Lions beat reporter says what all fans already knew about 2024 defense

The Detroit Lions' defense suffered some big injuries last season, leading to them struggling down the stretch of the season and leading into their loss to the Washington Commanders in the Divisional Round.

While it was hard to see them collapse after such a magical run in the regular season, there were already some signs that the Lions' defense wasn't going to be up to the task of containing the likes of Jayden Daniels, Jalen Hurts, or former Lions QB Matthew Stafford because of how many penalties they kept stacking up throughout the year.

Those pass interference penalties, of which they had 19 according to Lions beat reporter Tim Twentyman, were good for second-most in the league behind the Commanders in 2024. That's a big issue for a defense that will be relying pretty heavily in 2025 on younger defenders like Terrion Arnold to hold down their secondary.

This is something that has to get cleaned up, but also something Lions fans knew was an issue last season when frustratingly watching so many stops get called back due to those penalties.

Lions must cut pass interference penalties out of diet in 2025

With the addition of D.J. Reed and the return of both Kerby Joseph and Brian Branch to the secondary, you'd hope that the Lions are able to cut down on silly calls that kill momentum for their great-when-healthy defense. However, according to Twentyman, these calls might be a feature and not a bug of their defensive scheming.

"The Lions lost 274 yards worth of field position on those 19 penalties, which was the third most in the league. If we include three illegal contact, four roughing the passer, five offside and 12 personal fouls, that's 42 defensive penalties. Detroit plays a lot of man coverage which lends itself to more interference and illegal contact penalties, but limiting those in 2025 should be a priority for Detroit's back seven on defense," wrote Twentyman.

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With an extra year under the belt of Arnold in addition to so many key veterans returning to their secondary in 2025, those penalties shouldn't tally up as quickly as they had in 2024. Plus, with the addition of Aidan Hutchinson back to the defensive edge, it'll be a lot easier for the secondary to remain in coverage without committing too much physicality to getting a stop.