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Lions Defensive Backs Coach Tony Oden Excited For Competition At Cornerback

By Ashley Dunkak
@AshleyDunkak

CBS DETROIT - Cornerbacks Bill Bentley and Nevin Lawson will have some serious competition as they try to come back from the season-ending injuries they suffered early in the 2014 season.

Bentley tore his ACL in the season opener, and Lawson went down with a dislocated foot in the second game of the year.

When Lions defensive backs coach Tony Oden spoke Saturday, he was optimistic for both Bentley and Lawson, though he did not know whether either would be ready for training camp.

Detroit has made a point this offseason, however, to make sure the team will not be in trouble if Bentley or Lawson cannot get healthy or cannot play at the level the Lions want.

Rashean Mathis and Darius Slay are expected to be starters again this season, after Detroit re-signed Mathis in free agency, but the Lions have brought in a number of players who can provide depth.

After adding veteran cornerbacks Josh Wilson and Crezdon Butler earlier in the offseeason, the team drafted two corners, Alex Carter of Stanford in the third round and Quandre Diggs of Texas in the sixth.

"Obviously, we had the injuries at nickel last year," Mayhew said Saturday. "I can tell you for a fact that when we're sitting there in the sixth round and we have an opportunity to draft a corner who we really liked, I felt like it's better to have too many than not have enough.

"Quandre was a great pickup for us, outstanding player, great kid, great guy, hard worker," Mayhew added. "He had an outstanding Senior Bowl, I thought, so he's a really good fit for us playing nickel for us."

Needless to say, the Lions have given themselves plenty of options, though safety Glover Quin predicted bounce-back seasons for Bentley and Lawson a few weeks ago and Oden remained hopeful.

"I will just say this - if there's anyone that can come back from injuries, those are two guys that can do it because they are highly competitive players," Oden said. "They work very, very hard in the classroom. They work very, very hard in the weight room and on the field, but we expect those guys to get healthy and come back and compete. We love those guys.

"We love the competition that we're going to have," Oden added.

Mayhew considers Diggs a good fit at nickel, and Lions head coach Jim Caldwell said the team will put Carter at outside corner initially. Oden said the players will be prepared for other spots as well, however, since injuries often force teams to adapt quickly.

"One of the things our DC [defensive coordinator] here, Teryl [Austin], has done a good job [of], along with Coach Caldwell, is we coach our first guy in the room like our last guy in the room," Oden said. "We prepare all our guys like they're going to be starters. So we try to double-train and cross-train as much as possible. When we talk to the guys in the meeting room, we're talking to them from a corner perspective as well as a nickel perspective. Every now and then we say, 'As a corner, what is the safety supposed to do here?'

"So if you do that early, we believe, in a non-stressful situation in practice, in the meeting room, when it does happen in a game, or they have to prepare for a week to change a position, there's no stress involved," Oden continued, then smiled. "Well, I won't say there's no stress involved, but there's less stress involved because it's not new to them. So we try to treat all our guys that way and train them all that way."

Along with the defense as a whole, the Lions secondary enjoyed a solid season in 2014. Detroit held opposing teams to 17.6 points per game, the second-best total in the league behind the Seattle Seahawks.

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