A year ago at this time, Jeff Okudah was laid up. Now he's locking down the best wide receivers in the NFL. He has gone from recovering to covering, like his torn Achilles never happened in the first place.
"There is nothing physically that he’s lost," Dan Campbell said last week. "He looks great. He can run, he’s explosive, he’s using his length, you guys see it. There’s nothing that’s been lost."
Campbell made these comments after Okudah had shut down DeVonta Smith and Terry McLaurin in the Lions' first two games of the season. Then the third-year corner, who's still very much a rookie in terms of experience, held Justin Jefferson to a career-low 14 yards in Week 3. Combined, Smith, McLaurin and Jefferson caught nine of 18 targets for 74 yards and zero touchdowns when covered by the former third overall pick.
They've caught 36 of 47 targets for 656 yards and four touchdowns this season when covered by anyone else.
"Honestly, I’m just doing whatever the team asks of me right now," Okudah said Wednesday. "Just building that reputation of being somebody who’s dependable and consistent, week in, week out."
Okudah has been a boon for Detroit's defense so far. Not long ago, he was considered a bust. He battled injuries and bad coaching in nine games as a rookie, then lost all of last season to one of the most devastating injuries in sports. He entered training camp this year in a fight for the No. 2 cornerback job with former safety Will Harris. Now he's playing like the Lions' No. 1.
That is, he's playing like the No. 3 pick.
"In training camp, you started seeing glimpses of what he can be," defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn said Thursday. "As the season has progressed, you start seeing him get more confident in who he is as a player. You start seeing some of the things he did at Ohio State as far as shutting people down."
Okudah tries to surround himself with positivity. He has recently devoted himself to film study; it's rare to catch him in the Lions' locker room without a tablet in his hands. But he couldn't block out all the negativity over his first two seasons, especially last year when it started coming in waves on social media. At times during his rehab, he used it as fuel. Even now, Okudah said he keeps the critics "in the back of my mind."
"But at the end of the day," he said, "I just want to make my people proud."
Most of all, Okudah wants to prove himself right. And that's what he's begun to do this season. Asked if he thinks he's proved anything to anyone in the first three games, Okudah thought for a few seconds -- always introspective -- lifted his head said, "I can play cornerback in the NFL."
"And a lot of people thought I was a safety at one point, but I think I proved I can play cornerback," he said.
Based on the numbers, Okudah might be selling himself short. One matchup at a time, he's proving he can be one of the rarest commodities in the NFL. When Okudah was asked if he's proving he can be a lockdown corner, fellow cornerback Jerry Jacobs answered at the neighboring locker: "Hell yeah! Big facts."
Has Okudah made this statement himself?
"At the end of the season, I’ll pick my head up and see where I’m at," he said. "That’s my plan. I can’t let anything take me away from that plan of just taking it one step at a time."
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Okudah, to be fair, hasn't been on an island in Detroit's defense. He isn't suddenly playing like prime Darrelle Revis. He had lots of safety help in his matchup with Jefferson, which allowed him to press at the line of scrimmage and take away pretty much anything underneath and over the middle. Still, almost every NFL corner has safety help against Jefferson. Okudah's the only one who's held him under 20 yards.
His next assignment will likely be D.K. Metcalf of the Seahawks. Metcalf isn't all that impressed. Asked about Okudah's lock-down performance through three games, Metcalf told reporters Wednesday, "There’s a safety over the top of him, so he’s really not locking people down. But he’s a good corner."
(Okudah was a little more deferential. Asked how he plans to cover the 6'4, 235 lb. Pro Bowler, he smiled and said, "Get in the weight room, stretch your hamstrings out. It’s going to be a nice little battle.")
No, Okudah isn't a lockdown corner yet. He has to snuff out several more No. 1 receivers before he earns that title. Then several more, across several years. And he has to do it on his own. Okudah isn't a lockdown corner until Glenn can sleep at night without thinking about the opposing team's top receiver, until he can game plan without wondering if his top cornerback needs help.
"Jeff is steady climbing to be one of those corners that can go out and play that way," said Glenn. "And we’re going to find that out. If he’s that type, that allows us to do a lot more as far as taking other guys out."
"I feel like I’m capable," Okudah said, "but at the same time, I want to earn the trust of all my teammates first."
In his third NFL season, Okudah is off to one hell of a start. Ahead of his 14th career game, he's rounding into form like a first-round pick late in his rookie year. He has a feel for his defense and a bead on his opponents. He has trust in his coaches, who fave faith in him. Okudah has a chance to be exactly what the Lions envisioned, exactly what he envisioned when he arrived in Detroit. He has a burst in his step and "a lot of joy" in his heart, with one important caveat: the team is 1-2.
"At the end of the day, we want to stack wins. That’s the name of the game," he said. "So we still got a lot of room to improve, but I’m definitely proud of where I am now from where I was at in the past."
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