind of found a little rhythm, you know, had some tempo going."
Tempo and rhythm are the enemies of defense, but it's harder to find them when the offense isn't fizzling. So, yeah, fret about the defensive backs and their lack of star power, or any wattage at all, really. And fret that Joseph may not come back this season and that Branch may come back a fraction of who he was.
The worry is legitimate. It also demands context and perspective, which is to say, it demands that, while acknowledging the secondary is a long way from being a strength of the team, it may not need to be if the defensive line keeps playing as it did for the first three quarters Sunday and the offensive line finds its potential when center Cade Mays returns.
Clearly better in the trenches
Oh, and if both lines stay healthy.
If they do, the Lions will have a chance to get somewhere. That was clear Sunday, despite them needing overtime, despite the blown 21-point lead, despite the dropped passes and the stalled drives and the huffing and puffing on the D-line in the final stretch of the game.
The Lions are better in the trenches than they were a year ago. How much is hard to say. This guarantees nothing, of course, but it does offer the team a sturdier foundation, and a higher ceiling.
Whether they get there depends on many things. But the path back to the playoffs runs through the lines. It may not be clear yet, but the opening is there, especially on the offensive line, which showed more push and connectedness than it did last season. They've got a couple of promising young players in Tate Ratledge and Blake Miller, and if Mays shows why the Lions prioritized him in offseason free agency, the line will only get better.
As for the defensive line? There is promise, too, and depth, and while the pressure rate for most of the game was buoyed by Kelvin Sheppard's blitzes, the D-line caused trouble on its own.
How much trouble the unit offers as the season goes depends on the growth of some youngsters and the wind of everyone when the game settles into the second half. Because the defensive line clearly got tired Sunday.
The answer to that, second-year tackle Tyliek Williams told reporters Sunday, is to "get in shape."
Also?
"Don't play with your food."
Too confident? Perhaps. But he's got a point. The Lions played with their food, rather than gulping down a dominant win. Partly because the defensive line wore down. Partly because they played too many snaps in a row. The offensive has to help with that.
Campbell is right.
The season depends on it.
Contact Shawn Windsor: swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Same old secondary? Not so fast, especially if Lions DL can find 60 minutes
