ALLEN PARK -- Every year, Jim Caldwell talks about how much he wants his team to run the football well. And every year, his team fails to deliver.

That is not hyperbole painted with some broad brush. It is an observable fact. The Detroit Lions have finished no better than 28th in rushing since Caldwell's arrival in 2014.

They've tried everything. In 2015 alone, they used their first-round pick on a guard (Laken Tomlinson), their second-round pick on a running back (Ameer Abdullah) and their fifth-round pick on a fullback (Michael Burton). Then they finished last in the league in rushing.

Now Tomlinson has been ousted from the starting lineup, Burton has been cut all together and the Lions' running game is still buried in the bottom five of the league. Jim Bob Cooter, though, remains remarkably optimistic about the floundering ground game.

"I think we're going to run the ball better," he said. "I know we're going to run the ball more efficiently, very confident of that."

So why is Cooter so confident in a rushing attack that hasn't finished outside the bottom five since 2013? It starts with himself.

Even Cooter would admit he's more comfortable with the pass than the run. He is a former quarterback, after all, and broke into the NFL as a quarterbacks coach in Indianapolis and Denver -- two teams that were known for relying on the pass. He joined Detroit to fill the same role for Matthew Stafford, to terrific results.

But Cooter is took a page from Michael Jordan's playbook this offseason -- turn your weaknesses into strengths -- and devoted himself to becoming a student of the running game. He talked to coaches he respects, he studied film, he read books.

"It's been a big, big, big point of emphasis for me," Cooter said. "Just dealing with my own background, what I've gone through, it's been a really important point of emphasis for me this offseason. I think I have personally improved in the run game, how I see things, how I call things."

Of course, Cooter would also be the first person to say that this is a players league, and no amount of coaching can overcome a personnel deficiency. But he likes what Detroit has going on there too.

Ameer Abdullah is back from a foot injury that cost him 14 games last season, and that's huge. In their two games with him, the Lions hit 100 yards twice and ranked third in the league in yards per carry.

Without him, they hit 100 yards just once in 14 games and plummeted to 27th in yards per carry.

But it's not just him. Theo Riddick is back too. He's been held out of the preseason as a precautionary move, but if the jock straps he's left across the field are any indication, he's just as elusive as ever.

Zach Zenner returns for a third season, and is competing with Matt Asiata for a power role (and appears to be winning it). And then there's Dwayne Washington, an intriguing back because he's so powerful, and so fast. But he was essentially benched down the stretch last year anyway because of his inability to consistently hit holes and follow blockers.

If he could figure out the mental side of the position, he could be dangerous. And Cooter says he's done it.

"When he's able to find the point of attack and hit it, he's tough to bring down," Cooter said. "He runs over guys, through guys, around guys. I think he is improving with his run reads and where he's putting the ball. He's improving in pass protection, which is something that doesn't always show up maybe to the naked eye, to the fan at home on the TV copy.

"He's a young guy that this is a big offseason for him to improve. I see him making those strides. Needs to keep them coming, but I do see him making positive strides, and like I said, really physical guy. I would not want to tackle that guy."

Of course, the backs won't be effective without proper protection up front. And that indeed was an issue last year. Detroit running backs were taken down behind the line of scrimmage more often than anybody else in the league last year (13.4 percent).

In fact, among backs with at least 40 carries, Detroit had two of the five backs who were brought down most often for losses: Riddck lost yardage 18.5 percent of the time, which was worst in the league, and Zenner lost yardage 15.9 percent of the time. That was fifth worst.

Improving the running game must start with keeping the defense out of their own backfield, and the Lions believe they've done it with the addiitions of right tackle Rick Wagner and right guard T.J. Lang (although the loss of Taylor Decker for at least a month hurts those efforts as well).

"I think we've got a group that is a better communicating group," Cooter said. "I think we're doing a better job this year talking to each other up front, getting on the same page with what we're doing. That's vital. It's very, very important. And these days, they mike those guards up, or whatever they do. You guys can hear a bunch of it on the TV copies, so the more you can hear, probably worse that everybody will know our calls and stuff, but it's better that you're hearing those guys talking."

Throw it all together, and you begin to understand why the Lions feel so good about a running game that hasn't finished in the top 10 since Barry Sanders was still running around the Pontiac Silverdome in 1998.

"I'm excited," Cooter said. "I think our guys are getting better, and I do think we're going to be better running the football this year."