r/detroitlions

This would solve every problem

This is from The Athletic Football Show's interview with Aaron Schatz, who is the DVOA guy and the FTN Football Almanac guy. Obviously people will have lots of different views on how valuable DVOA is, but I tend to think that while no metric is perfect, if you get a cross-section of a lot of different metrics and they all point in a similar direction, that tells you something at least.

Here's a link to the section of the show where they talk about cornerbacks. Schatz talks about "coverage DVOA" which is a stat they use to rate CBs. They chart plays where CBs are in coverage and is adjusted for quality of receiver, quality of opposing offense, area of the field (for example, granting that covering in the slot is easier than covering outside).

Anyway, in Schatz's system, the worst CB in the NFL by coverage DVOA in 2025 was your very own Terrion Arnold.

He concludes from this that the loss of TA may not be as much of a loss as it seems like it would be (keep in mind, this is to a national audience who may just remember TA as a first round pick and).

Again, it's just one metric based on one system. I know a lot of people here don't like PFF either, but if you look at PFF numbers from last year, for Lions CBs, you've got:

• DJ Reed 65.2 (47th of 114 CBs)
• Rock Ya-Sin 62.8 (57th)
• Terrion Arnold 52.6 (97th)

If you look at Pro Football Reference's QBR against and Approximate Value (that's PFR's attempt to boil a player's value down to a single number):

• DJ Reed 72.8 QBR Against, 4 AV
• Rock Ya-Sin 72.6 QBR, 3 AV
• Terrion Arnold 101.5 QBR, 3 AV

If you removed the draft pedigree and the career trajectory, there's certainly an argument to be made that Rock Ya-Sin would have been the more attractive option at CB2 even leaving aside health and legal concerns.

ETA: I didn't include Amik since he's not on the team any more, but he had a worse PFF grade (48.7, 108th) and QBR against (115.7) than any of the four guys mentioned here, FWIW.

Is it safe to say he’s washed? Bro’s FG percentage dropped by more than 8000 last year!

Some of it seems legit. However this is from tape analysis not analytics so the sample sizes are goofy.

Can’t say I’m a Detroit fan but he was very chill and open to taking a picture, seems like a great guy. Wouldnt have ever expected to run into him all the way over here but he gained a fan today 🔥