Since Dan Campbell has taken over as the Detroit Lions’ head coach, there’s been a large shift in the way that this team’s offense plays football. In fact, there’s been a large shift in the way everyone’s offense has been playing football, and it largely comes from Campbell. We’re talking about the aggressive nature in which plays are called. The Lions are not scared to try things on 3rd-and-long, and they’re definitely not afraid to try things on 4th down.
That aggressiveness has taken over the NFL. You’re starting to see a lot more teams attempt the latter. Everyone wants to go for it on 4th down now, and while they’re not exactly doing it the way the Lions do, it’s still happening, and it’s changing the way that defensive coaches think about football around the league.
Not long ago, as a defense, if you got yourself into a situation where it was 3rd-and-7, you knew what you could do. You could send the house and dial up a NASCAR package, or you could put your safeties over the top because you knew that there was a throw coming. What do the Lions do? They don’t throw it. They instead run the ball, and maybe they get that first down, but if they don’t, they definitely get four or five yards and turn it into a 4th-and-short, let’s say 4th-and-3. If the Lions are anywhere near the middle of the field, you know they’re going on that 4th-and-3 and they’ll hit you with a run or a pass there.
Listening to The Athletic Football show this week, they spoke with defensive coaches, and that very scenario is something that everyone is trying to figure out right now. How do you defend that? We’re not necessarily talking about plays themselves; it’s that aggressiveness.
Put yourself in the shoes of a defensive coach going up against the Lions. It’s 3rd-and-7, and conventional football wisdom tells you they’re going to pass to make up yards and try to reset the downs, but this is Detroit. They have Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery. They’re going to run to set up a 4th-and-short. So let’s gear up for the run. Well, now that you’ve geared up for the run, you’ve left your queen undefended, so to speak. Now the Lions can go for that pass. Ok, so we’ll defend the pass. Well, now the Lions can go for the run. Now you’ve gone cross-eyed.
That’s just the perfect example of how the Lions’ offense and aggressiveness have changed defensive football. You have to throw conventionality out the window with this team because there’s nothing conventional about it. Other teams are seeing that, and they want to try it. The Eagles have become that now that they know the Tush Push is an unstoppable play. So they’re a four-down team every time. The Bears are likely to try and become this type of offense, too. That’s why Week 2 is going to be really interesting to see how Kelvin Sheppard responds to that.
2025 is a big year for the Lions offense, and it’s going to be fun to see how the rest of the NFL responds to what they do. Everyone thinks that with Johnson leaving that the intrinsic nature of this offense goes with him, but that’s all Dan Campbell and even Johnson will tell you that. I can tell you from what I’ve seen this summer that the Lions still have quite a bit up their sleeves on offense.
