The Detroit Lions are ending their formal offseason program a week early for most veterans, the second straight year Lions coach Dan Campbell has dedicated the last week of workouts to developing the young talent on his roster.
And the Lions headed into summer Thursday on a light note — with a big man punt-catching contest to end practice.
Impressively, all three offensive linemen (Penei Sewell, Kevin Jarvis and Dan Skipper) and both defensive linemen (Alim McNeill, Demetrius Taylor) who took part in the contest fielded their punts cleanly.
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Taylor started the post-practice fun by making a shoestring catch to the delight of his teammates, and Skipper closed by silencing the defensive line who summoned him to take part with chants of, “We want Skip.”
“Just have a little fun here last day, catch a ball, make the defense go crazy,” Skipper said. “If I can’t catch a punt, I got to hang it up.”
At 6 feet 9 and 330 pounds, Skipper is the most mountainous man on the Lions roster.
He said his catching skills came from his baseball-playing days in high school — “A little bit of outfield. First step back, see the ball in,” he said — and he honed his, ahem, punt return ability during his time with the New England Patriots and in his first go-round with the Lions.
Skipper, who played for the Lions in 2017-18, used to kill time before practice by fielding punts for ex-Lions punter Sam Martin.
“He looked good,” regular Lions punt returner Kalif Raymond said. “Actually, all those guys looked good. I was a little nervous. I was like, ‘Maybe it ain’t as hard as it looks then.'”
Raymond’s job as the Lions’ primary punt returner is safe, but as guard Logan Stenberg said, “all our offensive linemen are athletic, we just don’t get ever get a good rap.”
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Raymond, who is 13 inches shorter and 150 pounds lighter than Skipper, said he’d be “nervous” trying to tackle a punt returner Skipper’s size, though Skipper said his days as a punt returner are done.
“This is fun,” he said. “Pulled it back a little bit today, get everyone healthy and get recharged for when we come back here at the end of July.”
As for what was on the line in the punt catching competition, Skipper said there’s only one thing the defense lost by calling him out on the field: “Their pride.”
More observations from Thursday
• As noted, the Lions have one final week of OTAs next week, which Campbell said will focus heavily on the development of rookies and young players who need time on the field and in the class room.
“I kind of like this time of year because the rookies come in rookie minicamp and they really feel great about themselves and then the vets come in and all of sudden they realize they’re not as good as they think they are and they got a lot to learn,” Campbell said. “Then they watch how it’s done and then they begin to grow, and they start learning. But yet there’s these things, they still don’t ask these questions. They’re the young guy in the room and they don’t always just kind of open up.
“So now that they’ve seen how it’s done and they’ve had time to sit in the room with the vets once they kind of go away now you start getting those questions and you get more of the one-on-one and they kind of take another little jolt up in their development which is good. So that’s what next week will be and that’s where we’ll go.”
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• DJ Chark, Deshon Elliott, Jerry Jacobs (ACL), Ifeatu Melifonwu, Romeo Okwara (Achilles), Jameson Williams (ACL), James Mitchell (ACL), Natrez Patrick, Derrick Deese and Josh Paschal were among the non-participants in Thursday’s practice.
Jeff Okudah did limited individual work as he continues to rehab from Achilles surgery, John Penisini remained absent and I did not see backup center Ryan McCollum on the field.
With no sign of McCollum, Tommy Kraemer took third-team reps at center. He had one bad shotgun snap in a five-play sequence with the threes.
Jonah Jackson, who sat out team period Wednesday with an apparent arm injury, was back working with the first-team offense Thursday.
• The Lions had a shortened team period Thursday, putting their first- and second-teams through an end-of-game situation, with the offense trailing 30-21, at its own 25-yard line with 1:59 on the clock and in need of two scores to win.
Neither the offense nor defense seemed to be going quite full speed up front, but Jared Goff drove the first-team offense for a quick touchdown and put them in position for the game-winning field goal, which Riley Patterson missed wide left from about 54 yards.
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Goff started the drive with a pass to Raymond down the middle, then after a spike to kill the clock, found Josh Reynolds open down the right sideline against Will Harris. Reynolds might have scored on the play, but Campbell blew the whistle around the 11-yard line and Goff followed another spike with a touchdown throw to tight end Shane Zylstra with 1:18 on the clock.
• David Blough did not move the second-team offense nearly as well. Blough through incomplete twice down the middle to Tom Kennedy and Trinity Benson, but converted a fourth-and-short pass to Quintez Cephus.
After converting a second fourth down, Blough threw an interception down the right sideline to Bobby Price on a pass intended for Cephus.
• I don’t know that there’s a clear favorite for the No. 2 quarterback job — both Blough and Boyle have had their moments, and probably not coincidentally, both have looked better playing with the second-team offense this spring.
But Campbell said the competition is open heading into training camp.
“Competition is great thing,” Campbell said. “I respect what both of them did this spring. That’s what I love about both of them. I know they are going out there to compete against each other.”
• The Lions kept the same receiver pairings as Wednesday during their walk-through drills, with Raymond, Reynolds and Amon-Ra St. Brown running with the first-team offense and Cephus, Benson and Kennedy working with the twos.
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Rookie first-round pick Aidan Hutchinson worked with the first-team defense during the situational period. It’s only a matter of time before he gets a starting nod full time.
• One other depth chart note: The Lions repped some punt coverage between team periods Thursday. The gunner pairings: C.J. Moore and Price, AJ Parker and Benson, and Mike Hughes and Cephus.
• Staying on the special teams front, I’d give Austin Seibert the edge over Patterson in the early battle for the kicking job. Seibert seems to have a bigger leg, and Patterson has struggled with his accuracy from distance during some the Lions’ open practices this spring.
• Last note from minicamp: The Lions tested out the arms of their receivers and running backs Thursday, too. Kennedy threw a 75-yard pass to Raymond on a trick play in the Lions’ season-ending win over the Green Bay Packers last season and he had another nice toss Thursday.
Josh Reynolds has a big and accurate arm (for a receiver), and Raymond said he was impressed by St. Brown’s arm, too.
“Trinity has always, I thought, had the best arm, but I was actually going to say Josh Reynolds (has the best arm),” Raymond said. “But Amon-Ra threw one over there that kind of hit me out of left field, cause I didn’t know he had it like that. And then he got a little confidence with it. I’d say probably Trinity’s the most consistent. J-Rey (Josh) told me his throwing accuracy’s 99, so I guess we’ll watch the tape and see exactly what 99 looks like cause he told me that last year, too, and I didn’t even see that.”
Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett.