4 advanced stats that prove D.J. Reed is a huge addition for Detroit Lions

Here are four advanced statistics that stood out about the Lions newest cornerback, D.J. Reed.

Typically during the season, we’re sorting and scanning spreadsheets with the best of ‘em to find numbers that help us further explain what we’re seeing out on the field. What better way to get to learn about D.J. Reed, the Detroit Lions big addition on the first day of the league’s tampering period, than to dig into some of those numbers?

Here are four key advanced statistics, pulled from the 2024 season, to help you better familiarize yourself with the Lions newest cornerback.

156 man-coverage snaps

There seems to be a bit of a narrative circulating the airwaves *cough Mike Valenti cough* that Reed is a zone corner and will have to make a transition to playing man coverage.

Did Reed play his fair share of zone coverage with the New York Jets in 2024? Sure, he played 55.7% of his coverage snaps (279 total) in zone according to PFF, but he played 31.1% of his snaps in man coverage (156 total), which placed him 34th out of 197 cornerbacks last year. In 2023, he played 32.8% of his coverage snaps in man, good for 28th among cornerbacks. Prior to that, he did play considerably more zone than man, but old narratives die hard.

37.3% tight window target rate

Playing on the other side of Sauce Gardner will earn you some more attention from opposing quarterbacks and result in more passes getting thrown your way: that much is true from Reed’s time in New York. Reed was targeted 60 times in 2024 which puts him in the 84th percentile of 127 qualifying cornerbacks who played at least 146 coverage snaps.

Despite that volume of targets coming his way, Reed played some real sticky coverage last season. According to NFL’s Next Gen Stats, Reed forced a tight-throwing window on 37.3% of his targets, the fourth-highest rate by cornerbacks with at least 40 targets—just ahead of Gardner (35.3%).

8 defensive stops in man coverage

One of the more interesting nuggets found when looking into Reed’s numbers was his play in man coverage—and it led to unearthing a trend among Lions defenders in general.

Among 127 qualifying cornerbacks in 2024, Reed finished second in PFF’s defensive stops—tackles that constitute a “failure” for the offense—with 8 defensive stops when making tackles on passing plays while in man coverage. The cornerback who finished first in that statistic was Amik Robertson (10). Brian Branch finished sixth among 104 qualifying safeties with 6 defensive stops. Out of 89 linebackers, Alex Anzalone finished first with 8 defensive stops.

The Lions have built a defense with a bunch of sure tacklers in the passing game to make sure that pass plays don’t yield more than the catch point. It limits explosive plays and forces offenses to string together longer drives while Detroit is betting that their defense will eventually make a play and force a stop. Reed’s numbers while in man coverage signal that he’ll fit right in.

18% forced incompletion rate

As nice as it is to make plays after the catch to limit gains, it’s obviously even better when the defender in coverage doesn’t allow the reception to happen at all. Reed’s tight coverage led to him shutting down plays in more ways than one.

Reed posted an 18% forced incompletion rate in 2024, good for 10th among 127 qualifying cornerbacks—that put him in the 96th percentile of players at his position. He recorded 11 forced incompletions in total on 60 targets which also placed him t-10th among that pool of cornerbacks.