The Detroit Lions‘ secondary remains unresolved despite the team’s best performance on defense of the season. Detroit beat the Green Bay Packers 20-17 in Week 7, but the team resorted to its deepest rotation in the secondary yet. Former starters Rock Ya-Sin, Ennis Rakestraw, and Roger McCreary mixed in, but so did special teams ace Khalil Dorsey.
Head coach Dan Campbell noted after the game that he liked the way Dorsey played and expects to see him on defense again in the coming weeks.
“I thought (Khalil) Dorsey, man, stepped in and did some big things,” said Campbell after the game. “There was no panic, made some big plays downfield.”
Campbell later admitted that this is not just a one-off plan. The team will continue to rotate their cornerbacks into the mix. That includes Dorsey playing more.
“We’re going to use all those guys, just like we did today,” said Campbell on the plan moving forward. “That was the plan coming in. Hey, we’re going to use all of our – they’re all going to the game. We’re using them on special teams, we’re going to use them on defense too. Let’s roll them. And we also knew those guys had launched some of these, so let’s get some fresh bodies in there if we need to. And we’ll continue to do that. When guys step on and make plays, we can get more opportunities. That’s the bottom line, man. So, did a good job, and there’s no reason why he wouldn’t get a few more plays.”
Dorsey played 14 snaps. He was one of five cornerbacks to get work on the outside.
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As usual, the Lions started Roger McCreary on the outside. Then, when the team moves into nickel situations, McCreary would shift into the slot. So, McCreary wound up playing in all 67 snaps, but he only had 14 as an outside cornerback.
D.J. Reed was second in snaps on the Lions with 61. All of his snaps were on the outside. When McCreary was in the slot and Reed was not on the field, they rotated Rock Ya-Sin, Ennis Rakestraw, and Dorsey.
Rakestraw finished with 21 snaps while Ya-Sin and Dorsey recorded 14 snaps.
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In the first two weeks, Ya-Sin started. Now that he is healthy, the team is working him back in. In the meantime, they have played McCreary and Rakestraw, so that makes sense. The only significant change is Dorsey seeing the field on defense.
The 2020 UDFA has been with the Lions since 2023. However, he has just 189 snaps on defense in four seasons. He played 20 snaps on defense last year. Dorsey has nearly 900 special teams snaps with the Lions in that time. So, he is a core member of the roster.
Still, this is the first time the team really trusted him on defense, and he performed for them. Detroit is looking for anything to stick on defense. In one game, he did that. We will see how much more Dorsey plays in Week 8.
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