Lions’ staggering injuries have Dan Campbell turning up the aggression

Dan Campbell has no choice but to be aggressive in the face of the Lions’ absurd amount of defensive injuries.

Winning in the National Football League is a difficult proposition.

The Detroit Lions are learning that lesson the hard way in 2024.

The Lions’ loss to the Buffalo Bills on Sunday — in what has been billed as a potential Super Bowl preview — dropped Detroit to 12-2 on the season. While the Lions remain in first place in the NFC North, they are now tied with the Philadelphia Eagles atop the conference in the race for the first-overall seed in the playoffs, and the NFC’s sole first-round bye.

But they added three more names to an ever-expanding pile of losses on the defensive side of the football.

Defensive tackle Alim McNeil, cornerback Khalil Dorsey, and cornerback Carlton Davis all left Sunday’s game against Buffalo with injuries, and the team reported brutal news on both fronts Monday morning. Davis suffered a broken jaw that requires surgery and will be out indefinitely. As for McNeil, he suffered a torn ACL, and his season is over.

As for Dorsey, he suffered what the team described as a “significant” ankle injury, and head coach Dan Campbell said after the Buffalo game that it would also end his season.

When you add those two names to the list of players the Lions are now missing on the defensive side of the ball, you start to realize that you could build an entire starting defense with that group:

DE Aidan Hutchinson
DT Alim McNeill
DL Marcus Davenport
DL John Cominsky
LB Alex Anzalone
LB Malcolm Rodriguez
LB Derrick Barnes
LB Jalen Reeves-Maybin
CB Carlton Davis
CB Ennis Rakestraw Jr.
CB Khalil Dorsey
S Ifeatu Melifonwu

Add another name to the list: star running back David Montgomery on Monday morning.

Detroit also lost promising rookie defensive end Nate Lynn for the season with a shoulder injury in the final preseason game. The Lions also lost cornerback Emmanuel Moseley earlier in the year with a chest injury, but he came off Injured Reserve three weeks ago.

The mounting injuries on the defensive side of the football are now starting to show up in the box score. After not allowing more than 30 points in a single game all season, the Lions have given up 31 and 48 points in back-to-back weeks. First, they gave up 31 points in a 34-31 win over the Green Bay Packers, then came Sunday, when their banged-up unit was unable to find an answer for Josh Allen in a 48-42 loss.

Speaking after the loss, Campbell outlined how in his mind, the Lions gave the Bills and Allen too many opportunities to make big plays.

“It’s frustrating,” said Campbell. “I thought we’d be better. Some of these things where they make a play, I can live with that stuff. It’s across the board when you know that you had self-inflicted wounds. There’s things that we did on our own and gave those guys something to where they had better opportunities. That’s the frustrating part. You want to know you didn’t help them and I feel like we helped them.”

However, Campbell did not buy into the idea that it was the mounting injuries that hurt the Lions against Buffalo.

“No, I’m not buying, I don’t buy it,” Campbell said of the defensive injuries. “We can be better. We should have been better. We know how good they are but we should have been more urgent.”

Help may also be coming on the defensive side of the football. Speaking Monday following the loss to Buffalo, Campbell indicated that decisions may be coming soon on Melifonwu Rakestraw, and that Anzalone could be ready for either Week 18, or Detroit’s first playoff game.

Campbell is certainly a “no excuses” head coach, and that may be part of the reason he has completely transformed the Lions in his tenure in Detroit. But the mounting injuries are not only showing up in the box score, they are also showing up in Campbell’s decision-making. Known for being aggressive on fourth downs, that has kicked into overdrive in the past few weeks.

For example, against the Packers, Detroit converted four of their five fourth-down opportunities, including a 4th-and-1 situation late in the game. With the score tied at 31-31 and under a minute remaining, Campbell kept his offense on the field for 4th and 1, passing up a 38-yard field goal attempt from Jake Bates.

How aggressive was the decision? Even the numbers said to kick the field goal.

But Campbell left his offense on the field, and David Montgomery picked up the first down, allowing the Lions to run down the clock and end the game on a field goal from Bates.

After the win, Campbell made it clear that he wanted to end the game with his offense on the field.

“I just felt like we needed to end it on offense,” Campbell said after the win. “I did not want to give that ball back and I believed we could get that. I believed we could convert, and I trust that O-Line, I trust David [Montgomery], and they came through for us.

“It’s a hell of a call by [offensive coordinator] Ben [Johnson]. I knew how I wanted to play this game, the team knew it, and everything in me told me, ‘Let’s finish this,’ and so we did.”

Quarterback Jared Goff said after the win against Green Bay that in the week leading up to the game, Campbell told him and the offense to expect to remain on the field more on fourth down.

“We came into this game knowing we were going to do it a little bit more than usual,” described Goff. “Dan had mentioned that early in the week. He was really going to lean on our offense to make some things happen and be aggressive on fourth down if the opportunity presented itself.”

Then came Sunday against Buffalo. After Goff connected with Jahmyr Gibbs on a 12-yard touchdown pass to trim the Bills’ lead to 38-28 with 12 minutes left in the game, Campbell called for an onside kick which, in the new NFL, means you have to declare your intentions, and cannot rely on the element of surprise.

Not only did Buffalo recover, but Mack Hollins returned the kick deep into Detroit territory:

Buffalo scored on the very next play to reclaim a 17-point lead.

After the game, it was clear that Campbell knew he needed to try and steal an extra possession for his offense, rather than hope for a stop from his defense.

“I just thought we’d get the possession,” Campbell said. “I thought we were going to get that ball. It was one of Bates’ best kicks that I’ve seen him have. That was a big kicker at the end, you know, that thing took a good jump on us.

“Hollins made a heck of a play on it. And, you know, obviously, now sitting here hindsight after them taking it down to the three-yard line, yeah, I wish I wouldn’t have done that, but is what it is.”

More than anything else, these decisions might be the inevitable result of these mounting defensive injuries. As the Lions start to give up more and more points on the defensive side of the football — a natural result from the staggering toll this season has taken on their defense — Campbell will turn more and more to his offense, either by leaving them on the field on fourth down when the numbers say otherwise or trying to steal extra possessions for them early in games like he did Sunday.

Campbell has built a team molded by his aggressive nature.

That might be the last card he can play to save their potential dream season.