The Detroit Lions improved to 5-1 with Sunday’s 20-6 win in Tampa Bay, and they got the victory by leaning heavily on the starting lineup, especially on offense.
Head coach Dan Campbell shortened the bench on offense in the win. Some of that was injury-related necessity. With regular starting guards Jonah Jackson and Halapoulivaaati Vaitai unable to start, the starting five playing the whole way was a necessity. All five played all 70 offensive snaps, as did QB Jared Goff.
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The other key starters played very high percentages of the game. Amon-Ra St. Brown was on the field for over 90 percent (64 of 70), followed closely by Josh Reynolds (57) at wide receiver. Rookie TE Sam LaPorta repped on 58 snaps, with Brock Wright in for 43 as the Lions leaned heavily into using two TEs against the Bucs’ impressive defensive front.
The reserves didn’t get much action. Jameson Williams caught his two passes on just 16 snaps, which is one more than Kalif Raymond got on offense. David Montgomery’s injury after 18 snaps thrust Craig Reynolds (43) and Devine Ozigbo (6) into more action than expected. Dan Skipper played four reps as an extra tackle in his first game back on the active roster.
On defense, 17 players saw action for Detroit. Five never left the field, playing all 56 snaps: DBs Kerby Joseph, Tracy Walker, Jerry Jacobs, Cam Sutton and LB Alex Anzalone.
DE Aidan Hutchinson crept back up over 85 percent usage again, playing 50 reps. John Cominsky played a season-high 43 snaps, out-repping Charles Harris (18), Levi Onwuzurike (11) and Romeo Okwara (9) combined in the No. 2 DE role.
The Lions split playing a third LB and a fifth DB pretty evenly. Will Harris was the No. 5 DB and played 39 snaps, with no other CBs or safeties seeing action. Jack Campbell was the third LB at 29 snaps.
Vaitai did play, but only on special teams. He was one of 11 Lions to appear strictly on special teams. Notable again amongst the 11: linebacker Malcolm Rodriguez, his second straight game no seeing any action on defense.