bad Report : detroit lions face a big trouble today follow by Alex Anzalone
The Detroit Lions rookie linebacker has played 383 defensive snaps this season, but mostly in a supporting role behind Alex Anzalone and Derrick Barnes. Now Anzalone is battling a hand injury that will sideline him at least this week, and while Barnes and Malcolm Rodriguez surely will see their roles grow too, all eyes will be on the first-round pick to see how he handles more responsibility than ever.
That includes wearing the green dot, which means he’ll be the one taking the playcalls from the sideline and getting everyone set on the field.
“It’s right up his alley,” head coach Dan Campbell said. “It’s right up his alley. Listen, he embraces that. He’s a guy who wants it all. He wants it all. He doesn’t want anybody to think, ‘Man, I can’t take this job description on.’ He wants every bit of it, and he hasn’t missed a beat out there. He’s been great.”
The Lions continue to tout how great Campbell’s makeup is, and the physical traits are undisrupted too. He was the 18th overall pick for a lot of pretty obvious reasons.
But the actual performance hasn’t always been there in his rookie season. He missed three tackles against Chicago, and has allowed the last 14 passes thrown his way to be completed. For the season, quarterbacks are 23 of 28 passing for 272 yards and two touchdowns while targeting him, and have racked up a passer rating of 131.0.
Detroit has tinkered with Campbell’s role along the way, including deploying him more as a pass rusher. He has five pressures and one sack overall.
All told, he ranks 74th among the 79 linebackers who have played enough snaps to qualify for a grade, according to Pro Football Focus.
Anzalone, by comparison, is 18th.
It’s clearly not talent holding back Campbell, and coaches insist he’s made a lot of progress this season too. Now more than ever is the time to show it.
One thing they’re preaching: Get less serious.
“The thing is (with) how hard he works, it’s going to naturally happen for him,” linebackers coach Kelvin Sheppard said. “What I’ve said about him from Day 1, he’s just got to relax a bit, because in a way, you can be so tight-wound and perfect in your craft that you can hold yourself back from doing some things. Like, it’s hard. It’s a fine line you juggle when you’re dealing with a player like this. He reminds me of Luke Kuechly. I’ve told Jack a few times that he reminds me of him. But what Luke was able to do was you saw him relax out there. Like it’d be ‘intense, intense, intense’ — relax. That allows you to open up. A lot of times people don’t know, with sprinters, everyone thinks they’re tightly wound. Those guys are relaxed when they’re running. They’re breathing. Their body mechanics. You can’t be so tightly wound because it limits your ability to make certain types of plays I expect that player to make.”
Now that Campbell is about to shoulder more responsibility than ever, Sheppard is preaching the importance of just doing his job and playing fast.
“I’m very open when I talk with y’all. What I tell y’all is what I tell those guys. (And what I tell him is) listen, repeat what you just heard. Don’t make anything more of it. Because these guys watch the media and stuff. You’re kidding yourself if you think they don’t see it. Now it’s, ‘Oh, Jack Campbell, the pressure is on. Alex is out, green dot,’ Listen, repeat. Listen, repeat. And the other guys who are out there with him and D. Barnes, whoever is wearing the green dot, to echo the calls and help him with the signals. It’s an 11-man thing, because obviously we lost Alex, and I’m not going to sleight this like we didn’t lose anything. But like I told the room, we should take a step up. That’s just the way I’m wired, the way I’m built, and to have Alex say, ‘Oh wait, I got to get back, those guys …’ and that’s when you create that environment where everyone is (raising each other up), versus everyone sitting back and saying, ‘I hope we get through this…’ No, no, no, no. We’re going to raise the pressure on Alex. You better hurry back, because these guys are about to ball.”
