The Detroit Lions are ready to go this year. Maybe a little too ready in the early going, though. On Tuesday, the Lions were being a little too physical, and head coach Dan Campbell had to stop practice multiple times to reel everyone back in. One player even got kicked out.
I know it sounds totally weird to the average fan that Dan Campbell, a guy who has preached about wanting violent players, would want his guys to be less physical at training camp, but this is the acclimation period. Currently, all teams are supposed to be doing is going through the motions and warming up to play football full-time. On Friday, when the pads come on, they can hit all they want.
So what's going on? Why did Campbell have to dial back practice multiple times on Tuesday? Aidan Hutchinson gave a pretty good answer in an interview with Sirius XM's NFL channel later in the day.
"It's, I think, we weren't very happy with our turnover ratio last year. We think we could get more strip attempts, more I know Kerby (Joseph) and BB (Brian Branch) had a bunch of interceptions and stuff. Besides that, just looking to get more production all across the board as a defense, punching the ball out, and really just trying to go after the ball. I think you're seeing it out there, and it's a little bit hard to go after the ball, but also not exactly bring someone to the ground. So it can be a little tricky sometimes, but at the end of the day, the intentions are where you want them. In order to take this defense to the next level."
It's funny because as soon as Hutchinson said that, it popped into my brain how much I had seen the Lions defense really trying to do that in the early part of camp. They're trying to punch the ball, grab their arms, or grab at the ball. You can see how that comes across and how players might respond to it. Before you know it, everyone gets a little heated, and it just snowballs.
Turnovers are something that Campbell has stressed a ton since he got to Detroit. He really sees it as something you can win games on. The Lions forced 24 turnovers last season. That was tied for seventh in the league. They gave away the ball 15 times for a differential of +9. That was eighth in the league. So not bad at all.
If they want to be better and wind up being better, that's a huge plus for this team. Let's see where it goes.
