–It’s a small sample size for sure, but the Lions have made headway the last two weeks in fixing the weakest part of their team, their run defense.
The Lions ranked last in the NFL against the run in the first half of the season, allowing 142.5 yards per game. In games against the Bears and Panthers the last two weeks, they’ve given up just 110 yards rushing total.
The presence of new nose tackle Damon Harrison has helped, but head coach Matt Patricia said the biggest change is the absence of big plays. The Lions haven’t allowed a run over 10 yards the last two weeks. In the first two months of the year, they allowed five runs of 40 or more yards.
“As long as we can eliminate kind of those big runs that just kind of blow all the stats out of the water and obviously really change field position, that’s kind of the consistency part of it,” Patricia said. “If we can just kind of get that under wraps, that really helps us out a lot. But give credit to the other side, too. Sometimes there’s some runs that we haven’t seen before that kind of hit or they’ll sneak through and we got to go get them corrected on the sideline. And from a scheme standpoint, the guys are still working through a lot of that, too.”
–Marvin Jones Jr. is expected to miss his second straight game with a knee injury Thursday, which means the Lions’ once-deep receiving corps has been reduced to Kenny Golladay and a bunch of backups.
TJ Jones had one catch for one yard last week while playing as the Lions’ No. 2 receiver. Bruce Ellington has emerged as the team’s primary slot receiver after signing in early November. And Andy Jones played 19 snaps in a variety of packages against the Panthers.
“The more experience playing together they can have and I can have with them, the better,” Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford said. “I think whatever it’s been, 14 days or so, isn’t a whole lot time in the bank, but we’ll take what we can get.”
–After allowing 16 sacks in losses to the Minnesota Vikings and Chicago Bears, the Lions gave up just one in last week’s win over the Carolina Panthers.
“We keep Stafford upright and he can make some plays,” left tackle Taylor Decker said. “He’s pretty phenomenal back there, give him a little time.”
BY THE NUMBERS: 17 – Damon Harrison is on pace to become just the eighth player in modern NFL history to play 17 games in a regular season. The Lions acquired Harrison in an October trade with the New York Giants, after their bye week had passed and before the Giants’ bye. Harrison has 23 tackles and one sack in four games in Detroit. Will Allen was the last NFL player to play 17 games in a season, doing so for the Steelers and Cowboys in 2013.
