The Detroit Lions closed out their ninth and final OTA practice on Thursday afternoon. Next week, their offseason program will conclude with two days of Mandatory Minicamp, and then the team will be off until late July.
“They will have gotten their full share of the program,” coach Dan Campbell. “You know everything is a little different this year because it’s a later start for the league year, but no, we’ll get them out of here.”
Here are my observations from Thursday’s final OTA practice. If you
want to know which players weren’t practicing on Thursday, you can check our unofficial injury/participation report here.
Business as usual
The Lions’ practice was very similar to the previous two we’ve watched. The format: 30-ish minutes of walk/jog-throughs, positional drills, special teams drills, and one full-team drill. This week, they worked on punting during special teams, and we saw a full 11-on-11 situational drill at the end of practice. The walkthroughs were slightly different this week: instead of working on two separate fields between the first and second teams, they were all on one field running simulated drives.
This was the second straight practice in which they did not run any 7-on-7 drills in front of the media, which, at this point, feels intentional. That makes observations pretty difficult with almost zero full-speed drills and no pads, but I’ll do my best.
However, next week the Lions won’t be able to hide any drills with both minicamp practices being open to the media.
Interesting rep orders
While it’s important not to read too much into rep order at this time of year, it is an interesting peek into what Campbell and company may be thinking about the standings of each player. Here are some interesting notes from Thursday’s practice:
Right tackle
Larry Borom continues to rep ahead of rookie Blake Miller, but they are splitting time nearly evenly. Miller is getting plenty of work with the first-team offense, and it feels like it’s only a matter of time before that job becomes fully his to lose.
Don’t sleep on Juice Scruggs
Scruggs, who the Lions obtained in the David Montgomery, has consistently been the backup center during the spring program, but on Thursday he even got a small amount of work with the first-team offense at left guard. That spot has been occupied by Christian Mahogany nearly all of OTAs, while Miles Frazier has commonly repped with the second team.
Scruggs seems like the front-runner for the backup center job, and so it makes sense for Detroit to test out whether he can be a versatile reserve at multiple positions.
Khalil Dorsey, come on down
With no Terrion Arnold, Rock Ya-Sin, and Ennis Rakestraw, the Lions were severely shorthanded at outside cornerback. That left Dorsey to team up with D.J. Reed for the first-team defense. Behind them were Nick Whiteside and De’Shawn Rucker.
Dorsey brings a ton of special team skills, including excellent play as a gunner. But he remains relatively inexperienced on defense. While it’s only OTAs, this was good experience for the 28-year-old corner.
Linebacker breakdown
As it has been all spring, Jack Campbell, Derrick Barnes, and Malcolm Rodriguez make up the starting linebacking crew. When they’re in nickel, it’s Campbell and Barnes.
As of right now, it looks like the next two up are Damone Clark and Joe Bachie, although rookie Jimmy Rolder has worked his way into that group occasionally, as well.
My two early dark-horse candidates
One other interesting order of reps that has been consistent all of OTAs is Tyler Lacy getting very early work. When the Lions need a 4i or a 5-tech, he seems to be the first one out there, notably ahead of Levi Onwuzurike. Perhaps they are just working Onwuzurike slowly into the lineup, as he’s coming off a year lost to an ACL, but I don’t think we should underestimate Lacy, either. Campbell mentioned Lacy’s size as an asset in that “big end” role.
“We have got some length now, we have got some size and length and athletic ability on the perimeter,” Campbell said. “You know Lacy is that, but he’s a little more of that big end, big stack, but we are big, we are long and so you can’t wait for training camp, you know, you just can’t wait.”
The other player who caught my eye is receiver Cedrick Wilson. Admittedly, he is still repping very late in the rotation, but the nine-year veteran turned around rookie Keith Abney during a jog-through red zone drill, and he displayed some skills during a gunner drill.
Wilson was a late add, so I think he’s being overlooked. But after the Kendrick Law injury, there is room on the roster for a receiver with special teams skills, and Wilson has played in at least 10 games in six consecutive seasons, although his special teams playing time has been limited to just 381 total snaps.
Offense wins situation drill
Our first taste of true 11-on-11 drills came toward the end of practice, where the team competed in the following end-of-game situation:
- Offense down 4 points
- 40 seconds left
- 1 timeout
- Starting on opponent’s 44-yard line
Here’s how each play went:
- False start
- Post route to Amon-Ra St. Brown, who had beaten Roger McCreary by a few steps for an easy 19 yards
- Checkdown to Jahmyr Gibbs, “tackled” by Malcolm Rodriguez after a 3-yard gain
- Overthrow/throw-away to St. Brown on an out route
- Crossing route to ST. Brown for 18 yards — timeout with 7 seconds left
- Back of the endzone pass to Jameson Williams for a toe-tapping touchdown, but ruled incomplete
- Refs called pass interference on someone
- Quick slant to Williams, incomplete, but Reed was called for holding
- Untimed down from the 1-yard line: Jared Goff sneaks in for an easy TD. Defense looked like it only had a three-man front, so it was a very easy score from Goff.
Odds and ends:
- Funny moment during practice when Penei Sewell appeared to be called for illegal man downfield: he quickly picked up the flag and stuck it in his pocket so no one saw it.
- Other players who were working on the gunner drill: Isaac TeSlaa, Kyre Duplessis, Roger McCreary, D.J. Reed, Khalil Dorsey, Christian Izien, Dominic Lovett, Keith Abney, Malik Cunningham, Nick Whiteside, De’Shawn Rucker
- The quarterbacks briefly worked on a neat rollout drill, where they would navigate the pocket, roll to their right, and try to hit a dummy on the back of a golf cart moving full speed in the end zone. Both Goff and Luke Altmyer connected on about half of their attempts from about 15-20 yards away.
- Practice ended with a competition between the offense and defense fielding punts. The offense lost after Dominic Lovett dropped his attempt. He also had a tough drop during individual drills. Greg Dortch, Reed, and Tom Kennedy all caught their attempts.
