This is just my observation and wanted to see if anybody else notice this. When they sat TW and put Iffy into the starting role with KJ the Defense started playing much better and was holding offense down in points. When CJGJ was going to come back from injury he said I didn’t work my a@@ off to come back from injury to come off the bench. To me the defense had been flying to the ball cornerbacks and linebackers were all staying in their lanes and working together but then AG starting tinkering with 3 safety just to satisfy CJGJ which changed everybody’s role pulled linebacker seemed to cause confunsion on wr routes to you was suppose to cover and be where. This was him caving in to a player so this is on AG for the way the defense played last couple games. Not just talent but they looked worse imho what do you guys think?
I thought the defense played well the first two 10 quarters of the playoffs.
Then we missed two chances at early stops in the second half and the wheels came off. Against a great offense of course.
AG inherited a shit defense. 3 drafts definitely improved the composition, but, until we have a #1 CB, and a #2 Edge, it’s going to be real hard to polish that turd.
I’m on record thinking and expecting AG to be better. But the defense did improve some in 2023 compared to previous years.
The injuries to Houston, Moseley and CJGJ all impacted the pass defense a lot.
The run defense was outstanding.
Yeah, people forget that we’re still early in the current FOs tenure. We haven’t exactly had a lot of time to stack the roster the way SF, Philly and KC are stacked. We’ve come a long way, really quickly, but it’s skewing perceptions. There are still quite a few starter holes to fill (mostly on D), which is unusual for a team in our position.
I would go as far as to say we’re still in the rebuilding phase, and making the NFCCG while we’re in the rebuilding phase is something else. Gotta love our coaches.
If Mosley doesn’t get hurt we get the #1 seed and would be playing tomorrow. I’m 100% convinced of that.
No, AG did not ruin the defense. It was bc of AG that the defense got better from the denver game out. AG om a few occassions got outcoached and didn’t adjust (seattle) but that is also a hard matchup…you want your defensive cordinator to win the matchup of course but the reality is it is a tough assignment that wasnt made any easier due to his lack of adjustments. He adjusted a lot more as the season went on.
He didn’t ruin the D the stats prove that, we fell apart in one half . Now if you think back an want to guess the long pass that hits are guy in the mask an the WR just is in right spot an ball does’t go left or right or further away just floats right to him. You want to what if that ball defects left or right or just few more feet away from the WR. Does that change the game? That was good luck for them bad luck for us plain an simple an we may be playing tomorrow would you still make your post?
In regulation they allowed like 12% more total yards than Seattle average. Not great but it all was made to look so much worse bc of the fumble and Monty fumble.
I’m maybe more optimistic than most and for a chronic realistic-pessimist like me that is something
I don’t think the Lions are far off at all. They are one edge rusher or one interior rusher or one #2 CB from having a really good defense
If they could make defenses account for just one more rusher (preferably interior) or had one more legitimate outside pass defender everything would have come together
I know most think they need a #1 CB. While that would be ideal, I disagree. The problem this year was that the drop was so far from Sutton to whoever ran opposite that opposing teams knew he would usually be on an island and could scheme for that. Most of the big plays against him were when the safety rotated to the other side
Get a comparable cb to Sutton and Lions’ opponents will no longer enjoy that liberty and it will be much tougher to scheme against him.
I think by a 1 people mean a CB that slides Sutton down a rung. He doesn’t have to be a true #1. I brought up Greg Newsome in a trade He’d be a good example. Probably more of an elite number 2 but he’d matchup better with #1WRs due to his length and speed. So you improve both corner spots.
I think most people actually mean Sauce Gardner
But even so, I am fine with a couple of Rhamondre Stevensons
Not a player who is better than Sutton but a player who can be counted on to hold their own on an island every now and then. The drop from Sutton to Jacobs or Vildoor was too great, and once the team went to a blitz heavy scheme late in the season Sutton was left on his own.
Get that second pass rusher and they can go back to AG’s preferred scheme. Or get a real corner to run opposite Sutton and they won’t suffer so much when they do go blitz heavy
Ideally they do both, but I truly don’t think they need stars at any of those spots. Just better than they’ve had.
???
dammit
Tyrique Stevenson
As a rookie?
I would be nervous is if that is the only solution. I want backup solutions built into our answer at CB.
Our CB plan this year made sense if we were dealt aces. We were not. I want several redundancies this time around.
Fine
No disagreement
My point wasn’t necessarily a rookie, but rather players who can field the position adequately relative to Cam Sutton.
Right. And we’re unlikely to get a true #1 at CB. Not without having to take $ or injury risk (probably both).
So have a mlltuprong approach to get us up to league average at outside CB. Just that should help a ton.
The three way job share at safety was a bit strange, and I wonder how much of it was down to not wanting to piss off CJGJ and not have a malcontent in the locker room, but I don’t think that affected things in the playoffs. The defense was pretty much as good as we’d seen it all year given the caliber of the offenses they were up against, and it was bad luck, bad tackling and the achilles heel of the QB using his legs that killed us against the niners rather than the pass defense.
Easy to forget this further away we get from the game.