Heading into the 2019 season, most believed the Detroit Lions defense would be a strength. After all, the defense stepped up towards the end of the 2018 season and GM Bob Quinn went out and added more pieces to the puzzle in the offseason.
http://gty.im/1185290923
Unfortunately, the Lions defense has been an absolute embarrassment so far this season and the blame has to be placed somewhere.
When reading Lions’ CB Darius Slay’s comments following a 31-24 loss to the Oakland Raiders, it is obvious that he is calling out the Lions coaching staff for not putting the players in the right spots. Slay added that every opponent is beating them the same way with the same plays.
No Lions player offered specifics why the defense is failing, but Darius Slay offered harshest criticisms, saying they aren't putting the puzzles pieces in the right spots and every opponent is beating them the same way with the same plays, since Week 1.
— Justin Rogers | Detroit News (@Justin_Rogers) November 4, 2019
From Detroit Free Press:
“It was just rough,” cornerback Darius Slay told reporters after the game. “We just got to figure out a way how to put all this stuff together, man. We got a great team, we got all the right pieces, but it just ain’t sticking together. Like, I don’t know, we might be putting the pieces to the puzzle in the wrong spot. That’s what it is. We’re putting the puzzles in the wrong spot right now.”
Slay said the Lions are the victims of copycat gameplans, unable to stop the same plays week after week.
“It’s not even different,” Slay said in video posted on Fox2Detroit.com. “Like, I don’t think they be calling their own plays. Whoever started this first, they just start copying it from the jump. That’s all it is. This league is a copycat league and they see that we have a problem with all that, they do the same thing. So everybody know the way we play this, they run this, and they do it all the time. So we ain’t seeing nothing new. Ain’t no new plays designed up, it’s the same ones we been having a problem with since probably first week of the season. So we just got to fix it.”
Nation, so you agree with Slay? Is there any way he is a Lion in 2020?
Birkett: Darius Slay’s time with Detroit Lions will soon be coming to an end
