Power of the Mind: How Dan Campbell and the Detroit Lions play so fast, so free
"Can you hang with us when we’re going to hit you in the face with a baseball bat?" In Allen Park, Mich., we talk to players who strike the most vexing balance in the sport.
Before we take you inside the Detroit Lions locker room, imagine being a different head coach. One whose seat is boiling. You craft a gameplan. You’ve gotten your club to mentally reset on the heels of a crushing last-second loss to the Seattle Seahawks. And all week, you drill all rules into the minds of your players. You remind everyone to hold onto the damn football as they cross the goal line in the aftermath of wide receiver A.D. Mitchell costing his Indianapolis Colts a win by inexplicably dropping the ball.
Your Arizona Cardinals are on the verge of a 28-6 lead over the Tennessee Titans and… it happens. Again. Emari Demercado holds the ball for 71 1/2 yards instead of 72.
The Cardinals proceed to lose in tormenting fashion with head coach Jonathan Gannon going ballistic on Demercado. It’s overboard — obviously — but the twittering public also acts as if Gannon balled up a fist and went full Tony Soprano on one of his players. Furor at a fever pitch, the lawyers and PR officials on Park Avenue predictably fine Gannon $100,000. The fact that Gannon quite literally just told players to hold onto the ball while crossing the goal line, as confirmed by SI’s Albert Breer on the MMQB Podcast, at least explains why the 42-year-old went nuclear. Of course, nothing justifies it. Players forever take on the personality of their head coach. When coaches throw such infantile tantrums, volatility on the field should be expected.
Mostly? This entire incident (and its explosive aftermath) hints at the plight of all 32 NFL head coaches.
Football is as close as we’ll ever get to gladiators in a coliseum. The average play is a five-second vessel of violence. Preparing players for those five seconds is the ultimate challenge.
Coaches universally prep their players for every… conceivable… scenario. On one hand, your players must be scholars well-versed in all rules, all situations. On the other, you’re not reporting to work with a briefcase in one hand and textbooks in the other. Think too much on the field and you’re dead meat. Coaches need all 11 playing fast, free, off unconscious instinct. Demercado’s involuntary lapse is obviously the most extreme example of instincts gone wrong, but this sort of stuff happens all the time.
The coaches who can build an exceptionally smart team that knows precisely what to do in all situations while simultaneously playing fast have the edge.
Here in Allen Park, Mich., the Detroit Lions strike this near-impossible balance better than anyone.
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Head coach Dan Campbell and GM Brad Holmes have created a machine of an organization that’s full of exceptionally smart players who still manage to play on raw emotion. They’re not robots. They’re not reading a virtual Terms and Conditions pamphlet mid-play. And through all riverboat gambling on fourth down, all epic speeches, all shrewd personnel decisions — finding players who already have a fire burning inside — this duo has cultivated a locker room of players on offense, defense and special teams that do their jobs at a fast rate.
It’s taken time, and we’ve chronicled each step at Go Long.
First, the Lions built a nasty offensive line. Then, they sought a very specific DNA in all players through all transactions. Jared Goff, first and foremost, brought the coach’s message “grit” to life. Detroit realized before anyone that it pays to kick ass in a sport going soft. Several players detailed the moment they fell in love with the sport’s violence. Kalif Raymond’s rise explains so much about this team. And it sure helps to have a leader like David Montgomery blasting off. There’s a reason he runs so hard.
Newcomers realize quickly that this habitat is different. Hired this season to oversee the defensive line and coordinate the run game, Kacy Rodgers was blown away in practice when one of the team’s linebackers made a check out of a play. The Lions hadn’t even installed this check yet, but it was the dead-on correct call.
Now, it’s gotten to the point where players on both sides of the ball know virtually every play call that’s going to come in during the course of a game.
“These guys know if it’s third and 1 on the minus-15, this is the play we’re in,” Rodgers says. “On offense and defense. As a player, you can play fast because you know exactly what’s coming in. Even the way we gameplan — if they’re in this personnel, this is the call. They already know it. They practiced it. So now, it lets you play faster. There’s no wondering ‘What do I do in this call versus that?’ You already know. You know what call is coming. So that allows these guys to play fast and really confident.”
Everyone seemed to get a good chuckle in when the Lions drafted certain players at the front end of this rebuild. You cannot take a running back that high! But player acquisition is different, too. Rodgers has coached for five teams over a 22-year career in the pros and has never seen a team draft players to fit a specific mold quite like these Lions. The “fit” is emphasized. Holmes and Campbell seek specific intangibles.
Adds Rodgers: “You can say, ‘Why didn’t they take this guy? Why didn’t they take that guy?’ Is the guy the right fit? It’s not necessarily the players — is it the right fit? … This guy, he’s tough, he’s hardworking, he’s gritty, he’s an overachiever. There’s a whole list of intangibles to what they want the Detroit Lions to be.”
Inside the locker room, cornerback Avonte Maddox played for Gannon with the Eagles in 2021 and 2022. He ardently defended his former coordinator, calling Gannon “passionate” and a “great person” who didn’t mean any harm. Still, one can only wonder how freely Demercado will play this point forward. Chances are, nobody will see a Lions player commit such a cardinal sin on the field. Maddox credits the head coach for reviewing the details with so much regularity that it all becomes “muscle memory” and “embedded in your head.” Players feel prepared for all potential situations.
Coaches stress ball security on offense and punching the ball out on defense… nonstop.
“It becomes embedded in your head,” Maddox says.
All teams crave such an environment. It’s easier said than done.
Eliminating the fear of reprisal helps.
Mike Vrabel is bringing toughness back to Foxborough, but he also was a high-level pro for 14 seasons. He understands the value of a clear conscience. So when Andy Borregales missed two extra points vs. Miami in Week 2, Vrabel didn’t flinch. He let Borregales attempt a 53-yarder on fourth and 7 with 1:47 left to go up by six. The rookie drilled it. Three weeks later, he drilled a 52-yarder to stun Buffalo. Running back Rhamondre Stevenson has had issues fumbling, too. Maybe he reaches a point of no return. Nonetheless, Vrabel refuses to lock the running back away in a doghouse. Despite putting the ball on the ground for the third time this season at Buffalo, Stevenson led New England’s backs in snaps (31) and rewarded Vrabel for his trust with two goal-line touchdowns.
Letting players be themselves helps.
Thursday night felt like a massive breakthrough for the New York Giants.
To date, a general lack of talent, apocalyptic injuries to the offensive line and misplaced faith in Daniel Jones have held this regime back. Out of nowhere, rookies Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo are bringing a level of aura to this team that MetLife Stadium hasn’t experienced in ages. Against the defending champs, the quarterback slickly danced his way around the pocket with ease. His receiving corps decimated, Dart completed 17 of 25 passes—multiple drops included—for 195 yards, a TD and added another 58 yards on the ground with a TD. Meanwhile, meeting Cam Skattebo in the hole is the NFL equivalent to a rendezvous with Peak Blake Griffin at the rim. He sent All-Pro linebacker Zack Baun airborne. He had Adoree Jackson making business decisions.
In the end zone, he’s back-flipping and surfing. In his postgame interview, “Scatt” tears his shirt off to chest-bump Ryan Fitzpatrick with a rebel yell.
Quarterback and running back — head-butting their way to a 34-17 upset of the Philadelphia Eagles — are giving Giants fans real hope because of their attitude, their very unique styles of play that Brian Daboll will not change. There’s much work to do, the schedule’s brutal and Malik Nabers’ torn ACL is a colossal bummer. But it’s clear Daboll wants both young bucks to be themselves, and that’s a not a bad place to start in building this team.
This night, the Eagles played like the crew afraid of their own shadow. A predictable, crestfallen bunch.
Finally, evolving as a head coach helps, too.
This fast and free state of mind is difficult to attain and sustain.
Some of the sport’s winningest coaches struggle to get here. Sean McDermott is 90-46 in the regular season as Buffalo’s head coach. His teams have claimed five straight division titles. As written in ‘23, however, his teams too often got tight in pressure-packed moments. Through ’17, ’18, ’19, players could sense that McDermott was wound up ahead of dates with Bill Belichick, Tom Brady and mighty New England. From ’20 to ’21 to ’22, his nerves were noticeably heightened into dates with Andy Reid, Patrick Mahomes and dynastic Kansas City. The result was a team that grew to expect something to go wrong in the waning moments. He was a micromanaging extraordinaire. Intense attention to detail even led McDermott toward a training camp speech he’d like to take back.
Gradually, he’s changing. The Bills head coach has made a concerted effort to loosen up because he knows his players will do the same. By his standards, McDermott has noticeably chilled out the last year and a half. We sat down during the postseason a year ago to discuss this evolution. He still values preparation and laying out all possible obstacles the Bills could face on Sunday. But he’s viewing his players as human beings more than ever. He’s trying to get them to imagine everything that will go right vs. dreading what could go wrong.
Judging by how the Green Bay Packers have operated late in games, it’s fair to wonder how Matt LaFleur’s emotions and day-to-day approach shape his team. He’s liable to scream at people on the sideline and he’s described as a hard-driving presence behind the scenes. I’ll explore at greater depth some point this season. It’s worth a closer look.
Right in Green Bay’s own division, these Detroit Lions sure are doing something right.
On Friday, I canvassed the locker room to further figure out how they’re getting guys to play with smarts and instincts. Here’s what a few players had to say.
Isaac TeSlaa
Wide receiver, rookie
Go Long: Brad and Dan value smart football players. High intelligence. Guys know every situation going into every game, but everybody plays fast and free. Like they’re not thinking out there. How do you think they’ve struck that balance that so many teams struggle to strike? You don’t want to be thinking too much.
TeSlaa: Bringing in the right guys. Whether it’s the draft or free agency. Obviously everyone that they draft they know is going to have that similar mindset coming in. But even the guys that are coming in through free agency, they all fit the standard here. They’re going to fit into what we’ve got building here. But I think it just comes down to preparation. Everyone prepares the right way and that’s going to allow you to play fast if you prepare like that. And I’d say going throughout camp, at least for me, there were some days where my head was spinning. But that’s what camp is for. Before you get into the season, those camp reps are how you really build your confidence. You’re locking in the playbook and you’re hearing the play calls. That’s how you learn to play full speed. It’s during those camp reps going at different guys and getting different looks.
GL: How much is your head spinning? What are you trying to get down at that point?
TeSlaa: Everything. You’ve got formations. You’ve got run game. You got pass game. So many different things you got to remember and it’s completely different than the college that you came from. So you have to completely wash that and learn this new playbook. So definitely those first couple of days at camp — getting thrown in the fire — it was like, “Oh man.” But everything starts to slow down the more and more you play.
GL: But you guys aren’t robots out there. He’s going for it on fourth down. He’s building confidence. What does that do for the attitude of a team? You can play free because you know the head coach believes in you.
TeSlaa: We’re all ball players and that’s when it comes down to. “Johnny Mo” always talks about, “Yes, we install the plays and this is how it looks on paper.” But you can’t just run the lines on the paper, otherwise your ass is going to get covered. You’ve got to have some creativity. You’ve got to be a football player.’ Everybody on the field, that’s our mentality. Just be a football player. Obviously stay within the boundaries of what you can do. But be creative. Be a football player. Make plays.
Taylor Decker
Left tackle, 10-year vet
Go Long: Guys are really smart here. You know every rule for every situation. But they also play freely. How do you get to that place as a team where guys are playing off of instincts and you’re going for it on fourth down? Nobody’s stressed. You go do it. But you also have a lot running through your head at the same time.
Decker: I think first and foremost, we’ve got a core group of players that’ve been together a long time, so you build trust within the coaching staff. Dan trusts us in situations to go make plays and there’s a lot of times going into certain games where it’s like, “We’re going to go for it on every fourth down.” If it’s reasonable. Last year when we played the Packers at the end of the year, our gameplan was, “We are going for it on every fourth down.” And we did. But we knew that was the gameplan. We knew that was the expectation. And then we’ve done it so much to where it’s just normal. And then we do those situations. We do stuff like that in practice all the time. In training camp, we run through every weird situation. Everything you possibly can do in training camp and I think that just the coaches just trust the guys.
GL: What are some of those weird situations that you’re preparing for in camp?
Decker: I don’t know if I want to give things away necessarily because that’s something that could win you a game. But maybe you need seven yards and you need to find a unique way to get it because they’re playing sideline defense and you get into a unique formation or something like that. We practice all sorts of stuff. We’ll do different things every week. Not necessarily because we think it’s going to come up, but just to refresh as we go. Then there’s simple things that you see executed well or poorly in terms of clock management (around the league). I think I saw one game this year — I don’t know if it was halftime or at the end of the game — where it’s a hurricane field goal situation. There’s like 18 seconds. You have no timeouts. You’re going out for third down. Oh, you don’t get the third down. Now, it’s fourth down. You’ve got to run the field goal team on and get it set up quick to kick the field goal as time’s expiring. Stuff like that, we do all the time.
GL: There’s also the element where you guys want to run through a wall for this guy, too.
Decker: 100 percent.
GL: Is there a speech that still resonates to you?
Decker: Probably one of my favorite ones would be — and this might’ve been on Hard Knocks too. It was pretty early on where he was talking about how the way we’ve been built and structured, there’s teams that thrive in the shallow water. And then there’s four or five or six teams that they want to pull people out to the deep, dark depths and see if you can survive. And that’s the kind of team that they build around here where we’re going to pull you out to the deep water and see — when things are going wrong — can you sustain what you’re going to do? Can you hang with us when we’re going to hit you in the face with a baseball bat? That resonates because that’s the brand of football that we play.
GL: You were 4-19-1 to start this whole thing. You’re going to go one of two ways at that point.
Decker: One thing that Dan did early on that still to this day I think it was very impressive for him to have done — and maybe it was just natural for him in hindsight — when we were losing a lot of games early on, he always took all responsibility to the media. He would always say, “I’ve got to fix it. The guys are playing so hard. They’re doing what they’re supposed to do. We’ve got to clean some stuff up, but I’ll put this one on me. I’m responsible.” And it sounds silly because these are all grown men who get paid a lot of money to do it. But when you’re a player and you’re out there feeling like you’re doing everything you possibly can to get results and they’re just not there yet? For your leader to say, “No, look at me. It’s my fault.” Everybody here could work without that extra added pressure. That was always super impressive. Because he’s always like, “Point the finger at me. Don’t worry about them.” And that was impressive to me.
GL: That meant a lot to guys at that point?
Decker: 100 percent. It was almost like he was shielding us from it. We still see it. But he was never going to sell anybody out. He was always going to say, “It’s my responsibility. I’m the head coach. I’m going to get this turned around.”
GL: You could feel his emotion. After those early losses, at his press conferences, he’s in tears. You could see how much it’s killing him. When you’re not winning those games, I can’t imagine what it’s like behind the scenes.
Decker: He’s always been that way. That’s how he’s always been. He’s always been a “wear emotions on his sleeve” kind of guy. Recently, it’s been a lot more happy emotions because we’re winning. But I think that’s just how he is. It’s not performative. I’ll have family members ask, “Oh my God, is he really like that?” And I’m like, “Yeah. That’s really how he is.” You go talk to him 1 on 1 in his office. That’s how he is.
GL: Which is so hard. That’s why I hate press conferences. The interaction, by nature, is that everyone is performing a role. He’s himself even in that setting — that’s how he is. He goes up there and it’s like he’s doing a 1 on 1, bullshitting, being real but with substance.
Decker: When he’s doing interviews, I draw a parallel to how he talks about injury situations or whatever it may be. Last year down the stretch, we lost a lot of guys on defense. And he would say, “The show goes on. It doesn’t matter. Nobody cares. We’ve got to keep going.” So I feel like when he’s doing the media, he’s like, “This isn’t going to change us winning a game. I’m going to give a genuine answer. I’m going to be myself because none of this is going to impact tomorrow. The show’s going to go on. This isn’t impacting the day to day. We’ve got to keep rolling. We’ve got to keep doing this thing. So me trying to be secretive or scold a reporter is not going to do anything.” We’ve got to keep this thing moving.
Kalif Raymond
Wide receiver, 10-year vet
Go Long: You’ve got a locker room full of players who play off instincts. But it seems as if you also all have all solutions to all problems. How do you get to that place?
Raymond: One, a lot of coaching. A lot of situations we’re in are situations Dan put us in before. We’ll even rep scenarios from other teams. We do a lot of situational football. And then we’re very detailed in our walkthroughs. You can’t just put on pads and bang every day. But if you can mimic things in walkthrough and have a plan for things that arise? You can’t get every single play, every single look in the game. But in a walkthrough, you can put on a load. It really helps us: “Oh yeah, this is the look from walkthrough. We’ve already made adjustments. And even it doesn’t hit the same way in practice, I’ve seen it already and I can make adjustments.” So a lot of that has to do with coaching in. And then the flip side of that is we have a lot of high character guys that are in the locker room. High-character guys will take what we do with intent and it means something to ‘em. So even the stuff that happens when the ball is not in your hands, it means something to the guys.
GL: You’re right. Because there’s one ball and that block 10 yards down the field can spring one of these backs. There’s got to be something burning inside of you? You’re looking for a certain type of player to fit a certain team.
Raymond: Look at all the guys that have been here. They’ve gone through some sort of adversity that molds who they are. You’ve guys that go through things, have that adversity, it builds their character, but also they develop an appreciation for the game.
GL: That’s what we talked about — all the shit you’ve been through. You’re still standing. When you look around the locker room, do you see guys that have been through something and that explains why they’re here and why they’re playing the way they’re playing?
Raymond: From top-down, you could go through each person. There’s something in your life that changed you. Actually one of the coolest guys—you talk about a fighter who’s seen a couple regimes and still kind of doing his thing, making a mark sight on scene? That guy right there: Tom Kennedy. Elevated. Cut. Elevated. Cut. Elevated. Cut. Played in the Patricia Era. Undrafted. A tryout guy. All that stuff. And he’s just been chopping at the block every year. (Pretends to chop wood) This is seventh year. All with the Detroit Lions. Two coaching staffs. He probably has had five or six different receiver coaches and he just keeps chopping at the block. And there’s something about Tom Kennedy every single time. That’s the guy who saw adversity, found a way to change it and keeps persevering through it.
He does all the little stuff right. The stuff you ask — blocking. Knows all the plays. Runs all the routes. Catches the football. He just keeps chopping at the block. To go seven years as a tryout undrafted guy on the same team through two culture regimes.
GL: That’s unheard of.
Raymond: There’s got to be something about you. His type of character resembles a lot of the character in the room. It’s the type of stuff that I think Dan Campbell’s trying to build. He’s been through two regimes with two completely different coaches. But something about what he offers sticks. It’s true. He’ll go in there and block. He’ll go play offense, play defense, play special teams. If you ask him to go run down a gunner, he’ll do it. Something about him sticks. And then when you ask him, “Hey, what do you have? Hey, what does this guy have? Oh, what does the running back have? Oh, what does Jared have? What protection is this?” Tom Kennedy will know the whole thing.
GL: And Dan brings in players who fit a certain mold. When somebody doesn’t fit that mold, they’re out of here. You’ve seen that whittling process to sharpen this team and that image. For Kennedy to survive all that, that’s what Dan wants 1 through 53.
Raymond: I think so. And it’s cool. It’s been cool to watch the transition of it all.
Tom Kennedy
Wide Receiver, 7-year vet
(Approach Kennedy later in locker room on this general theme. He is disinterested in this topic.)
Kennedy: Kalif just likes to hype people up.
(Kennedy now walking away.)
Kennedy: They just like guys who work.
On Sunday night, the Lions face the desperate Chiefs at Arrowhead. Odds are, this matchup boils down to one critical play in the waning seconds. Win or lose, the collective heart rates of these Lions won’t spike uncontrollably. They’ll fully grasp the down and distance and run all permutations through their minds at warp speed.
They’ll know exactly what play call is coming in.
They’ll expect to convert. And win.
What an article
Nobody, i mean nobody provides such a look into an NFL locker room and the culture of an NFL team like this does. Fascinating on some many levels. Keep up the good work Tyler.