Dave Fipp took a break from training camp to take in the Chris Stapleton concert at Ford Field earlier this month.
The Detroit Lions special teams coordinator said he’s a big fan of Stapleton and Stapleton’s opening act from the show, Lainey Wilson, and when he watched Wilson perform he was wowed by an instrumentalist from her band, Traverse City nativeSav Madigan.
“This lady was jamming on this guitar and I'm like, ‘Damn, who is that?’” Fipp said. “And then all of a sudden, she's playing the electric violin in front of everybody, and this person jumped off the stage. The way she was playing that instrument with the passion and energy, and I'm like, ‘Damn, I mean, she's got it. She’s definitely got it.’”
When it comes to football players, Fipp
said he’s looking for players who jump off the film like Madigan did to him that night at Ford Field. And on special teams this summer, he singled out four players who’ve popped before practice Wednesday, Aug. 19.
“So Tay Martin has jumped off the film every day,” Fipp said. “A bunch of these guys, [Erick] Hunter's jumped off the film doing something good, [Joe] Bachie's played some good football, all these guys I've mentioned. [Troy] Reeder's done some good things. And that's why I say it's a very competitive situation here. But yeah, it's a good question. I can't give it all away.”
Martin, Hunter, Bachie and Reeder are all bubble players fighting for jobs with a little over a week left in camp. How they play down the stretch in practice and in the Lions’ final two preseason games Saturday, Aug. 22, against the Washington Commanders and next week against the Indianapolis Colts, could determine whether they make the initial 53-man roster.
Martin is part of a heated battlefor the final one or two spots at wide receiver, behind Amon-Ra St. Brown, Jameson Williams, Isaac TeSlaa and Greg Dortch.
Fipp said Tom Kennedy also is vying for the return job on kicks and punts, and he mentioned Tarik Black and Lucky Jackson as receivers who’ve made plays in the return game, though he indicated none of those players is likely to earn a job based solely on their special teams ability.
“In the old days I felt like, yeah, there was a handful of guys that they just made the roster on special teams,” Fipp said. “And I feel like over the last handful of years [that] has changed a little bit. We've had more injuries collectively probably as a league, you're playing more players throughout the course of a year. I tell the players now, 'You're going to make the team probably in two phases. You're going to have to play on offense and special teams or defense and special teams.' And I know this, the more that you can do, the better in modern football.”
At linebacker, Hunter, Bachie and Reeder are among a group of players competing for the final one or two spots at linebacker. Jack Campbell and Derrick Barnes are the team’s every-down players, and Devin White, Malcolm Rodriguez and Trevor Nowaske are the top backups.
Reeder was a core special teams player for the Los Angeles Rams and Chargers the past seven years and Bachie has filled a similar role for four teams over most of his career. Hunter, meanwhile, has “caught everybody's eye” as an undrafted rookie out of Morgan State.
“He's done some good things,” Fipp said. “And I would say he's right in the middle of a competition. The advantage those other guys have is they've played, so they've been through that stuff. I think (ex-New England Patriots coach Bill) Belichick … used to have a thing where there'd be no rookies playing on the punt team. He just didn't want that to happen because he knew a mistake in that phase is devastating.
“So anytime you have to put a young player out there like that, you have got to be careful. And that's his challenge that he's fighting the other guys that have experience, but they haven't in some ways flashed as much as he has at certain things, too. So it'll be interesting.”
Pop on returns
Isiah Pacheco hasn’t practiced since early this month because of a sprained MCL, but Fipp said the veteran running back could handle kick returns this fall.
“Anytime if a guy's dynamic with the ball in his hands on offense, then there's a chance that translates on special team, too,” Fipp said. “And so that's kind of really what we see in Pacheco.”
Pacheco was the Kansas City Chiefs’ primary kick returner as a rookie in 2022, when he averaged 20.6 yards per return.
Fipp said he favors a running back type in that role for their body types, durability and the nature of the play.
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: How a Lions assistant used a Chris Stapleton show to identify stars
