Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Lions hope familiar scheme helps Jeff Okudah catch up

The Lions can’t do any hands on coaching with first-rounder Jeff Okudah (or any other players) at the moment.

So they’re hoping that some familiarity with his college position coach pays off.

Via Tim Twentyman of the team’s official website, Lions coach Matt Patricia mentioned that he’s friends with former Ohio State secondary coach Jeff Hafley, and that they teach many of the same methods.

“It was something for us that was really interesting about [Okudah] even going up and into the draft,” Patricia said. “Having a guy we knew was very familiar with our techniques and we thought that would help us in the long run.”

Of course, there are plenty of adjustments the No. 3 overall pick will have to make that won’t be covered by college instruction, so he’ll still be coming in cold. Those challenges will be the same for every incoming rookie, who will only have virtual classroom work through the spring before they head to training camp — whenever that may be.