The Detroit Lions rampaged past the Tennessee Titans in Ford Field. The 52-14 final score saw the Lions score the final 38 points en route to improving to 6-1 on the season. Reviewing the game film was reflective of the early struggles followed by sheer dominance thereafter.
This week, I focused on two players: left tackle Taylor Decker and left guard Graham Glasgow. It was an interesting game for the left side of the Lions offensive line, and the film review reflected that.
I evaluated Decker and Glasgow on every snap, giving a plus for a positive play and a minus for a poor one. Not every play earns a plus or minus. Here’s how they fared against the Titans in Week 8.
Opening drive
Decker started out about as badly as someone of his stature can. Titans EDGE Arden Key fired up the field from a 2-point stance and simply ran around Decker, who appeared to set his inside foot too shallow and too early in protection. Decker barely grazed Key on the way to the defender sacking Jared Goff.
The subsequent snap wasn’t much better for Decker, and on this one Glasgow also got soundly beaten. Glasgow started out by firing into massive DT T’Vondre Sweat, who aligned between the left guard and center Frank Ragnow. After doing very little to slow down Sweat (Ragnow took over and also got bulled backward), Glasgow spun the wrong way to help Decker with Key to his left. Goff got the pass away underneath, but the pressure forced him to abandon wideout Kalif Raymond streaking open across the field with neither deep safety picking him up. That’s a 30-yard gain, at minimum, if Goff gets an extra second.
On third down, the Titans run a twist after shifting the line just before the snap. Decker earns a plus for picking up his man, but Glasgow picks up another minus for missing his mark and instead blocking Ragnow’s back before shoving Jeffery Simmons to the ground from behind as Goff lets go of the ball. He missed his twist assignment and also missed his immediate help.
Rest of the first half
Decker settled in nicely. He earned another minus on the second sack of Goff, though the sack itself was definitively on Jahmyr Gibbs. Decker also got beaten on the play, quickly losing the blitzing LB (Jack Gibbens) after making the initial pick-up.
The very next play was a hit on Goff, and on first blush it appeared to be Decker’s fault. But further review largely exonerates the big left tackle–and shifts the minus to Glasgow. The left guard lost immediately over his inside shoulder to Sebastian Jones-Day, which forced Goff to escape directly into where Decker had been successfully locking up Key. In fact, Decker is still engaged with Key when Goff runs almost directly into Key and goes down.
For the half, Decker finished with seven plusses and four minuses, with all the minuses coming in pass protection. Glasgow had six minuses and four plusses, the first of which he earned for a terrific open-field block that helped spring Jahmyr Gibbs on his long TD run. In pass protection, one plus and three minuses.
Second half
The performance after halftime was somewhat abbreviated, as Decker left the game for Dan Skipper in garbage time. Glasgow did stay in the entire game. In the limited duty, Decker did great, earning four plusses and one minus. He earned a plus on the Lions first offensive snap of the half, a beautifully coordinated pickup of a line twist that both Decker and Frank Ragnow played expertly. This was an exotic set for both teams, with the Titans running a DT/DE twist and the Lions having Glasgow pull across to pick up the right-side DE (Key) and RT Penei Sewell chipping back inside to pick up the LDT, who happened to twist deeper away from him.
Glasgow earned one minus in the run game for getting pushed by Jeffery Simmons into Frank Ragnow, causing both to fall down and neutering what could have been a nice run off left tackle by Montgomery. Decker got a plus on the same play for a perfect drive/seal block on the edge. Both earned a minus on the later hit on Goff, with Glasgow being directly responsible for losing over his outside shoulder to Simmons; Decker also got beaten inside, partially because he got clipped (not the penalty) by Simmons and being unable to sustain his solid contact with Key because of it. This play is notable because it changed in the official box score from initially being a split sack between Simmons and Key to just Simmons getting credit–which is exactly correct.
Final tally
Taylor Decker: 11 plusses, 5 minuses. In pass protection, six plusses and five minuses.
Graham Glasgow: 8 plusses, 11 minuses. In pass protection, four plusses and nine minuses.
Decker deserves credit for altering how he played Key after getting abused early on. He appeared to shorten his set and not give Key as much of a target to hit on him.
Glasgow spent a lot of the day going against Jeffery Simmons, who is one of the NFL’s best pass-rushing DTs. That’s important context for his overall poor performance, though that doesn’t excuse Glasgow’s long-running habit of impressively getting out into space in run blocking but failing to actually engage with anyone. Other than the aforementioned plus above, that was No. 60s’ standard fare run blocking.
