When the Detroit Lions hired Dan Campbell, we all knew we had to be patient. He and GM Brad Holmes were taking over a very bad roster that was in absolute shambles because of the previous regime of coach Matt Patricia and GM Bob Quinn.
It wasn’t just Campbell where Lions fans needed patience. We had to wait for the roster to get rebuilt inside and out, and we needed to see which coordinator was going to find success here. After all, both Ben Johnson and Aaron Glenn were first-time coordinators once they joined the Lions.
As time has gone on, we’ve seen the success for offensive coordinator Ben Johnson. Over the last two seasons, the Lions have had one of the better offensive units in football. Specifically this year, they’ve been ranked with the best offensive line (per PFF) and they’re one of the highest-scoring offenses in the NFL.
Defensively, it’s a different story.
With Aaron Glenn, he took over a defensive group that had big contracts for players such as Trey Flowers and Michael Brockers. However, the production was limited from those players. Fortunately, the Lions were able to draft defensive players that fit Aaron Glenn and his system. Those players included Aidan Hutchinson, Alex Anzalone, Malcolm Rodriguez, Kerby Joseph and now Brian Branch.
While the improvements have gradually happened on defense, there’s been plenty of resources put into it. Free agent signings and mid-round draft picks have all occurred but it feels like this defense should be playing better. Since Glenn has taken over the Lions defense, the Lions average points against per game have been the following:
- 2021: 27.5 PPG
- 2022: 25.1 PPG
- 2023: 23.5 PPG (through 11 games played)
Over the Lions last four games, they’re allowing 26.75 PPG and have either lost or have been close to losing in three of those games. For me, I can’t tell if the patience from the fan base on Aaron Glenn is starting to run thin or not, but I can assure you, he’s throwing everything out there to see what sticks for his defense.
Certainly, when things are going well, you don’t hear anything bad from the fans and when the going gets tough, everyone wants off the boat. From what I’ve watched throughout the season, there have been bright spots. But right now, everything defensively on the field is problematic. Let’s jump into the tape to breakdown some of the fundamentals and bizarre schematics from the Lions defense against the Packers.
One of the things that immediately stood out when watching the Lions defense against the Packers was how much motion the Packers used in the game. Per Sports Info Solutions (SIS), the Packers use motion 61% of the time (6th most in the NFL) on offense.
Particularly in this game, I think Green Bay knew that the Lions were going to be aligned in man coverage. Per SIS, the Lions run man coverage 26% of the time (ranked 15th in the NFL). When facing that man coverage, the Packers knew the motion would draw a defender away from a particular area of the field so they could attack it. They used motion, picked their spots and, most importantly, picked the Lions apart.
Looking at the play above, you can see the Packers come out with their 11 personnel (one tight end and one running back) and to the bottom of the screen, they’ve got a trips formation. Prior to the snap, quarterback Jordan Love sends wide receiver Jayden Reed on an exit motion towards the sideline. As the motion occurs, you’ll see the Lions shift their linebackers toward the motion and safety Tracy Walker starts to lurk closer to the line of scrimmage.
Once the ball is snapped, Walker blitzes and as you can see, Aidan Hutchinson is dealing with not one, not two but three blockers on his way to the quarterback. Meanwhile, the Lions are in a single-high Cover 1 look with their coverage. The dead giveaway is the safety in the middle of the field but also, watch linebacker Alex Anzalone. He’s in man coverage on that exit motion due to the Lions blitzing Tracy Walker off the edge.
With that, it opens a throwing window on the seam because Anzalone sprints to his man and cornerback Jerry Jacobs gets beat on the quick route. Sure in this instance, the Lions send a 5-man pressure and run-man coverage, but had they run a Cover 3 variation on defense with a 5-man pressure, it feels like that throwing window would have been covered. Football is a game of chess and on this particular play, Aaron Glenn and his defense got beat.
Staying with the man coverage looks from the Lions, the play above is very interesting. The Packers come out in an empty formation and the Lions are aligned in their nickel defense (4-2-5). At the top of the screen (right of the quarterback), the Lions have linebackers Derrick Barnes and Alex Anzalone bunched together. Behind them, the Lions show a two-high safety look so pre-snap it looks like Cover 2.
Once the ball is snapped, that Cover 2 look quickly turns into an inverted Cover 1 man coverage. In the middle of the field, they drop one safety back with single-high responsibilities and they funnel the other safety down. With a 4-man rush, the rest of the defense is in man coverage and the Packers call an almost perfect play with a mesh concept ran from their tight end and wide receiver.
On this play, the Packers are faced with a 3rd and 7 and the play resulted in a six-yard gain. Ultimately, the Lions stopped the Packers on 4th and 1 but if it wasn’t a tight end catching the ball and instead a faster receiver or running back, this could have been a touchdown.
The downside of the defensive call for the Lions is that they’re in man coverage with only a 4-man rush. It only takes one mismatch for the opposition to expose this defense and with the Lions consistently having two or three linebackers on the field with man coverage responsibilities, the likelihood of those mismatches and getting exposed becomes higher.
Moving to another odd observation from this game, let’s talk about the screenshot above. The Packers show an empty formation, and the Lions come out with a two-high look defensively. But look at the wide alignment from the Lions’ defense!
Aidan Hutchinson is aligned on the inside shoulder of the slot receiver (at the bottom of the screen) and covering that slot receiver is Alex Anzalone. We’ve all heard of the wide-9 but having your best pass rusher this far off is asinine. Meanwhile, the highlighted player above is Derrick Barnes. You better be a superb athlete to be put on an island like that. I’m not sure that Barnes is the correct choice here.
Fortunately for Detroit, the pass on the play above was incomplete on the slot fade to Christian Watson. However, he did get tied up with the defender and it could have potentially been flagged for pass interference. Ultimately, I found the alignment on defense very interesting and one that could get exposed down the road.
Moving away from the Lions defensive coverage, I want to focus on their pass rush. The defensive line has more depth than any unit for this defense, but yet the results have been lackluster. Aidan Hutchinson is doing everything he can, and there’s been splashes from Alim McNeill. Other than that, there’s been limitations with this group, particularly with the interior of the defensive line.
On tape, it feels like the interior defensive line tends to play more lateral than vertically up the field. That definitely contributes to the Lions being one of the better run defenses (5th-best) in the NFL, with 91.3 rushing yards allowed per game. However, the need for more pressure is real on this defense. The Lions only have 8 interceptions this season (tied for 20th in the NFL) and their 23 sacks this season are tied for the 26th in the NFL.
Looking at the play above, the Lions run a “Tempe” stunt with Aidan Hutchinson and Alim McNeill on the left side and Josh Paschal and Charles Harris on the right side. This stunt is essentially both defensive ends looping around the defensive tackles that “shoot” outside rather than inside.
For Charles Harris (#53), he gets beat by Packers right guard (#74) Elgton Jenkins with a snatch-trap technique. In addition to that, it looked like Harris and Paschal got caught on each other. When watching the Lions defensive lineman stunt, that appears to be a likely occurrence for this group. Finding ways to execute line stunts faster and cleaner could pay off for Detroit.
That said, I think the downside to this stunt is that the defensive front is too wide, and it gets complicated with linebacker Derrick Barnes being thrown in the middle of it. Much like McNeill, he also has to “shoot” outside and ultimately, it’s another body in the way of Hutchinson.
This essentially causes Hutchinson to have to loop across 3 or 4 gaps. Once teams realize how wide Hutchinson is aligned, they know they can either chip him with a tight end or running back. Especially if he’s going to run straight up the field. If he doesn’t have a straight rush, they know they can get rid of the ball quickly if he’s going to be used in a line stunt like the one above. If there was a more threatening presence along the Lions’ defensive line other than Hutchinson, I think teams would operate differently against this defense.
Lastly, I want to focus more on the fundamentals of this defense. As we know, the Lions have struggled with mobile quarterbacks and much of that is due to the way their defensive ends and linebackers play against zone-read and read-option plays.
Last week against the Bears, it was Aidan Hutchinson not playing disciplined. Against the Packers, it was Alex Anzalone. Looking at the play above, you’ll see the Packers use pre-snap motion to get aligned in a trips formation. With that, the Lions follow the motion and essentially put linebacker Alex Anzalone on an island.
He’s aligned off-the-edge and he knifes inside to try and stop the running back. However, Jordan Love does a great pulling this ball and keeping it to make the veteran linebacker look bad. On this play, Anzalone needs to stay home and at the heels of the offensive line. Additionally, if there’s supposed to be a “scrape exchange” with linebacker Derrick Barnes and Anzalone, that doesn’t happen.
Both players bite on the fake to the running back and this allows the tight end to easily climb to the next level. Ultimately, it gives Love a huge opening to put the nail in the coffin. This all leads back to the fundamentals of this defensive unit.
Closing Thoughts
Just a few weeks ago, head coach Dan Campbell alluded to the team not playing well fundamentally and that still remains to be the case. In addition to the poor fundamentals, defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn seems reliant to run man coverage with a limited 4-man rush. His defense is becoming limited with the overall speed of the unit by continuing to run his base and nickel packages with two or three linebackers on the field at the same time.
When comparing the Lions defense to a team like the Pittsburgh Steelers, it feels like night and day. The Steelers run their base defense 36% of the time (2nd most in the NFL) and their dime defense 21% of the time (6th most in the NFL). However, they rarely run their nickel defense (31st in the NFL) and the Steelers blitz 35.8% of the time (per Pro Football Reference).
On tape, it shows and the analytics show that the Lions are completely opposite. The Lions only blitz 24.5% of the time (per Pro Football Reference), and they primarily run their nickel and base defense onto the field. As I stated earlier, that leaves them in predicament of having two or three linebackers on the field. To me, it feels like they need more speed on the field and they need to get aggressive. Maybe that’ll change if Ceedy Duce returns to the lineup.
Overall, the poor fundamentals and the odd alignments from this defense are the root cause to the inconsistencies. When putting on the tape, the Lions try to send pressure with different blitzes and line stunts but it’s only causing chaos to themselves due to their personnel. While I don’t have all the right answers on how to fix it, I stand by my observations of this defense up to this point.
Right now, it feels like Aaron Glenn is very much on the fence of being aggressive and conservative as a play-caller. That said, he’s going to have to make a decision, and I’m leaning towards being more aggressive. I want to believe Glenn is a hell of a coach, and I’m not even sure if he’s on the hot seat. But his defense is becoming problematic for the best Lions team we’ve seen in decades.