Jared Goff is top 10 in passer rating, Amon-Ra St. Brown is eighth in receiving yards, and the entirety of the rushing attack might be the scariest component of the Lions team as it throttles forward into the second half of the regular season and arrives with authority at or near the top of the NFC playoffs.
OK, so yes, passing and stopping the pass are more vital than anything else is the modern-day NFL. We all know that. And I literally own a t-shirt that reads, in large script letters "don't draft running backs in the first round." Also, the Lions play indoors and only have one outdoor game slated for December or January -- a Week 14 tilt in Chicago.
I still love the complete makeup of their ground game and what it, on paper, it should do to allow Detroit to keep its defense fresh and close out games late.
After a workmanlike start to the season for David Montgomery in which he toted the rock 94 times for 385 yards (4.09 per) before getting injured, the veteran feature back triumphantly returned from a month-long absence to score a 75-yard touchdown in a wild, high-scoring win over the Chargers in Los Angeles.
The rest of his day was largely less than impactful, but the touchdown was a much-needed exclamation mark for Detroit and signaled to the rest of the league that Montgomery was indeed, back. Through Week 10's effort, Montgomery now sits at third in the NFL with 19.8% of his runs featuring a forced missed tackle among backs with at least 100 carries. He trails only Christian McCaffrey and Bijan Robinson in that metric.
And then there's Jahmyr Gibbs, the proverbial lightning to Montgomery's thunder. We all watched, mouths agape, at the former Georgia Tech and Alabama star on "Monday Night Football'' to conclude Week 8, rushing for 154 yards on 26 carries and chiping in 37 more yards on five receptions in a win over the Raiders.
Gibbs was supremely efficient once again, with 77 yards on 14 carries (5.5 per) with three grabs for 35 yards against the Chargers. He also scored two one-yard touchdowns. He's forced a missed tackle on 16.7% of his rushes to date, a tenth of a percent lower than Breece Hall and two tenths lower than Derrick Henry.
Of course, an evaluation of a team's run game is never complete without homage paid to the offensive line, and the Lions blocking unit is as ferocious as any.
Montgomery and Gibbs are one of two running back tandems in football that currently averages at least 3.4 yards before contact per rush, which of course does speak to the elusive ways of each ball carrier but more directly indicates the Lions blockers are moving people on a routine basis. Only 6.7% of Gibbs' runs have gone for negative yards, tied for the fourth-lowest rate in football among backs with at least 50 carries. Conversely, 14.4% of his attempts have gone for 10-plus yards, the fourth-highest in that same running back group.
Altogether, Detroit is fourth in rush EPA, behind the Ravens, Bills, and Dolphins. And they've gotten there despite Montgomery being unavailable for essentially three games.
And this is now a team that wants to run the football. After a season in which Jared Goff finished with the sixth-most pass attempts, the Lions are now currently in the bottom 10 in pass attempts entering Week 11. Penei Sewell, Taylor Decker, Frank Ragnow are the former first-round anchors up front. Jonah Jackson's been a Pro Bowler at guard, and the combo of Graham Glasgow and Halapoulivaati Vaitai have rocked at the other guard position.
Dan Campbell's club has rushed the football 121 times with a lead in the second half this season and have 29 first downs on those plays, both the third-most in football. The ground game is Detroit's ultra-reliable closer.
The Lions offensive front is an unequivocal strength of this 7-2 team. It's the engine that makes the offense go. And Detroit's offense isn't only efficient moving the football through the air. Now, with Montgomery back in the mix, the Lions have a case for the NFL's most perfectly complementary and dynamic running back duo.
And at this point of the season, that should scare every team in the NFC.
