ALLEN PARK -- The Detroit Lions were ripped for 201 rushing yards against Cleveland. They didn't have many answers for what went wrong, other than they needed to play better. Then they went out there against Chicago and didn't play better.

They allowed another 222 rushing yards. They still don't have many answers for what wrong. And that includes the guy who is supposed to be making the tackles.

"It's tough to really say exactly what it is," rookie middle linebacker Jarrad Davis said. "At the end of the day, defense is about all 11 players making a play on the ball. And we got to do what we can to make sure we get to the ball and get the runners down."

While a lot of players may be to blame, Davis' struggles in the middle have been chief among them. And that's a problem heading into Thursday's game against the Minnesota Vikings, who feature the league's eighth-best rushing offense.

Davis was drafted in the first round to replace the struggling Tahir Whitehead at middle linebacker. But he's been every bit as bad, and in some cases worse. He ranks 86th out of 88 qualifying linebackers, according to ProFootballFocus. And he's been especially bad on the ground, ranking 57th (out of 58) against the run.

He's also missed five tackles and ranks dead last out of 57 linebackers in tackling efficiency.

The Lions were expecting some ups and downs from their first-round pick, but they've gotten far more downs than ups through 10 games.

"I think anytime you're a rookie in this league and you're playing early, it's not going to be pretty the entire time," coach Jim Caldwell said. "You're going to have some good times and really good games. You're going to have some that where you're not as productive as you'd like to be.

"He's been effective for us. He runs around. He makes plays, but he's not perfect. But does a good job in terms of leadership, and he's learning every week. I think that's the valuable thing. So he's getting an opportunity to get out there and do it, and he's done a lot of really, really good things for us."

In Davis' defense, he has had to fight through a lot of adversity this year as well. He missed two games with a concussion, plus watched three defensive linemen go down who were supposed to be starting in front of him.

That includes defensive tackle Haloti Ngata, the Lions' best run stuffer up front. Before the injury, they were allowing 74.6 yards per game on the ground and ranked in the top five overall. Without him, they've allowed a staggering 153.8.

That has been the biggest problem of all against the run. Ngata is just a big, big man, capable of moving the line of scrimmage and clogging the rushing lanes. Without him, Detroit has been forced to shorten its defensive tackle rotation to basically just A'Shawn Robinson and Akeem Spence, and they've struggled.

Throw in the loss of Kerry Hyder in the preseason and the back injury that has sidelined Ezekiel Ansah the last two weeks, and Detroit is playing without three of its projected starting defensive linemen. Davis refused to make excuses, but that sort of thing will hurt a linebacker trying to flow in behind them to make plays.

There is a hope that over time, once Detroit gets better production up front and the game begins to slow down for Davis, he will still deliver on the potential that Bob Quinn saw in him when he took the Florida linebacker 21st overall.

"I mean, like, the game is still so fast," Davis said. "At this point in the season, it has slowed down tremendously from where it was earlier, but at the same time, there's so much going on at one moment in the game. And I know if I take one wrong step, I'm going to be out of position."

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