The Detroit Lions game grades from Pro Football Focus are now out for the team’s Week 7 loss to the Dallas Cowboys.
PFF grades do a fairly reliable job of communicating which players performed well and which ones did not. The grades are based on evaluating each player on each play and how they performed in relation to expectations of the situation or assignment. It’s important to note that good players are capable of bad games, and bad players can churn out great games from time to time.
The game graders are not infallible, however. There are always some marks that make you scratch your head, or play attributions to players that don’t make sense based on a deeper knowledge of the team’s schemes and tendencies. There are a couple of those for Detroit this week, too.
Top offense
The overall top-graded Lions players on offense, with a minimum of 10 snaps played in the game (out of 60):
TE Brock Wright – 78.6
TE T.J. Hockenson – 73.9
WR Kalif Raymond – 73.8
RG Evan Brown – 72.9
C Frank Ragnow – 71.3
Wright played his most impactful game in two years in Detroit. He caught all four passes thrown his way and gained 57 yards. An impressive 47 of those yards came after the catch, most on the one play where he was tackled just shy of the goal line (and yes, he was clearly down).
Brown pitched a shutout in pass protection, a big reason for his high mark. Ragnow gave up one QB pressure but excelled in run blocking. Raymond’s grade was bolstered by his two designed runs.
Top defense
The top-graded overall performers on the Lions defense in Week 7, again with a 10-snap minimum:
CB Jeff Okudah – 86.1
DE Aidan Hutchinson – 78.1
LB Derrick Barnes – 74.8
S DeShon Elliott – 70.2
S Juju Hughes – 68.1
Okudah was fantastic all game. He was phenomenal at attacking the run with 15 total tackles, seven of which PFF grades as “stops”–meaning they prevented the offense from accomplishing a minimum threshold on the play. Okudah allowed three receptions on four targets for just 22 yards.
Hutchinson also played quite well. PFF credited the rookie with four QB pressures and two sacks. His grade was hampered by a missed tackle and one blown coverage assignment. Asking your best pass rusher to play in coverage is a coaching problem, not a player problem.
Hughes earned his nice score in just 16 snaps, while Barnes played 18.
Bottom grades
The lowest-graded Lions on offense, dropping the minimum number of snaps to eight to be more inclusive:
OL Dan Skipper – 46.4
RB Justin Jackson – 53.5
RB Jared Goff – 54.8
RB Jamaal Williams – 55.0
Skipper played just eight snaps, all as an extra lineman. His whiff on a third-down pass block led to a sack. Williams and Goff each fumbled twice, with Williams helping his grade by forcing three missed tackles on his runs. Goff’s accuracy (he was 21-for-26) helped soften the blow of his rash of turnovers in PFF’s eyes.
Defense:
LB Alex Anzalone – 36.5
DT Benito Jones – 51.4
DT Isaiah Buggs – 53.0
CB AJ Parker – 53.9
Anzalone’s score is an interesting one that we’ll touch on in a bit. Jones and Buggs were largely ineffective in the NT role, where neither generated a single QB pressure. Parker allowed all four passes thrown his way to be completed and gave up 24 YAC, a big sin in the eyes of PFF.
Grades that don't match the eye test from the game
Alex Anzalone’s terrible grade seems to be based as much on reputation as it was evidence in this game. Did the hirsute LB play well? Not really. Was he the worst player on the field? Not a chance.
It sure seems like PFF credited a couple of pass completions on Anzalone’s ledger that do not belong. This is a fairly common occurrence and complaint about PFF’s initial game grades, where they automatically assign the closest defender at the time of the catch to be the coverage responsibility. In watching the game, at least two plays where this happened with Anzalone were absolutely happenstance and not his coverage assignment (one was Malcolm Rodriguez, one was Parker). He also made more than the one stop they credited to him amongst his six tackles; twice Anzalone made the tackle to prevent a third-down conversion on a run play. It appears they confused him for Derrick Barnes on one of those.
On offense, Penei Sewell graded out with an average score of 69.7. Yet Sewell played a great all-around game, as one of PFF’s own analysts notes:
Penei Sewell faced Micah Parsons on 12/32 pass blocking snaps yesterday. Stats show he gave up one pressure to Parsons, but on that play Goff was bailing deep and out of the pocket, hard to fault him too much.
Overall Sewell was impressive vs. one of the best
— Trevor Sikkema (@TampaBayTre) October 24, 2022
In addition, the Lions had their most success running directly behind Sewell. That’s because he created the most yards before contact of all the offensive line spots using PFF’s own stats, but that is absolutely not reflected in his 69.7 overall grade.
One other one that doesn’t pass the eye test is Raymond’s run blocking grade. It was the lowest on the team at 46.4. That simply does not stand up with even a token film review.
