Getty Jared Goff reacts during a 2022 game against Miami.
The Detroit Lions got off to a hot start on the offensive side of the ball in Week 8, and managed to move the ball down the field consistently and score points.
For most of the first half, the Lions moved the ball at will and put up 27 points. The Lions were held to that, and ended up losing the game 31-27. Safe to say the power outage was a big reason the team lost.
Speaking to the media on Thursday, November 3, Johnson explained what he thought went wrong in the second half. He didn’t seem to think it was an execution issue for the team or something drastically different they saw on defense, but rather small mistakes.
“I said it was turnovers (and) penalties. To me, it’s more us as opposed to a defense doing things that that we aren’t countering well enough,” Johnson said.
As he went on to say, he wasn’t troubled by much of what Miami was showing on defense in the money quarters, but rather challenged his players to execute much better on the field next time they are in crunch time.
“I just say last week in particular, (Miami was) playing a little bit more vanilla brand of football than what they’ve put on tape so far this year. That’s probably due to their personnel more than anything else, so we had a good feel how the rest of the game was going to be played with how we started and what they were doing. It just came down to execution, which we didn’t do a good enough job of,” Johnson said of the team’s second half.
The Lions just needed to find a way to avoid the mental mistakes on a few more plays, and as Johnson says, find better consistency with regards to execution and attention to detail. If they can do that, they will be able to make enough plays in crunch time to get the team over the top.
Lions Played Better During Week 8
In terms of the turnovers and the mistakes, the Lions didn’t make many of those on offense last week, at least when compared with the past few weeks.
Once again, Jared Goff got back to taking care of the ball, something he had not done nearly well enough in the past few weeks. Goff didn’t have a fumble or interception, but did throw for 321 yards and a touchdown against Miami en-route to a 108.1 passer rating.
What the Detroit offense didn’t do was have the cleanest half in terms of execution, and that was the biggest problem on the field for the Lions. Detroit missed far too many easy passes and had some mistakes in terms of penalties which did cost them dearly.
As Johnson points out, if the Lions can clean up a few of their smaller issues they will be in much better shape moving forward, and can find a way to sneak out a close game in terms of execution.
Johnson Talks Halftime Adjustments for Lions
Perhaps one of the biggest critiques of what has happened with Detroit’s offense has been Johnson’s ability to adjust at halftime. In this game, it appeared as if the team didn’t get that done given the score.
Johnson explained what happens in terms of adjustments for the team, and said that contrary to what many think, there are discussions that take place for what to do moving forward.
“There are certainly adjustments that happen at halftime and we get together the coaching staff right away and for the first five (to) seven minutes, we’re meeting and then we get together with our guys and kind of tell them the plan of attack going forward. What’s happened in the first half, what do we need to continue to do and what do we need to do better,” Johnson said.
This week, the Lions need to find the inches and do a much better job in terms of executing, avoiding small mistakes and adjusting. If the Lions can do that, Johnson would no doubt agree the team will be in much better shape.