Kelvin Sheppard sees a little bit of himself in Brian Branch, and the Detroit Lions first-year defensive coordinator has a some advice for his suspended safety based on his own experience.
“I believe it’s my job to be a mentor in that department to him because I have been in his shoes,” Sheppard said. “At one point I was a kind of toeing-the-line kind of player that played with that type of edge, but I told him, ‘Man, you just have to understand. You have 60 minutes to be able to do whatever you want to do to another man and kind of leave it right there.'”
Branch was suspended one game for striking Kansas City Chiefs receiver Juju Smith-Schuster in the face at the end of last week’s 30-17 loss in Kansas City.
Branch apologized for the incident after the game, which he said was in retaliation for an illegal blindside block he felt Smith-Schuster made late in the fourth quarter. Smith-Schuster was not penalized for the block.
NFL Films highlighted what it called a “long day” for Branch on the show “Turning Point” and posted a since-deleted promo for the show on social media Thursday that included several plays it insinuated led up to the incident. The clip included Smith-Schuster’s block and a voiceover from analyst Louis Riddick saying Branch “got burned” on a catch by Travis Kelce and “got showed up” by Patrick Mahomes after a touchdown run.
Sheppard said he hadn’t seen the post – the full video remains online.
Off the field, he called Branch “the most soft spoken guy you’ll ever meet, the most respectable guy you will ever meet.” But on the field, where Branch has racked up 10 fines since the start of last season for infractions, he acknowledged Branch has to do a better job controlling his emotions.
“Those 30 seconds in that spotlight could change how people view you and how people see you, so just always remember that,” he said. “In this profession in life, one wrong decision could now peg you as a person that you’re nowhere near to being. So I think he understands that more than anybody right now and he’ll learn and grow from that situation.”
As a player, Sheppard said he received counsel from older college teammates like Dwayne Bowe and Ali Highsmith and from watching veterans like Reggie Wayne and Robert Mathis in the NFL to understand the line he had to walk as a player.
“Just those guys, kind of seeing how one thing could kind of tick me off and kind of when I get there, it’s hard to pull me back,” Sheppard said. “But them opening my eyes and understand that for 20 seconds, you having that type of temperament can really change a bigger picture thing for you. So just understanding that, learning and growing.”
Dave Birkett covers the Lions for the Detroit Free Press. Contact him at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Bluesky, X and Instagram at @davebirkett.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Suspended Brian Branch getting mentorship from Lions DC Kelvin Sheppard
