One of the more interesting questions from Dan Campbell’s Friday press conference was about how he can regain confidence in the Detroit Lions defense. In short, what did he need to see in Sunday’s game against the Arizona Cardinals to make him feel better about the direction of the defense.
Campbell’s answer was basically three-fold: force turnovers, get to the quarterback, and cut down significantly on the missed assignment and missed executions.
It’s a fair answer, but probably not one that makes
Lions fans feel good enough about the state of the defense. So for today’s Question of the Day, I’m going to ask you the exact same question Campbell was asked:
What would make you feel good about the direction of the defense going into the bye? What benchmarks do you want to see?
My answer: First of all, I want y’all to put your thinking caps on. I know I’m probably going to get at least 50 “Fire Sheppard” answers here, but let’s dig a little deeper.
Before we do, I think it’s at least exploring if there’s anything Detroit can do on Sunday to build faith in the defense. We have to recognize that the Cardinals are not a very good offense right now, and that any “improvement” we see from the Lions could also just be interpreted as facing a poor offense.
That said, I just need to see this team be assignment sound. If Trey McBride and Michael Wilson just win their 1-on-1s, I can live with that as long as Detroit doesn’t have any glaring mental mistakes. If there are terrible run fits, wide open spaces in zones, and failed communications in the secondary, then Detroit can produce as many takeaways as they want—I won’t feel good about this defense making any progress.
If you want to shorten that to one statistical benchmark: no rushes of over 15 yards allowed vs. the Cardinals. The explosive-prone run defense needs to stop or this team has no hope.
Still, I don’t think there’s a ton Detroit can do to make me believe the defense will turn things around based on a single performance against a subpar offense. But they can certainly show progress and lead me to believe they can at least string together some acceptable games of defense.
What specifically—besides firing Kelvin Sheppard—do you want to see this week from the Lions defense?
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