After 13 days and an extra hour with daylight savings on Sunday, the Detroit Lions were back in action. Entering the game 5-2 after a win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Lions stayed home as they took on NFC North rival, the Minnesota Vikings. The Vikings got their starting quarterback, J.J. McCarthy, back from his high ankle sprain as the former Michigan Wolverine returned to the state of Michigan to take on his former teammate, Lions EDGE Aidan Hutchinson.
The Lions and Vikings traded blows to open the game, but once the Vikings took the lead 14-7, it felt like they had control the rest of the time. The Vikings’ defense dominated the Lions’ high-powered offense and gave the Lions defense issues, with McCarthy having a solid performance in his return. Detroit couldn’t overcome the Vikings’ blitz-heavy defense, and they fell apart at home.
Let’s get into my five takeaways from the disappointing loss against the Vikings.
Special teams continue to struggle
The exception here is punter Jack Fox, as he had a solid game booting the ball to the Vikings, punting five times for 238 yards, two landing inside the 20, and his longest going for 58. Running Back Jacob Saylors struggled to get the ball past 30 for most of the game, as the team should possibly consider someone else to return kicks or maybe let it start going into the end zone for a touchback.
The Lions kicked off to Minnesota five times and allowed 164 yards, averaging 32.8 per return. Minnesota had two big returns, the first was a 99-yard return for a touchdown to end the third quarter, but the Vikings were called for a holding, wiping away the big play. The other good return by Minnesota was for 61 yards on their first return, which set up the offense to easily score to tie the game at seven.
When kicker Jake Bates attempted a kick late in the fourth quarter to make it 24-20, the Vikings blocked it, and cornerback Isaiah Rodgers returned it 41 yards before he was pushed out of bounds. It was a summary of how the game was in just one play.
Offense reverts to Week 1-like performance
Despite it being November today, it felt like it was early September. The Lions’ offense struggled to do just about anything outside of the opening drive of the game. The offensive line couldn’t handle the Vikings’ heavy blitzes, sacking quarterback Jared Goff five times. If Goff wasn’t getting sacked, he was rushing throws, having balls getting batted at the line, or quickly getting rid of the ball to avoid another sack.
The offensive line wasn’t only struggling to protect Goff, but they also struggled to help either running back for Detroit to find a hole to burst through. The offense hasn’t played this poorly since the season opener against the Green Bay Packers, so to see this type of performance sneak up on them again wasn’t good to see.
It’s not all on the offensive line; Goff could’ve made better decisions, receivers dropped some passes, and running backs could’ve run through the correct lanes instead of bouncing outside. The lone turnover for Detroit came from running back David Montgomery. The team had all this time off, and the offense took the biggest step back of them all. Not a good feeling to see that from a team that had plenty of time to prepare and rest.
Penalties, penalties, penalties
The Lions had a season-high 10 penalties for 76 yards today, and that doesn’t include the others that the Vikings declined as well. Whether on offense or defense, the Lions were playing sloppily all over. As soon as the defense would get a stop on third down, a penalty was soon to follow. The Lions come out on offense for the first play of the drive, a penalty to put them behind the sticks. There was no way they could go out there and play clean football.
There were two flags that I found questionable, but besides those, the rest were just simple, dumb mistakes made by the team. False starts, unnecessary blocks in the back when the play is over, holdings, just things this team shouldn’t be doing at all. Minnesota took advantage of those woes and made them pay by extending drives and putting up points.
Injuries stack up at the worst time
After the bye week, the Lions were getting healthier as players started to practice who are on the PUP or IR list, and others who had missed practice weeks before returned in limited or full participation. While players did return, like cornerbacks Terrion Arnold and Avonte Maddox, countless players were added and banged up during the matchup.
Starting with the offensive line, almost everyone was banged up after the game. Right tackle Penei Sewell appeared injured but never missed a snap. Left tackle Taylor Decker, who was already dealing with a shoulder injury, left with a knee injury and returned. Right guard Tate Ratledge left the game briefly but did return, but left guard Christian Mahogany got the worst of it as he left the game on a cart and didn’t return.
It wasn’t just the offensive line that got injured; wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown appeared banged up, as well as cornerback Amik Robertson. It felt like everyone was dropping like flies. Now, with no bye week for the rest of the season, and the trade deadline looming soon, the Lions might have to be buyers if any of these players will miss a serious amount of time.
Move over turd quarter, it’s now turd down
Ever since Lions head coach Dan Campbell took over the team, they usually struggle in the third quarter, but this year, that isn’t the biggest problem. It’s been moved from just a quarter of play to a certain down, third down. Campbell and the coaching staff addressed their struggles on third down this season and vowed to make changes to improve it coming out of the bye week.
There was no improvement seen today by the Lions on both sides of the ball when it came to third down.
Having extra time to make corrections to fix these woes only to come out flat isn’t a good look. You can’t preach that you know it’s an issue and worked hard to address, only for it to be a huge reason the team loses the game. The Lions had three-and-outs on three straight drives for the first time since Week 14 in 2023 against the Chicago Bears.
It didn’t help that the Lions’ offense was backed up for the majority of the game due to penalties or sacks allowed, but when it was within friendly distance, it didn’t make matters better.
Source link
