What we did and didn’t learn from Detroit Lions minicamp, OTAs

Detroit Lions coach Dan Campbell has a name for spring football. It’s called a “pajama party.”

Campbell calls it that, because it obviously doesn’t much resemble real football, as players during OTAs and minicamp aren’t allowed full contact and they aren’t wearing pads.

It’s an absolutely fair point, and it’s something you always have to keep in mind when watching the practices over the past month or even just reading the beat writers observations.

So now that the media-covered portion of OTAs and minicamp are over, it’s time to take inventory of what we learned. On the latest episode of the PODcast, we go over specific players and position groups and discuss what we saw at practice and whether we actually learned anything that will translate when actual football is being played. Here are topics and timestamps of that discussion:

• Are the secondary improvements we’ve seen for real? Is there any concern the receiving group has taken a step back? (4:50)
• Sam LaPorta making plays all over the place, but how likely is he to buck the trend of modest rookie years for tight ends? (12:00)
• Are the Lions fine at backup quarterback or is it too early to tell? (17:15)
• Any concern about Jared Goff and the offense’s slow start? (20:20)

For the rest of the podcast, we discuss potential breakout stars for the Lions in 2023 and their likelihood of accomplishing that, including Alim McNeill, Kerby Joseph, James Houston, Jameson Williams, David Montgomery, and James Mitchell.

Listen to the entire episode below:

Subscribe to the PODcast on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or iHeartRadio. Follow Pride Of Detroit on Twitch to get notified when we record the PODcast live and chat with us. Video replays are available on Twitch and highlights can be founded on YouTube.