Notes: Hockenson, Walker receive Lions’ highest PFF Week 1 grades

Hoooooboy, I knew this was going to be an interesting collection of notes today, so I tried to pick some stuff that would make you feel a little better.

Despite a rough Sunday afternoon that ended in a 27-27 tie with the Arizona Cardinals, several Detroit Lions players looked pretty dang good.

Pro Football Focus ranked T.J. Hockenson, duh, as the highest graded Lion on offense at 83. He set an NFL record for a rookie tight end’s debut—six catches for 131 yards and a touchdown. Next up, Joe Dahl and Danny Amendola tied at 70.4

At 81.2, Tracy Walker was the highest graded on defense, followed by A’Shawn Robinson and Rashaan Melvin. Along with nine tackles and two passes defended, Walker had a beautiful pick in the first:

You can find a full article on the game by the PFF analysis team right here.

As for the rest of your notes:

• OK this one isn’t nice but it’s kinda funny. “The timeout.” as I’m calling it, was ranked number one in the “12 dumbest mistakes from a preseason-like Sunday in NFL Week 1”.

• Great immediate postgame from FOX 2 (best news station in the world, IMO) with Hockenson. Quote of the century just before the one minute mark.

• Shawn Windsor from the Detroit Free Press on why you shouldn’t panic just yet.

• Interesting: A look at how many times the Lions have played to a tie from K102.5 of Kalamazoo.

• From a few days ago but just stumbled upon a column by Arizona Republic’s Greg Moore, who grew up in Detroit: “Mitch Albom should have broken the ‘Curse of George Plimpton’ that’s vexing Detroit Lions.” It’s ... something.

• In case you missed it, my friend Brian Manzullo with the Freep tweeted a very fitting Bojack quote after the game:

• I don’t think the audio’s up yet, but an article from 97.1 The Ticket with comments from Mike Valenti. “”(Patricia) looks homeless on a crutch with a pencil behind his ear for a notepad that he doesn’t own.”