6 takeaways from the Detroit Lions’ playoff loss to the Washington Commanders
I hope you enjoyed the ride because the ending was a crash landing.
The Detroit Lions , arguably the top team in the NFL with an electric offense, collapsed under the playoff lights in an embarrassing fashion. An incredible 15-2 regular season yielded just one playoff game and one playoff loss. The Lions outclassed the Washington Commanders in nearly every facet on paper, but it mattered not. The Commanders were the better team on Saturday night, and the Lions shot themselves in every possible extremity.
The defense continued to be a liability. The offense had its trickery, but the bad far outweighed the good in this one. It was only fitting that the season all but ended with a Jameson Williams interception—live by the sword, die by the sword. On a night when the offense needed to be perfect, it only added to the implosion.
The Super Bowl dreams are dead for now. For the last time this season, let’s examine some takeaways.
A near-perfect season wasted
The Lions chose the worst possible time to earn their third loss of the season. Earn is the key word here, since Detroit was just as damaging to themselves as the Commanders were. This loss is on the Lions, plain and simple. They were a Super Bowl-caliber team and they lost against a team that, frankly, is not. The Lions set themselves a high bar with their regular season dominance, sure, but the expectations were high for good reason: they were a damn good team. Instead, it’s a quick offseason exit and wasting of a 15-win season.
With coordinators Aaron Glenn and Ben Johnson as potential head coaching candidates, the Lions coaching staff could get gutted this offseason. Not only could they lose two top coordinators, but they could take an assistant coach or two with them. The Lions have built themselves up as a team whose whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and it seems possible that they may lose two of their most important parts.
The Lions will get back players for injury, sure, but it is difficult to rebound from something like this. The entire phenomenal regular season ended up not mattering because the team could not show up when it mattered. The Lions now have back-to-back devastating playoff loses when factoring in the NFC Championship loss to the San Francisco 49ers last season. That track record is painful, plain and simple. Adding to the woe is a difficult-looking schedule for 2025 featuring multiple playoff teams. Sure, great teams should beat playoff-caliber teams, but it could be a gauntlet for the Lions if they want to win the division and top NFC seed yet again.
This was one of Detroit’s best chance at a Super Bowl in franchise history. They had a beatable opponent. They had a high-octane offense. They had one of the best coaching staffs in the NFL. All of it amounted to a single playoff loss. The Lions will be competitive in 2025, but a loss like this stings nonetheless. It is going to take a lot for the Lions to get back to where they were—and as we learned tonight, even that might not be enough.
I legit feel like crying right now!
— Golden Tate (@ShowtimeTate) January 19, 2025
Me too, Golden. Me too.
Goff implodes at the worst possible time
Many of us dunked on the Minnesota Vikings when Sam Darnold turned into a pumpkin over their final two games. Karma hit us hard, for quarterback Jared Goff had one of his worst outings of the season on the biggest stage.
Goff had three interceptions, two of which came in the first half. One was returned for a touchdown, albeit the return should have been called back for a blatant missed helmet-to-helmet hit that nearly concussed Goff. He also had a strip sack, taking points off the board on a promising drive—points that Detroit could ill afford to lose given the sieve that was the defense.
It is difficult to say if the illegal hit rattled Goff or not, but he was not his usual crisp self even before the hit. He was airmailing throws at inopportune times, and some of his decision-making was subpar. The offense still put up 31 points—a winning effort for most teams—so the entirety of the blame is not on Goff. Yet in a game where the Lions needed him at his near-best, he was at his near-worst.
More injured defensive starters to cap off a cursed season
Of course, the Lions season ended thanks partly to more defensive injuries.
This time around, it was a trio of secondary starters. Amik Robertson suffered a scary injury that resulted in a hospital visit . Robertson had been the star of the Lions defense of late, including a shutdown performance of Justin Jefferson just two weeks ago. Ifeatu Melifonwu left midway through the third quarter. Fellow safety Brian Branch was injured on a tackle during that same drive.
With the injuries, the Lions had to turn to Kindle Vildor at outside corner, a player who was their sixth-string cornerback at one point. Yet with Robertson, Carlton Davis, Ennis Rakestraw, and Khalil Dorsey out with injury, it had to be Vildor across from rookie Terrion Arnold. At safety, meanwhile, undrafted rookie Morice Norris was forced into a starting spot, a player who was on the practice squad for most of the season.
There is no other way to describe this defense other than cursed. This is not a training staff issue or a play style issue. The Lions have suffered wild and unpredictable injuries all season long—their list of broken bones would frighten any skeleton, not to mention the multitude of torn knees and pectorals. This was purely historically bad injury luck.
No edge to the defense
The Lions had a phenomenal outing against the Vikings in Week 18, pressuring Sam Darnold on nearly every down while notching a pair of sacks. Their encore performance was a massive dud.
The defensive line was failing to generate pressure with a four-man rush. When the Lions dialed up a blitz, the Commanders had the perfect counter, one of which was a massive 58-yard screen to Terry McLaurin. The key to stopping the Washington offense was to make things difficult for Jayden Daniels, and it was anything but. The rookie looked like a veteran, carving up the Lions defense with his arm and legs.
Worse yet, the defense failed to stop Washington on the ground as well. Brian Robinson finished with 15 carries for 77 yards and two touchdowns, a week after a paltry 10 carries for 16 yards against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the Wild Card round. Contain was a serious issue for the Lions, often struggling on whether to commit to the inside to the run or outside to the threat of Daniels’ scrambling.
Star defensive end Aidan Hutchinson will return next offseason and hopefully resume his unreal level of play, but with the cast of Josh Paschal and Za’Darius Smith proving to be modest at best, it is clear that additional help is needed.
Glasgow’s time as a starter should be at an end
Graham Glasgow’s return to Detroit was a great story last season, and it earned him a sizable three-year, $20 million contract last offseason. Sadly, the Cinderella story mostly ended there. Amid a good year from the Lions offensive line, Glasgow was the obvious weak link. Penei Sewell, Taylor Decker, Frank Ragnow, and Kevin Zeitler were among the top-rated players at their respective positions, but Glasgow was lagging behind for the majority of the season.
Glasgow will be entering his aged-33 season and I am doubtful that he will return to being a solid starting lineman. The Lions have a potential heir in Christian Mahogany (who played well against the Commanders) but with Zeitler a pending free agent and also getting up there in age (35 years old in March), Mahogany could be destined to be his replacement instead. Replacing two starting guards in an offseason is a tough ask, but something needs to be done about Glasgow.
Glasgow could simply be relegated to a backup role, but moving on from the veteran is also an option that would save the Lions a few million dollars, depending on when the cut was made. I am leaning towards keeping Glasgow not only as an above-average backup but also because of his leadership role in the locker room. That being said, the Lions should go shopping this offseason for an upgrade.
Optimism for the road ahead?
The good news for Detroit is that the bane of this season, the multitude of injuries, will (mostly) get reset come next season. The likes of Aidan Hutchinson and Alim McNeill will be back in the starting lineup, and the depleted depth will get reloaded this offseason, either through returning players or new faces.
The Lions went 15-2 with a skeleton crew defense, which is beyond impressive. Against the Commanders, they were leaning on players like Morice Norris, Kindle Vildor, and Al-Quadin Muhammad—these are not players who should be starting. With a healthy defense, it isn’t hard to imagine a sharp defensive turnaround, even if Aaron Glenn is no longer on the team. Terrion Arnold will have a year under his belt and could/should stake a claim at the top cornerback spot. Ennis Rakestraw could jump into the starting lineup. Jack Campbell excelled in his second season and looks like a star linebacker in the league. The defense has enough young talent to turn into a solid unit down the road.
The 2025 Week 1 Detroit Lions should be a better roster than the Lions we saw tonight. Here’s hoping that’s enough to get over the playoff hump. In the meantime, thank you to the Lions and their players for all the exciting weeks of football we got to experience this season. The ending hurts like no other, but for many months, the Lions were the best entertainment on television without question.