Earlier today, the Mother Ship ESPN analyst Mike Sando dished out a chart that showed that the Detroit Lions are the fourth oldest team in the NFL. (Hat tip to Joshsun for the FanPost.) Now, I had a hard time believing that the Lions were that old seeing how most of the starters were drafted in the last three years. Either way, I decided to do my own research and find out exactly how "old" they are.
For the numbers below, I have accounted for the release of Chris Morris and Aaron Brown and also accounted for the addition of Jacques McClendon:
- Average age of the team: 26.4 years
- Average experience of the team: 4.1 seasons
- Average age of all offensive players: 27.5 years
- Average experience of all offensive players: 4.5 seasons
- Average age of all defensive players: 26.4 years
- Average experience of all defensive players: 3.3 seasons
Below is the full chart of all the current Lions players, their age and their NFL experience. Following that is an age and experience breakdown for each position. Projected starters are in italics:
Quarterbacks |
Age |
Exp. |
Defensive Ends |
Age |
Exp. |
Matthew Stafford |
23 |
2 |
Kyle Vanden Bosch |
32 |
9 |
Shaun Hill |
31 |
5 |
Cliff Avril |
25 |
3 |
Drew Stanton |
27 |
3 |
Lawrence Jackson |
26 |
3 |
Running Backs |
Age |
Exp. |
Willie Young |
25 |
1 |
Jahvid Best |
22 |
1 |
Defensive Tackles |
Age |
Exp. |
Maurice Morris |
31 |
9 |
Ndamukong Suh |
24 |
1 |
Jerome Harrison |
28 |
5 |
Nick Fairley |
23 |
0 |
Wide Receivers |
Age |
Exp. |
Corey Williams |
31 |
7 |
Calvin Johnson |
25 |
4 |
Sammie Hill |
24 |
2 |
Nate Burleson |
30 |
8 |
Andre Fluellen |
26 |
3 |
Titus Young |
22 |
0 |
Middle Linebackers |
Age |
Exp. |
Rashied Davis |
32 |
6 |
Stephen Tulloch |
26 |
5 |
Maurice Stovall |
26 |
5 |
Isaiah Ekejiuba |
29 |
6 |
Stefan Logan |
30 |
2 |
Outside Linebackers |
Age |
Exp. |
Tight Ends |
Age |
Exp. |
Justin Durant |
25 |
4 |
Brandon Pettigrew |
26 |
2 |
Bobby Carpenter |
28 |
5 |
Tony Scheffler |
28 |
5 |
Ashlee Palmer |
25 |
2 |
Will Heller |
30 |
8 |
Doug Hogue |
22 |
0 |
Tackles |
Age |
Exp. |
DeAndre Levy |
24 |
2 |
Jeff Backus |
33 |
10 |
Cornerbacks |
Age |
Exp. |
Gosder Cherilus |
27 |
3 |
Alphonso Smith |
25 |
2 |
Jason Fox |
23 |
1 |
Eric Wright |
26 |
4 |
Corey Hilliard |
26 |
3 |
Chris Houston |
26 |
4 |
Guards |
Age |
Exp. |
Aaron Berry |
23 |
1 |
Rob Sims |
27 |
5 |
Brandon McDonald |
26 |
4 |
Stephen Peterman |
29 |
6 |
Safeties |
Age |
Exp. |
Jacques McClendon |
23 |
1 |
Louis Delmas |
24 |
2 |
Centers |
Age |
Exp. |
Amari Spievey |
23 |
1 |
Dominic Raiola |
32 |
10 |
Erik Coleman |
29 |
7 |
Dylan Gandy |
29 |
5 |
John Wendling |
28 |
4 |
Specialists |
Age |
Exp. |
|||
Jason Hanson |
41 |
19 |
|||
Ryan Donahue |
23 |
0 |
|||
Don Muhlbach |
30 |
7 |
As you may have noticed, there are only seven players over thirty on the entire roster. That means only 13.2% of the entire roster is above 30. Around this time last year, I wrote a similar post, and 17% of the entire roster was above 30. The average age of the roster last year after cuts was also 26.4, so the Lions have actually gotten a bit younger this offseason.
Not surprisingly, the offensive starters as a whole are older and more experienced as compared to last season. Last year, the offensive starters were about 26 (25.7) years old. This season, they are 27.5 years on average and have 5.1 years of experience. Last season, they only had 3.9 seasons of NFL experience on average. You may have noticed how the average experience went up by almost exactly a whole season; that is because the Lions starting offensive unit has stayed the same for the first time since I can remember being a Lions fan. The only real change is that they are no longer featuring a fullback, which is why I didn’t account for one when I did my number crunching.
On the other hand, the Lions actually didn’t get any more experience on the defensive side of the ball. The Lions defense had starters averaging 3.3 seasons of NFL experience last season, and that is exactly what they are averaging right now. Most of that can be attributed to the deletion of a dinosaur like Julian Peterson and the releasing of veteran C.C. Brown. Not having those two players pretty much made up for any increase in experience by the rest of the defense.
Below are the average age and experience of the Lions players broken down by position:
Average Age By Position |
Age |
Exp. |
Quarterbacks |
27 |
3.3 |
Running Backs |
27 |
5 |
Wide Receivers |
27.5 |
4.2 |
Tight Ends |
28 |
5 |
Tackles |
27.25 |
4.3 |
Guards |
26.33 |
4 |
Centers |
30.5 |
7.5 |
Defensive Ends |
27 |
4 |
Defensive Tackles |
25.6 |
2.6 |
Middle Linebackers |
27.5 |
5.5 |
Outside Linebackers |
24.8 |
2.6 |
ALL Linebackers |
25.57 |
3.4 |
Cornerbacks |
25.2 |
3 |
Safeties |
26 |
3.5 |
Specialists |
31.33 |
8.7 |