And they really exploited that against what has turned out to be a fabulous Eagles defense. We know that under Campbell, the Lions want to break tendencies and show you things you do not expect in certain downs and distances. Swift had six explosive plays in that game - five as a runner and one as a receiver - and three of those runs came in situations where a defense would absolutely expect a passing play.ĭavis was not on the field for any of these plays. The absolute primary reason for this was what the Lions did to that defense in Week 1 by running in obvious passing situations, when the Eagles would like to sub Davis out. Through the first two weeks of the season, the Eagles were allowing 4.4 yards per attempt and 1.0 yards after contact when Davis is on the field, and 7.2 yards per carry and 3.2 yards after contact when he’s not. The Philadelphia Eagles selected Georgia defensive lineman/small planet Jordan Davis with the 13th overall pick in the 2022 draft in part to help settle their run defense. Hockenson to come in and block Hargrave to seal the other side of Swift’s gap, which Hockenson did perfectly. Left tackle Taylor Decker blocked end Josh Sweat on the edge, while left guard Jonah Jackson set up the trap by vacating his gap against defensive tackle Jovon Hargrave and pulling instead to take defensive tackle Fletcher Cox out of the play. The trap play, where the offense intentionally leaves an interior defensive lineman unblocked in a pulling scheme, requires another blocker to pick that defender up - or, obviously, things are going to get blown up in the middle of your offense.ĭ’Andre Swift’s 50-yard run early in the Eagles game (more on this specific play later as well) was an ideal example of how you want a trap play to work. Injuries have forced the Lions to go with their second- and third-stringers at multiple positions along the offensive line, which makes the coordination of their run game all the more impressive. Let’s start with how Detroit’s run game beats defenses from the head down. The multiplicity of concepts are most impressive, especially with injuries all over their offensive line. So, you see Hank, myself being – everybody, you make a commitment to run a ball, you just – you spend a couple extra hours in the office trying to get it right.” And not just the players making a commitment, the coaches also. “It goes back to OTAs, training camp, and making a commitment. “It goes back to thought process,” Staley said last week, when asked why this rushing attack is working now, when it didn’t in previous years. We’ll get to that in a bit, but let’s start with how the Lions are killing defenses with run concepts of every stripe, in every situation. Even in the Vikings loss, the Lions ran the ball 35 times for 139 yards and two touchdowns, and though they were more efficient and explosive in the passing game against Minnesota, those explosive plays were built to a great degree off that run threat. But what we do know is that the offense led by head coach Dan Campbell, offensive coordinator Ben Johnson, and assistant head coach/running backs coach Duce Staley, has brought an entirely new energy and productiveness than we’ve seen before.Ītypically, the strength of this offense is the run game, and everything works off that. We don’t really know what the Vikings are yet, just as we don’t know what the Lions are. Sunday’s 28-24 loss to the Minnesota Vikings was the real killer Detroit had a 24-14 third-quarter lead, and they then let it get away. They then beat the Washington Commanders, 36-27, and that’s what you want to do when you’re a team on the rise - beat the teams beneath you in the pecking order. The Lions lost 38-35 to the Philadelphia Eagles in the opener, and the Eagles look very much like a Super Bowl team. But it’s important to evaluate the process as opposed to the outcome. The 2922 Detroit Lions are 1-2 and at the bottom of the NFC North after the first three weeks of the season, so it may seem odd to write an entire article about how awesome Detroit’s offense is.
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