Losing offensive coordinator Ben Johnson was inevitable for the Detroit Lions, and this year it happened when he took the Chicago Bears’ head coaching job. The search to replace him landed on John Morton, who most recently spent two years as the Denver Broncos’ passing game coordinator.
Morton will of course be tasked with keeping one of the league’ best offenses rolling like it was with Johnson as the play caller the last few seasons. But he will surely put some of his own stamps on the core principals of the Lions’ offense that head coach Dan Campbell wants to keep in place, leaning into his coaching experience going back to 1998.
Over the course of his career Morton has worked alongside offensive minds like Sean Payton, Jon Gruden and Jim Harbaugh, and each have hired him multiple times. He has only been a play caller for a full season once, as the New York Jets’ offensive coordinator in 2017, but the talent-barren roster that team had is not a reflection of who he is as an offensive mind himself.
No less an authority than Campbell noted how Morton had an influential role in the Lions’ offense in his role as a senior assistant in 2022.
“John Morton, man, Johnny was – Johnny’s a superstar now and there’s a number of things that he did for us last year that are things that we’ve kept,” Campbell said. “And I really feel like that helped Tanner as well. And he took a lot of that, and he learned from that, and he’s grown from that.”
Johnson obviously got a lot out of a lot of players during his time as Lions’ offensive coordinator, but it’s also fair to say there were odd lapses at times and some areas that could have been better/more consistent.
With that in mind, these three Lions players stand to benefit greatly from Morton being the offensive coordinator.
3 Lions players who could benefit most from John Morton being offensive coordinator
3. WR Jameson Williams
Williams took a big step this past season, topping 1,000 receiving yards for the first time in his career and becoming a noticeably better all-around receiver.
There’s no doubt Jared Goff is most effective as a play-action passer, and he dices up the middle of the field as an obvious corollary to that.
On play-action vertical routes in 2022, the Lions led the NFL with 1.31 EPA per dropback. That’s the highest mark across the 2022 and 2023 seasons in the league on those routes. They also averaged 19.2 yards per attempt (third), and posted a league-best 69.6 percent success rate. Kalif Raymond (169 receiving yards; fourth in the league) and DJ Chark (127 yards;13th in the league) were both proficient on those plays. Raymond averaged 33.8 yards per target on those plays, the highest in the league that season and the second-highest in the past three seasons (minimum of five targets).
That EPA per dropback on play-action vertical routes dropped to 0.84 for the Lions in 2023, and to 0.75 this season, with notable drops in success rate as well (50 percent in 2023; 47.6 percent in 2024). The latter numbers in both categories land as striking because of Williams’ emergence this past season.
Morton surely won’t stray too far from what Goff does best. But if he can unlock something that has been lost in the deep passing game, Williams could have another level in him.
2. QB Jared Goff
Goff began to play better late in the 2021 season as the Lions began to play better as a team. But his full resurgence started in 2022, with Campbell and Johnson both noting Morton’s presence to aid that (h/t to Mike Payton of AtoZ Sports).
First was Campbell, about Goff, in July of 2022.
“Yeah, well look I would say he’s more comfortable at this time than he was last year, Campbell said. “A lot of that has to do with what we’ve done offensively, I would say Ben Johnson has done a really good job and his staff. Not only what we’re doing or where we’re going, bringing in John Morton has been really good for us, who was at Vegas. But also, we’re doing a number of things that he did well at LA. So, I think those will help him.”
Here’s what Johnson said about Goff in January of 2023.
“I am really proud of how he’s taken the coaching this year from Mark Brunell, from John Morton, from J.T. Barrett, myself, and he’s taken any criticism we’ve had about his game, and he’s worked to improve those”, Johnson said. “And that’s been on a weekly basis. So I’ve seen growth from him as a player, and like I said to start the year, as long as a player’s still growing, it’s very encouraging as a coach.”
Goff and Johnson clearly had a close relationship, and the results reflected that. But there’s no reason it can’t be similar with Morton, and the two are not starting from square one as a quarterback and a new coordinator often would be. Any talk of Goff’s demise without Johnson should be put aside.
1. RB Jahmyr Gibbs
After an excellent rookie season in 2023, Gibbs reached another level this season (1,929 yards from scrimmage, 20 total touchdowns). But while he was more explosive in the passing game (9.9 yards per reception), he merely matched his catch total as a rookie (52) as it still seemed he has more to offer in that area.
In 2022 the Lions were an excellent screen passing team, averaging 7.0 yards per attempt (second in the league) with a 0.39 EPA per dropback (second) and a 54.2 percent success rate (fourth). That EPA per dropback is the third-highest by any team in a season over the past threes seasons. Screens provided Jared Goff with easy outlets, lightening his workload as he rebuilt his confidence. They were an easy avenue for him to not have the entire aerially attack on his shoulders.
Without Morton, while not awful, the Lions’ screen game efficiency has dipped the last two seasons. In 2023 they averaged 5.4 yards per attempt (12th in the league) with a 0.03 EPA per dropback (13th) and a 45.5 percent success rate (sixth). Those numbers rebounded some this season, but not to that 2022 level.
Gibbs was tied for firth among running backs in yards after catch per reception this season (10.6, according to Sports Info Solutions, minimum 20 targets), and his other metrics as a receiver were strong as he took a real step there in Year 2. But if there’s yet another level for him to get to as a pass catcher, it looks to be in the screen game and Morton might be the guy to unlock it.
