Detroit Lions think they're close to being a 'terrifying' defense, in a good way

Dave Birkett | Detroit Free Press

Show Caption Hide Caption Detroit Lions sloppy again. That falls on Matt Patricia & the coaches Lions are sloppy again, the defense stinks and that falls on Matt Patricia and the coaching staff after 35-27 loss to Cowboys, Nov. 17, 2019.

Where some see incompetence, Justin Coleman sees hope.

Coleman, the Detroit Lions nickel cornerback, said Monday he believes the Lions defense is close to being what head coach Matt Patricia intended for it to be all along: “One of the most terrifying defenses you can go against.”

“Nobody wants to sit there and go against man coverage all day,” Coleman said. “And I feel like we cover pretty well and we’re just going to have to finish, that’s all. We just got to finish.”

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The Lions rank 30th in the NFL in total defense and are coming off a 35-27 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in which they gave up a season-high 509 yards of offense.

They rank near the bottom of the league in every major statistical defensive category and are last in interception rate, but Coleman said he’s confident the Lions will start terrifying opponents soon.

“I know it is (coming),” Coleman said. “We pretty much got everybody we need. Yeah, we lost some people. Right now, it’s the next man up. We’re just trying to get everybody on the same page and understand that we all got the same goal.”

The Lions showed signs of being an elite defensive unit last year, when they posted one of the NFL’s best run defenses in the second half of the season.

After a rough start in that department this season, they’ve been better against the run of late. The Lions have held three of their past four opponents below 100 yards rushing as a team, and they limited Ezekiel Elliott and Saquon Barkley, two of the league’s best running backs, to a combined 109 yards rushing on 35 carries (3.1 yards per attempt).

But the Lions have struggled in one area all season that’s at the root of their defensive struggles: Getting off the field.

Last year, the Lions played fewer defensive plays (942, or 59.9 per game) than any team in the NFL, something that helped masked their defensive deficiencies.

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This year, the Lions are averaging more defensive plays per game (67.9) than any team in the NFL, and being on the field so much has exposed them.

Their anemic pass rush can’t get to opposing quarterbacks; Dallas’ Dak Prescott said Sunday he had so much time in the pocket he could go through his reads multiple times before getting rid of the ball. Their lack of interceptions means they’re not shortening drives. And those two factors together are why they rank 30th in the league in third-down defense, allowing opponents to convert on 46.2% of their third-down plays.

Coleman said Patricia delivered a point-blank message to his defense Monday – “He said, ‘Find a solution,' ” Coleman said – and that’s what the Lions are working on this week.

“It’s frustrating, cause we look back and see all the games that we shoulda, coulda won,” Coleman said. “But shoulda-coulda don’t help nobody win nothing and we’re just trying to keep moving forward cause that’s the only thing we can do.”

Quiet on Kaep

The Lions sent director of pro scouting Rob Lohman to quarterback Colin Kaepernick's free-agent workout Saturday in the Atlanta area.

Lohman was one of the highest-ranking club officials at the workout, which was attended by seven NFL teams and moved at the last minute from the Atlanta Falcons' Flowery Branch facility to a local high school.

Patricia, on a conference call Tuesday, declined to share what feedback he received about the workout.

"I think in general we do a lot of workouts through the course of the week," Patricia said. "We go out and we see a lot of players. I don’t think we’ve ever discussed any of those workouts publicly or talked about any of that stuff. A lot of those are internal conversations that we have in regard to what we see and what we evaluate, and what we’re looking for from that aspect of it, too. So, I think I would probably keep it in that category.”

The Lions are happy with their backup quarterback situation, with Jeff Driskel playing well in place of injured starter Matthew Stafford. They are not expected to make any immediate moves to sign Kaepernick.

Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett. Read more on the Detroit Lions and sign up for our Lions newsletter.