DETROIT - After the Vikings’ 31-9 loss to the Lions on Sunday, center Garrett Bradbury and fellow offensive linemen debriefed inside the visitor’s locker room about just how aggressively Detroit’s defense played while grounding quarterback Sam Darnold and Minnesota’s prolific passing attack.
The linemen felt as bad as that score looks after Darnold took a season-worst 10 hits, two of them sacks.
Detroit delivered blow after blow while blitzing Darnold on nearly 56% of his dropbacks and generating pressure 49% of the time. NFL Next Gen Stats show that as the third-highest pressure rate Darnold has faced all season.
The Lions often used the most aggressive form of blitz, called “Cover 0,” in which every defender rushes the quarterback except those in solo man-to-man coverage on receivers. According to the NFL, nobody sent more zero blitzes in a game than the 14 Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn called in the 272nd and final game of the regular season.
“They brought a lot,” Bradbury said. “They brought everything. I think they brought ‘Saw’ — double [blitzers] off each edge — three times in the first two drives, a lot of twists, a lot of different pressures, safeties, bringing all-out [pressure]. The frustrating thing is I didn’t feel like they got home on a lot of those. Obviously, they affected the plays. But there’s just — we didn’t play good enough offensively.”
In the first half alone, Darnold took seven hits from all angles: Bradbury was pushed backward into Darnold on the first hit; a delayed rush by Lions linebacker Jack Campbell landed another; a D-line twist got by right tackle Brian O’Neill and right guard Dalton Risner for the third hit (and first sack); Darnold beat a zero blitz on a 31-yard toss to Justin Jefferson on third down but got tagged by Lions safety Kerby Joseph in the process; left guard Blake Brandel lost a matchup with Lions defensive end Josh Paschal for another hit.
Unlike the Oct. 20 loss to the Lions, Vikings blockers were protecting against a little bit of everything.
“It was just the variety of looks we saw,” O’Neill said. “Where the first game, they did one or two or three things over and over again. This week we kind of saw the whole Rolodex of things, so that might’ve had something to do with it.”