I just spent all summer telling fans of the Detroit Lions what I think about the team, I thought it might be nice to get a fan point of view this time around, so that’s what I did.
The Lions have four new receivers on the team right now. Former Broncos’ receiver Tim Patrick, former Pro Bowler Allen Robinson, undrafted rookie Isaiah Williams and Donovan Peoples-Jones. So Peoples-Jones isn’t totally new, but he’s newish in the sense that the Lions basically didn’t use him last year.
I wanted to find out who Lions fans thought would have the best season, so I put a poll out on Twitter and had everyone vote. Over 600 people turned in votes during the few hours it was live and 52.8% of fans believe that it’s Tim Patrick that will have the big year.
It’s hard to argue with that one. The Lions need an X receiver and Patrick is the best choice the Lions currently have in that spot. While it’s worrisome that he’s coming off back to back injuries that caused him to miss back to back seasons, he has looked good this summer and it would be fair to say the Broncos didn’t really want to make this move, but felt they had to.
This is the first time in Patrick’s career that he’s been on a team that’s very stable with a solid quarterback. He’s otherwise been with Case Keenum, Joe Flacco, Drew Lock, Brett Rypien, Brandon Allen, Jeff Driskel, Phillip Lindsey and Teddy Bridgewater. All those guys were in a four year span. You can’t make that up. Jared Goff is a sight for his sore eyes.
In second came Isaiah Williams. It’s clear the Lions fans really like the kid, the problem is that he’s in a situation as a slot receiver where the Lions already have the best slot in the game in Amon-Ra St. Brown and then have Kalif Raymond taking up the bulk of the slot reps after him. They also have Jahmyr Gibbs and Sione Vaki that can add a lot of what Williams can do. At this point I wouldn’t be shocked to see Williams inactive a lot like Antoine Green was last year.
Allen Robinson got a small amount of the vote and it’s understandable as to why. It’s been a while since we’ve seen him play up to the level that he used to play at. You kind of get the feeling that Robinson won’t be long for this world and maybe he never actually gets in a game. I hope to be wrong.
The last is Donovan Peoples-Jones. It’s kind of hard to see why the team decided to keep him after a really hard summer, but the Lions see something there, they just want him to unlock it and put it on the field. We’ll see if he can.
Overall I agree with the fans here. Tim Patrick should have a pretty solid year. If they can at least get 40 catches and 450 yards out of the guy, it’s a huge steal.