We’re back with another player spotlight film breakdown. This week’s subject is Lions rookie DE Aidan Hutchinson in the Week 4 matchup with the Seattle Seahawks.
The prior weeks have focused on CB Jeff Okudah and LB Malcolm Rodriguez. We didn’t get a Week 3 review because the NFL’s game film was glitched and I didn’t get an alternate source in time.
In this game, the 48-45 loss to the Seahawks, Hutchinson was credited with five tackles and two QB hits by the NFL’s official statistics.
Jeff Okudah: Breaking down the Lions CB’s Week 1 performance vs. the Eagles
Malcolm Rodriguez: Breaking down the Lions rookie LB in Week 2
As with the previous ones, I went through each play involving Hutchinson on both the broadcast feed and the all-22. Hutchinson played on 57 of the Lions’ 70 defensive snaps in Week 4.
I went through and assigned a plus or minus for each play for Hutchinson individually. He didn’t factor into every play; runs and rollouts to the other side or quick passes don’t earn any marks. Stalemates on run plays, especially when Hutchinson was double-teamed, also didn’t earn marks.
The tally came out to 11 plusses and eight minuses. Breaking them down into a little more detail:
- Three plusses came on pass rush wins vs. the left tackle, on five attempts on that side. Two were inside wins.
- Three were on run stuffs where Hutchinson got off a block and made a tackle.
- Four of the minuses came on passing plays where he lost by getting too far inside. All came vs. the right tackle, fellow rookie Abraham Lucas (who has more than a little Penei Sewell to his game).
- Two minuses came when he clearly lost on a wide rush to Lucas.
- One plus came on a QB hit, but Seattle’s Geno Smith still completed the touchdown pass thanks to bad coverage.
I also tallied up the amount of double-teams Hutchinson faced. I counted 12 true double-teams and three others where the Seahawks had help dedicated to Hutchinson. Nine of those 12 doubles came when he was aligned vs. Lucas on passing plays and Seattle had the TE stay in and double. The other Lions defenders did not register a single QB pressure on any of those double-teams.
He earned one penalty for being offsides but also forced a false start, evening out the ledger.
Overall I thought it was a solid but uneven performance from Hutchinson in his fourth career game. He was more successful in attacking the left tackle than the right tackle, which is something defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn needs to heed. There were a handful of undisciplined run defense reps where my takeaway was Hutchinson was trying too hard to make something happen. No. 97 was the only Lions pass rusher who logged any true wins vs. the tackles all afternoon.
