Despite their first home loss of the season against the Vikings, the Detroit Lions continued to keep up their reputation as elite scorers. Their 31-point average is the third-best in the league, while every other relevant category hardly falls below the top 10. But, unfortunately, that doesn’t make up the whole story.

Against Minnesota this Sunday, despite solid numbers on paper, Detroit’s offense was struggling. The rushing game, the third-down conversions, and also the QB protection hit concerning stats this week, and it is not lost on Jared Goff.

“No concern, no. There’s certainly an urgency of fixing things… There’s a ton to fix, there’s a ton to get better at,” he admitted during media availability.

The quarterback himself had 2 TDs and 25 of 37 passes for 284 yards– nothing to raise an alarm about. But those season-high five sacks, that was what mattered to him, right alongside a poor 29% conversion rate (5 of 17) on third down.

Going into the bye week, the coaches laid their complete focus on all third downs. Coach Campbell would call it the most glaring issue, and the offensive coordinator, John Morton, had sat down to get his homework done. But clearly, the issue persists.

What’s more, not only did the team struggle with conversion, but David Montgomery and Jahmyr Gibbs could manage inefficient 65 yards on 20 carries with a long of 11 yards. Then there was offensive lineman Christian Mahogany, who allowed a week-high seven pressures before exiting the game due to a knee injury.

They have the talent and the eighth-best offense; all they need now is to get the execution right, staff included. In Campbell’s words: “I really believe you tighten a screw here, you tighten a belt and all of a sudden this thing is running like a well-oiled machine.”

That would also mean alligning with the defense that could not keep the Vikings off the field until the end of the last minutes, allowing 27 points with 2 passing touchdowns in the first quarter. But after penalties that cost them 77 yards and an offense that took the loss as a turning point, Campbell says he knows what the real problem is.

Campbell has found someone to blame for the loss

Following the thin defeat of the Detroit Lions, Campbell admitted that coaching missteps, such as making wrong decisions during critical situations, were detrimental to winning by the team.

“I asked for improvement from last week. That was the story,” Lions head coach Dan Campbell said after the game. “And we did improve, and the coach cost them. Their head coach cost them. Critical error at the end of the half, 100 percent on me.”

He owned the bewildering situations and acknowledged that there were plays that the team executed poorly because of problems in coaching preparation. Campbell pointed out that the coaches are the ones to blame, and they must do better in planning the games and even make adjustments during the games to avoid similar losses in the future.

The openness of his comments was a leadership style that was ready to take the blame in front of the crowd and demand that the organization urgently fix the deficiencies following a frustrating defeat.