Meet Jacob Lacey, new Detroit Lions Cornerback

The Lions secured the services of all of their major free agents, and extended Calvin Johnson until the sun goes dark. As I wrote last week, this slams the revolving free agency door shut: the Lions won’t be losing any of their key young veterans for quite some time.

The flip side of this is obvious: they won't be bringing in anyone else's key young veterans, either. The Lions have only acquired one new free agent who figures to make any impact at all, and that's former Colts cornerback Jacob Lacey.

What are we getting? What can we expect? How does Lacey stack up to the existing Lions cornerbacks? Time to mash up two of our favorite features: Meet the Cubs and Old Mother Hubbard.

Jacob Lacey was a three-star Rivals prospect out of Garland, Texas. A 5’-10,” 155-pound kid with decent speed and some pop in his shoulder, Lacey had several Big XII and Big Ten offers. Lacey initially committed to Kansas, but flipped to Oklahoma State. Lacey played in 10 games as a freshman, and started all 13 games his sophomore year—as he would his junior and senior years as well.

Per College Football Reference, Lacey’s junior year was extremely impressive: 63 tackles, 48 of them solo, with 5 interceptions (one returned for a score) and 14 passes defensed. He had 61 tackles in senior year, 52 solo, and though he only had 2 picks he still broke up 16 passes.

Lacey's lack of game-breaking ball skills, as well as his thin frame (his combine weight was 177 pounds), dropped him out of draft consideration. Most sites projected him as a free agent, but also noted his upside (SI.com graded Lacey at 3.00, a “first-year contributor” in their system).

Contribute immediately, he did: after signing with the Colts and making the initial 53-man roster, Lacey got on the field almost immediately, and started Week 5 of his rookie year. After the subsequent bye, Lacey picked off Sam Bradford, took it back to the house, and drew a celebration flag all in one go . . . my kind of player. He finished 2010 with 3 interceptions and 7 passes defensed in sixteen games (nine starts).

Lacey was picked on, too; Mike Vick and Carson Palmer completed a combined 10-of-12 against him for 101 yards and a score over consecutive weeks. But for an undrafted free agent rookie, stepping in and being a major contributor to a team’s weakest unit is impressive.

As for 2011? Well . . .

As we saw in the cornerback Old Mother Hubbard, Darrelle Revis was the best corner on the planet last season and nobody was close. Aaron Berry earned the season’s best PFF grade, barely eclipsing Chris Houston who played hurt at the tail end of the season (note that Houston’s positive plays actually helped the Lions win more than Revis’s did the Jets).

After Berry and Houston’s solidly above-average performances, Alphonso Smith turned in the most spectacularly boom-or-bust mediocre season ever. It’s at this performance level, with a much improved level of consistency, that Lacey’s 2011 campaign came in.

Lacey played 712 snaps, three times as many as Smith, almost twice as many as Berry, and about a hundred fewer than Houston. He didn’t have much statistically in either direction: just 2 TDs allowed, but only 1 interception and 3 passes defensed. At 34 targets per TD allowed, he was above the NFL average, and ranked 30th out of 109 qualifying corners. But then, he also allowed 73.5% of passes targeted his way to be caught, which was the eighth-worst percentage in the NFL.

This is probably why Colts fans were not a huge fan of Lacey's work last season, and also likely why Lacey was available for the Lions to sign. But his +EPA of 31.7 and +WPA of 0.58 back up the statistical production: he didn’t make a lot of big plays, but he made them in big spots—and his PFF coverage grade of -4.8 coverage indicates he didn’t allow that many of them, either. Plus, his run grade was an excellent +3.1, 22nd-best of 109 in the NFL.

But that doesn’t tell the whole story, either. Nate Dunlevy of Colts Authority and Bleacher Report pointed out this ESPN story about Lacey’s rebound after defensive coordinator Larry Coyer was fired. The bounce in the PFF grades is Backusian:

Dunlevy also went to the tape himself to break down Lacey’s performance against the Chiefs in that fateful Week 5 game you see in red above. Lacey had a rough day at the office, but not nearly as bad as Colts fans came away thinking.

Bottom Line: Jacob Lacey is about as good as Alphonso Smith, trading the gambling risk/reward for consistency and much improved play against the run. Lacey should have a good look at unseating Smith for playing time in nickel/dime situations; if he can continue developing as he did at the end of the year he could push Berry for time at the #2 spot.

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Lions Slam the Revolving Door of Free Agency

When Martin Mayhew and Tom Lewand took over, they had almost no young talent on the roster. That’s the idea behind the Old Mother Hubbard posts: when they got there, the cupboard was bare. No longer.

The Lions are a playoff team, and an incredibly young one at that. The foundation of this team is No. 9, Matthew Stafford, and his connection with Calvin Johnson—who, thanks to the richest total contract in NFL history, will be a Lion through the end of the decade.

I can't overstate the significance of this.

I remember well the advent of free agency, the splash Reggie White made by going from Philadelphia to the tiny outpost of Green Bay, and the pillaging of the league the 49ers and Cowboys did throughout the 90s.

From the beginning, free agency has been a revolving door for the Lions: Jerry Ball out, Pat Swilling in; Chris Spielman out, Pepper Johnson in; Jeff Hartings out, Brenden Stai in. Time and time again, the Lions lost foundational pieces and replaced them with designer-impostor stopgaps. Even when they drafted well, the Lions seemed all too content to let good players walk out the door. The Old Lions would have let Calvin walk, and signed Josh Morgan to replace him.

Calvin Johnson is not just a good player, he’s a great one—and not only is he a good person, he’s a great one. Despite the mind-boggling figure, his teammates took to Twitter en masse to declare he earned every dollar (and then some) with his attitude and work ethic. That combination of talent and character is breathtakingly rare—and he has chosen to spend the best years of his career as a Detroit Lion. As Justin Durant wrote at MetroTimes, it was a good day for anyone connected to the Lions.

The Lions have also re-signed Jeff Backus to a two-year deal, inked Shaun Hill to another two-year contract, and  brought back veteran safety/special-teamer Erik Coleman. As Anwar Richardson reports, the last major free agent the Lions are looking to add is Stephen Tulloch.

But wait. Don’t I always say that standing pat is losing ground? Don’t I always say that A + B = C doesn’t work in the NFL? That each season is it’s own special potion, an alchemy experiment that can go wildly wrong or wildly right, even with similar ingredients?

Yup, I sure do. But letting Jeff Backus walk and signing Marcus McNeill, or swapping Stephen Tulloch for David Hawthorne, would be classic Old Lions moves. Moving from a sure thing who knows the system to someone new who doesn’t is a risk in and of itself; McNeill and Hawthorne are clear and obvious downgrades from Backus and Tulloch.

In the beginning, the cupboard was so bare the Lions cycled 123 different players on and off the roster in that first contract year. They were desperately clawing to get better at any spot on the roster, even if it was just the 53rd over and over and over. They viewed 1st waiver wire priority as a major tool to improve the roster. Can you imagine any street free agent improving the Lions now?

Let me quote what I said in the final Watchtower of the 2011 season:

For the first time in a long time, it’s truly possible for the Lions to regress. Building blocks of the offense and defense may need to be replaced. Jeff Backus, Cliff Avril, and Stephen Tulloch are all major contributors who may or may not be back, and they only start the list. For the first time since Schwartz was hired, this offseason will not be unidirectional.

Still, what’s important here is that the core, the fundamental truth, the identity of this team will not change. Jim Schwartz is the head coach, Matthew Stafford is the quarterback, Calvin Johnson leads a legion of viable targets, and the defensive line is stacked. That, along with all the other factors, is good enough to get the Lions to the playoffs—and that will be true in 2012 as well.

Can Schwartz, Mayhew, Lewand and company brew a more potent batch of Lions in 2012? Can they add just the right ingredients, and hold back what might spoil the brew? Can they put it over just the right amount of heat so, as the Saints are doing now, it peaks in strength at the perfect time? We’ll see.

We’re seeing right now: not only are the Lions drafting and develop long-term starters, they’re actually paying to keep them here long-term. Slamming the revolving free-agency door shut is crucial to becoming a perennial contender.

If the Lions ink Tulloch to a multi-year deal, and draft as well as they always do, this team is going to be better in 2012 than they were in 2011—and better over the next five years then they’ve been in fifty.

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NFL Free Agency: The Detroit Lions Bunker In

Today at 4:00 pm, NFL free agency begins. For the first time in my memory, there will be no 12:02 am faxes to the league office, or midnight gift-bearing showings-up at houses. Free agency will begin in an orderly fashion, just as office workers everywhere would begin looking for football news on the Internet anyway.

Yesterday a lot of contract-y things happened, the upshot of which is Tom Lewand got the Lions under the cap, as he always does. Unfortunately, he did not get them under enough to sign Cliff Avril or Stephen Tulloch to a long-term deal before the deadline.

Here is the situation with Tully: last offseason, he thought his body of work merited a long-term deal, and it did. But he and the Lions were unable to come to terms, so both sides agreed to a one-year deal. This is known as a “prove it” deal: sign a contract, prove you’re worth big money, then get that big-money deal from whoever’s offering it.

Tulloch did his part; he proved it. As the Old Mother Hubbard showed, Tully was one of the best—and most valuable—inside linebackers in the game in 2011. His performance removes all doubt: he is worth the big money he’s sought for years.

Free agency allows a player to earn his market worth. The problem for Stephen Tulloch is, the market doesn’t think he’s worth a whole lot. As Anwar Richardson pointed out, Tulloch is not being targeted by the teams with big money to spend and a hole at MLB. Whether that’s because he doesn’t fit their system, they like someone better, they don’t think they can afford him, the devaluing of the MLB position in a “base nickel” NFL, or what, I couldn’t tell you.

The upshot of it is, there is no team who needs Stephen Tulloch more than the Detroit Lions—so salary cap notwithstanding, there will be no team willing to pay more than the Detroit Lions.

This is all a thought experiment on my part; no hard news or even rumor fuels it. But the vibe I’m picking up is that once again, Tulloch will need the Lions to need him just as much as they indeed need him . . . but first, he has to know for sure; he has to test the market. That’s fine. If and when he comes back, it will be for good.

Calvin Johnson has been the straw that stirs the Lions’ drink for quite some time, and he is once again today. If he the Lions re-sign him to a long-term deal, it could greatly increase breathing room against the cap—and long-term deals with Tulloch and Cliff Avril become much easier to reach. If not, the Lions can retain Avril at his tendered salary—but Tulloch and the Lions will be in limbo for quite a while.

Jeff Backus is also an unrestricted free agent, both both sides seem exclusively intent on Backus returning. As I said on Twitter, it’s so not even a thing that they’re not even talking about it. In fact, I wonder if the tacit plan is to simply wait until the last of the CJ/Avril/Tulloch/Eric Wright dominoes has fallen and then get Backus some money however they can.

I don’t see the Lions as  players for signing other teams’ free agents. The Lions’ roster has matured; there are only a few select roster spots available on either side of the ball. Further, the lack of cap money means they can’t sign starters—and given the choice, I’m sure the Lions prefer to draft their backups.

So don't plan on any excitement today, Lions fans. The offseason is no longer our Super Bowl; the Super Bowl is our Super Bowl. The Lions need to re-sign their guys as best they can, then draft as wisely as they always do.

. . . now, watch them go sign Mario Williams.

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