Campbell was asked a question about defensive assistant and safeties coach Jim O’Neil Saturday and in his response, he said Detroit’s secondary has made the most growth of any unit since he’s become head coach in 2021.
Over the last five seasons, the Lions have acquired safeties Kerby Joseph (All Pro) and Brian Branch (Pro Bowler), who are now one of – if not the best – safety tandem in the NFL.
Amik Robertson has become one of the better nickel cornerbacks in the league. D.J. Reed is a proven vet playing pretty good ball to start the season in his first year with the Lions, and the team is still very high on Arnold’s potential.
Campbell gave a lot of credit for the growth of the secondary to pass game coordinator and defensive backs coach Deshea Townsend and to O’Neil.
“Between (O’Neil) and Shea, they do a great job with the backend. Those guys have – we’ve done our most growth here, since I’ve been here, defensively in the backend just from the steps that have been taken from Year 1 to here we go on Year 5,” Campbell said.
Running back Sione Vaki (hamstring) and linebacker Trevor Nowaske (elbow) have been full participants in practice this week after missing Detroit’s first two contests due to injury. If both can return to game action on Monday, it will give the Lions special teams a big boost as they are two of the best players on Detroit’s core special teams units.
“Well, look, it’s going to help,” Campbell said. “Those are two good football players for us in the teams aspect. But they also bring things offensively and defensively that we can use. So, they do, they’ll give us a little bit of a bump here. Now, it’s their first game back, we understand that, but we look forward to them being back and being able to use them.”