Can Detroit’s Offense Be Stopped? Inside the Mind of a Defensive Coordinator
I want to try something different from the usual pre-game preview. This week, we know that the Lions will face a Cincinnati Bengals team without its starting quarterback, Joe Burrow. They haven’t been very effective without him, and this shouldn’t be a close game. I fully expect Detroit’s defense to handle things and cause problems for backup quarterback Jake Browning. So the question of the day is: Can Detroit’s offense be stopped?
That got me thinking about how one might slow down the Lions’ offense. After a slow start in Green Bay, this Lions offense has been on fire. And on most weeks against the Lions, some poor defensive coordinator has to walk into a meeting room, grab a marker, and pretend he has an answer. Spoiler alert: he doesn’t.
So, who has the pleasure of coming up with this week’s defensive game plan? It’s Cincinnati Bengals defensive coordinator Al Golden, who was hired this past January. Golden most recently served as the linebackers coach for the team from 2020 to 2021 and also served as the defensive coordinator for Notre Dame. His homework assignment leading up to Sunday’s match against our Detroit Lions is simple: “Stop Detroit’s offense.”
Good luck with that.
Step Into His Shoes for a Moment
First, you must realize that this will be a near-impossible task. You’re staring at film of Amon-Ra St. Brown cutting through zones like butter. You scribble notes, erase them, scribble again. Do you double him? Great — now you’ve left Sam LaPorta wide open.
You could try to take away the run. Okay, cool — except here comes Jared Goff, calmly picking apart your secondary with play action and timing routes that look like they came from a quarterbacking clinic.
So you dial up a blitz? Sure. And while you’re trying to get cute with pressure, Jameson Williams just sprinted past your cornerback and is waving at the camera on his way to the house.
Welcome to the nightmare that is trying to stop the Lions’ offense.
The Puzzle With No Answer
Every week, DCs around the league must sit in dark meeting rooms asking themselves the same questions:
“If we press Amon-Ra, he’ll still find a soft spot. What then?”
“If we cover LaPorta with a linebacker, he’ll run right by him. If we cover him with a safety, now Jamyr Gibbs is matched on a linebacker instead.”
“If we sell out against the run, Goff will torch us. If we drop too many back in coverage, David Montgomery will bulldoze us for six yards a pop.”
It’s like a carnival game rigged against you. No matter which option you choose, you’re walking away with a loss.
Meanwhile, in Detroit
This isn’t an offense built on one diva star demanding the ball. This is a unit where everyone buys in. Jameson Williams may not get ten targets a game, but when his number’s called, he stretches the field. St. Brown blocks as hard as he catches. LaPorta already looks like a veteran. And the backs? They run angry.
The beauty is that it doesn’t matter who gets the ball. Someone is going to make the play.
The Defensive Coordinator’s Pep Talk (Satire Edition)
Picture the poor Bengals DC in front of his guys this week:
“Men, here’s the deal. We’re facing the most balanced offense in the NFL. We can’t stop everything. Heck, we may not stop much at all. But if we can just… you know… maybe force a field goal once or twice, then we can call that a win.”
Not exactly the speech you hang in the Hall of Fame.
So, Can Detroit’s Offense Be Stopped?
Short answer: no.
Long answer: defensive coordinators will keep drawing on their whiteboards, moving X’s and O’s around, convincing themselves they’ve found the answer. Then Sunday comes, and St. Brown’s sitting down in a zone, Gibbs is bouncing outside, LaPorta is rumbling down the seam, and Goff is dealing like it’s backyard pitch-and-catch.
The only thing that usually gets stopped is the other team’s hope. Now, that doesn’t mean the Lions are perfect, and on any given day, a couple of turnovers can spoil a good time. Fortunately, this team typically takes care of the ball, and I don’t expect that to change this weekend.
Lions Fans, Chime In
Let’s have some fun: if you were the defensive coordinator tasked with stopping this Detroit offense, what would your plan be? Drop your parody strategies in the comments — because honestly, watching other teams try is almost as fun as watching the Lions score.
This Week’s Prediction: Detroit 34 – Cincinnati 17
