Getty Dan Campbell during a Lions game in 2021.
Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell won’t face any heat in Week 6 with his team on a bye, but that hasn’t stopped some folks from dropping the hot takes about the coach.
Campbell continues to generate questions about his future with the team given how poorly they have played, and with a losing record and some notable implosions, Campbell is certainly feeling the heat.
According to Bleacher Report, he might even be working himself into the discussion to be the next coach fired. Recently, writer Alex Ballentine listed the top coaches who could be next to go in the wake of Matt Rhule’s firing.
Perhaps a bit surprisingly, Campbell was the top name on the list, and Ballentine admits that while the coach’s personality is fun and leads to hype, the results have not matched the effort so far in terms of wins and losses.
“Dan Campbell spent the preseason endearing himself to a national audience on Hard Knocks. The coach’s gift for rousing speeches and hard-nosed approach to football is easy to like, and it led to some high-profile stories and hype surrounding the coach. Unfortunately for the Detroit Lions, none of it has led to positive on-field results,” he wrote.
As Ballentine concluded, all is not lost for Campbell, but the need for wins and improvement is great right now.
“There’s still hope for Campbell, and it’s tough to fire a coach in his second season, but they need to start showing improvement quickly,” he wrote.
It isn’t a good look for Campbell to be on this list amid a rebuild, so the challenge will be finding wins and trying to salvage the season the rest of the way for the coach. Whether or not he is in danger of being fired, it’s hard to argue the results have not been good enough.
At this point, it’s more likely Campbell would make staff changes at the end of the year than be fired himself, but in the NFL, all bets are always off.
Heavy Insider Matt Lombardo Puts Campbell on Clock
Detroit’s head coach has been erratic with the decision making this year, and may have cost his team a shot at two more wins this season as a result.
Obviously, He’s far from a finished product as a head coach, and that could be costing his team in the short and long-term.
Heavy NFL insider Matt Lombardo is beginning to question whether or not Campbell is the man for the job in Detroit. After watching Campbell’s team get waxed 29-0 by New England, Campbell was proclaimed by Lombardo as a coach who should be on the clock in a Week 5 recap. The reason? A lack of wins and development.
“The only thing that creates a winning culture is winning. Campbell doesn’t seem to have a clue how to win. There is plenty of young talent on the Lions’ roster, on both sides of the football, it just may take a new voice to maximize it,” Lombardo wrote in-part in his recap.
The rest of the way, Campbell has a lot to prove, or critiques like this will continue. Thus far, Campbell is 9-23-1 as a head coach in the NFL. That’s not a lot of winning, no matter the talent he is working with. Detroit’s defense is also historically horrible.
While Campbell might be on the hot seat in the minds of some, Lombardo’s league sources aren’t completely sure that the team would make a coaching change.
Still, add it all up and all eyes figure to be on Detroit in the second-half of the season to see if a turnaround can be achieved.
Campbell’s Career With Lions Thus Far
Though the record has yet to match the hype, the Lions were one of the toughest teams in the league during the 2021 season, even if it did not translate into immediate wins.
Detroit was in nearly every game that was played and won three. They managed to do this in spite of multiple players being lost due to injury as well as illness outbreaks late in the season. In the end, it was an obvious testament to the toughness Campbell preached about on his first day.
Offensively and defensively, there is much to work out with the roster in terms of improvements and depth. Campbell is an aggressive coach on fourth-down, and looks desperate to be an innovator in terms of decision making in those moments. Campbell has also rolled the dice appropriately with a multitude of fake punts and onside kicks. When he took over play calling, the offense seemed to improve in a tangible way, especially with Ben Johnson.
Clearly, Campbell will need a solid second half to hush more criticism in the weeks ahead given how poorly things have trended.