Out of the bye week, Detroit Lions coach Dan Campbell confirmed that both Brian Branch and Cade Mays will make their 2026 debuts against the Green Bay Packers this week. Branch will see the field for the first time since suffering a torn Achilles in early December. Mays will make his Lions debut after suffering a wrist fracture early in training camp.
While both are expected to suit up on Sunday, Campbell said they were still evaluating how much each player will play on Sunday. The Lions coach made
it clear that he doesn’t intend on giving Branch a full-time load, but he will probably still play a significant amount of snaps.
“I think that’d be asking a lot to say he’s going to play 70 plays, but we feel like there’s—we do feel like he can handle quite a bit here,” Campbell said. “We’re going to push him in practice early. That’s one of the reasons we’re practicing tomorrow and not Wednesday. So we can push some of these guys a little bit knowing they’re going into a day off. I think that’ll help a little bit. Then we’ll have a really good idea by the time we hit the game. We already kind of have a range of what we’re looking at for him.”
It’s a little more complicated for Mays. Campbell noted that while it’s not uncommon for guards to play in a rotational role during a game, that’s not how centers are typically treated.
“We’re still back-and-forth on what do we do with him,” Campbell said. “Do we work he and Juice (Scruggs) in and out? Do we—the center position, it’s a little different than a guard. That’s somebody that’s constantly touching the football. But either way, barring anything negatively happening between now and the game, we plan on playing both of those guys.”
Complicating things further with Mays is also the strong play of backup center Juice Scruggs. Not only is he currently the No. 2 graded center per PFF, but Campbell says he’s been very impressed with how he’s played and grown at the position.
“That’s the hard thing, Juice is playing pretty good football for us right now,” Campbell said. “He’s done a good job, he’s gotten better every week, and Juice is a freakin’ team guy. Doesn’t mean that if it comes to that (benching him), that he doesn’t like that. Because there’s definitely an argument to keep him rolling, because he’s playing good football. But he’s a team guy, he’s all-in, he’ll do whatever we ask him to do. And the good news is, one way or another, we get Cade worked back in with Juice playing pretty good, (Christian) Mahogany’s had a couple of good weeks—well, now we’ve got some guys. We’ve got a pretty good crew there to go with and get better as the season goes.”
Campbell has already mentioned that by the time Mays is settled back into the starting role, Scruggs could re-enter the starting competition at left guard. But in the meantime, they like having him continue to grow at center to give the Lions some depth and insurance at one of the more important offensive line positions.
“Some of it will need to be dependent on how much Cade can play, as we keep Juice ready to play center, because he’s really plug-and-play in that regard—the IDs, all of those things,” Campbell said. “And then the more comfortable we get, then Juice is working the guard position a little bit with those guys. So now you’re getting some really good competition, you’ve got depth, you’ve got guys that can play.”
