Detroit Lions’ secondary looking dangerously thin ahead of Monday night clash

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: the Detroit Lions are missing several defensive starters.

After a mountain of injuries and safety Brian Branch’s one-game suspension being upheld, Detroit is missing both of its starting cornerbacks, its do-it-all safety and things aren’t looking great for Kerby Joseph either.

Joseph has been fighting through a knee injury that has apparently bothered him since training camp, and has been in some visible pain throughout Detroit’s last few games.

He left both Detroit’s Week 6 loss to Kansas City and Week 4 win over Cleveland with the injury, and though he returned to both, it’s clearly been a very difficult injury to try and tough out.

“He tried to gut through it, played most of the game, and, look, it wasn’t his best performance, and he’ll tell you that, too,” head coach Dan Campbell said of Joseph’s night against Kansas City. “He was giving us what he had, so we’ll have to reassess.”

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With Detroit’s bye week coming up after their Monday night game against Tampa Bay, it would make sense to sit Joseph for a week to allow him to recuperate a bit and manage the pain. But doing so would leave Detroit without both members of the NFL’s best safety tandem.

And the Lions are hurting even more at cornerback. D.J. Reed is still on injured reserve, and Terrion Arnold looks like he won’t be back until after the bye at the very earliest.

Nickel corner Avonte Maddox has also been ruled out until after the bye week with a hamstring injury, and 2024 second-round pick Ennis Rakestraw Jr. is out for the season after preseason shoulder surgery.

So Detroit will be without both of their starting corners and safeties if Joseph can’t go, which seems likely. It begs the question– who is even going to be out there on Monday night?

Well, Detroit added veteran corner Kendall Fuller to its practice squad on Tuesday, and signed safety Jammie Robinson off of the Kansas City Chiefs’ practice squad to their 53-man roster on Wednesday.

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Starting nickel corner Amik Robertson has been kicked outside the last few weeks when Detroit runs its base defense and played well, and that’s likely to be the case again on Monday night.

As for the other corner spot, Detroit has Rock Ya-Sin, training camp favorite Nick Whiteside, recent signee Tre Flowers and Fuller as the most likely candidates.

Safety Thomas Harper was pressed into action last week for a bit when Joseph went down and played well in a pinch. He appears likely to start at safety this week with Robinson providing depth. 

Ya-Sin was up-and-down as an outside corner last week, and Detroit mostly deployed him at safety throughout camp and the preseason. It would make sense for the Lions to put him back there with Joseph and Branch both out, although they could go with Robinson or Erick Hallett.

It would be a surprise to see Fuller start right away after just a few days with the team, but Detroit has done things like that before, and if they feel good about his abilities in man coverage they could very well throw him out there. 

Robertson has been one of the best nickel players in the NFL since joining the Lions, and it might be best for the defense to keep him there in their nickel package while having him play outside in their base defense, especially with Maddox out.

That would mean two of Flowers, Whiteside and Fuller will be Detroit’s two outside starters. Leaving them with a lineup looking something like this:

Base:

CB1: Amik Robertson

CB2: Flowers / Nick Whiteside / Kendall Fuller

S: Rock Ya-Sin / Jammie Robinson

S: Thomas Harper

Nickel:

CB1: Tre Flowers 

CB2: Nick Whiteside / Kendall Fuller

NB: Amik Robertson

S: Rock Ya-Sin  / Jammie Robinson

S: Thomas Harper

That’s a very loose outline and there doesn’t appear to be an obvious lineup configuration. Not exactly ideal with the red-hot Baker Mayfield and his Tampa Bay Buccaneers coming to town. 

But Tampa is plenty banged up itself on offense. Veteran wideouts Mike Evans and Chris Godwin have both been out for most of the year, although Evans is expected to return to practice this week and try to play Sunday.

Rookie wideout Emeka Egbuka has been outstanding and is likely the frontrunner for Offensive Rookie of the Year, but he injured his hamstring against San Francisco last week and isn’t expected to be ready on Monday. Star running back Bucky Irving is also expected to be down, and starting guard Luke Haggard is also injured and might not play. Star tackle Luke Goedeke is on injured reserve.

Both of these teams are hurting, and the Buccaneers are dealing with some injuries at corner of their own, although Zyon McCollum and Benjamin Morrison are expected to make a run at playing this week. 

Mayfield has been playing with essentially his second-team skill positions these last few weeks, and has still managed to tear it up. With both teams limping into Monday Night, it’ll be as much of a “next man up” game as you’ll ever see.

“The next guy’s got to step up and serve a role for us, help us out, and then it’s got to spread throughout the rest of your team, man," Campbell said. "Everybody else has got to pull a little bit more of that load.”