The Detroit Lions will be equipped with two new coordinators for the 2025 season: John Morton (offense) and Kelvin Sheppard (defense).

Sheppard, a former NFL linebacker who played with the Lions in 2018, joined Dan Campbell’s coaching staff in 2021 as the team’s outside linebackers coach. He proceeded to spend the past three seasons coaching Detroit’s entire linebacking unit.

Then this January, Sheppard was promoted to defensive coordinator, replacing Aaron Glenn, who departed to become the head coach of the N.Y. Jets.

“It means everything to me (to be named defensive coordinator). It’s the reason I chose to stay here over other opportunities,” Sheppard told Fox 2’s Dan Miller Monday. “It would’ve been almost impossible to take another job, no matter what. I told him that day, cause he said, ‘Now Shep, looking ahead, that day’s about to come where I’m not gonna be able to keep you.’ I said, ‘Maybe by that time, there will be a system where we can have two head coaches and I’ll be your head coach B here.’ I owe a lot to Dan.”

Sheppard first got to know Campbell when the two were each a part of the Miami Dolphins organization. Sheppard was a member of the Dolphins’ roster from 2014-15, while Campbell was Miami’s tight ends coach and later interim head coach in 2015.

“Number one, the belief system he’s had in me since day one when I met him in 2014 as a player. That’s carried over into the coaching career, he’s one of the first people that told me I should take a shot at this thing. He saw it in me as a player,” Sheppard said. “You can say what you want, but the belief system, and other people try to say, ‘I don’t care about what other people think about me,’ but that’s not true. That’s not human nature. You are gonna care about what other people think about you. Why do you want to be good or great at anything? It’s because you’re judged amongst your peers. Well, judged amongst your peers means you care what others think. Because if you didn’t, you wouldn’t care about your performance. So it does mean a lot. I’m confident in myself, I’m confident in my ability. But, having a man of his stature stand in front and behind me and say, ‘You’ve got this, you can do it.’”

Sheppard, 37, is a fiery coach just like his predecessor and mentor, Glenn. Glenn served as the Lions’ defensive coordinator from 2021-24, and never got in the way of Sheppard coaching the linebackers.

“I’m deeply indebted to Aaron Glenn, deeply,” the former linebackers coach said of Glenn. “Yeah, Dan was pushing for me, he wanted me on the staff. But, it was A.G. who had to say yeah. I remember the day I flew here. It’s crazy, it’s the office that I have now. My son says, ‘You have A.G’s office?’ I said, ‘That’s what you’re worried about? The office with the couch?’ In 2021 flying here in February, or it might’ve been late-January of 2021. Sitting with A.G., I never met him. Obviously I knew of him, Hall of Fame career and all that. I’ve heard about him as a coach and all that, and everyone loves being around him, but I had no prior relationships or anything like that with A.G.

“Sitting in there with him for four or five hours, we just jelled from the start. From talking life, talking ball, similar upbringings, things like that. He said, after that four hours, ‘Shep, you didn’t know this, but I left the room and said Dan, I don’t care what he’s coaching, but he’s gonna be on my staff.’”

Sheppard will be tasked with elevating the play of the Lions’ defense. It’s a unit that features a variety of young talent, including the likes of cornerbacks Terrion Arnold and Ennis Rakestraw and safeties Brian Branch and Kerby Joseph.

Sheppard believes that Arnold, a rookie in 2024, is ready to take the next step this upcoming season.

“We have a young nucleus, a young core. But somebody that jumps out at me is Terrion Arnold,” Sheppard expressed to Miller. “There’s so much meat on that bone that he don’t even know. He called me a couple days ago playing around. I said, ‘Where you at?’ (He was) down in Florida. I said, ‘You better enjoy it because when you get back, next time you see me, we’re getting back to work.’ He said, ‘Absolutely coach, I know how you roll.’”

You can expect Detroit’s defense to remain a gritty and tenacious unit under Sheppard’s leadership. And as Sheppard made clear Monday, a defense shaped in his image will also be expected to play “together” and with a “relentless effort.”

“This is one unit, and we’re gonna move as one in everything we do. That’s number one. So that togetherness, and so many things trickle from there,” Sheppard expressed. “Absolutely relentless effort, non-negotiable. That’s one thing I say, the coaches aren’t coaching effort. You’ll stand out if your effort lacks on this defense, and then just nasty, tenacious finishing. Scratching, clawing, fighting for every blade of grass that’s out there.

“I think if we’re able to do those things, everything else — like, you’ll notice I didn’t say one stat, I didn’t say one accolade. Because if you do all those things and you focus on those things, then the bigger-picture things will come from that. But that, to me, will be the DNA of who we are as a unit.”