The Lions are 2-2, in large part because the defense isn’t good enough. Everyone knows that, including defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard.
“There has to be real change,” Sheppard told reporters on Thursday. “There has to be real evidence of change, whether that’s personnel-driven, whether that’s some things — whatever the case is, something has to change. Because coming out of training camp, this is far from where we thought we would be at and should be at, and I still do, standing here before you after a four-game sample size. So these things will get corrected. But within doing all that, during doom and gloom, it’s easy to point at everybody, but also within this, ‘Let’s go. Let’s go.’ Because I do feel like we’re right there at this wall right now. And banging on this wall, and I said there’s gonna be a group of men that bust this M-Fer down. And some guys [are] probably gonna be with us, and some aren’t.”
Sheppard said the defensive line is playing well, but that the rest of the defense isn’t taking advantage of that.
“I told the D-line, it’s a disservice what we’ve been doing to you all,” Sheppard said. “I truly feel like this is the best D-line we’ve had in my six-year tenure here, since I got here in 2021. And we haven’t been complementing it well enough on the back end to see the benefits of it, and be outright beneficiaries is what they should be with what the D-line is doing, especially Sunday night. They assaulted the pocket all night. They generated pressure all night on the quarterback. But as you saw, the quarterback was able to get the ball out with the quick release and get it completed, far too many times.”
Sheppard said it’s “ultra-disrespectful” to say the offense is carry the defense. But isn’t that what’s happening?
He’s excited about the potential impact of the return of safety Brian Branch (who could be back by Sunday), but Sheppard is exasperated by little things, like players lining up in the wrong spots.
Sheppard believes this can be rectified with one thing: Violence.
“Violence overcomes a lot of things,” Sheppard said. “Violence overcomes deficiencies. Violence overcomes mistakes.”
Still, the numbers don’t lie. The Lions have the worst defense in the league, with 423.8 yards allowed per game. That’s more than 30 yards per game more than the No. 31 team.