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One thing you can count on with the Detroit Lions is that they are never, ever boring. Follow the latest news including injuries, roster moves and more here daily from Oakland Press beat writer Paula Pasche. Plus you'll find regular commentary about the team.

5/04/2012

Five things we learned about the Detroit Lions this week

Five things we learned about the Lions this week:

1. They are interested in free agent running back Ryan Grant who has spent last five seasons with Packers. In fact, according to ESPN reports, the Lions have made an offer to Grant who has been mostly durable during his six-year NFL career. The Lions must have injury concerns about Jahvid Best (concussions), Mikel Leshoure (coming off Achilles’ surgery) and Kevin Smith who has had trouble staying healthy. This would be an interesting move and certainly could help toward making the offense more balanced. The Lions didn’t draft a running back so it was expected they would go after one in free agency.

2. The Bills cut veteran corner Drayton Florence on Friday, but it would be surprising to see the Lions make a run at the 31-year-old. His best days could be behind him, and the Lions generally look to bring in younger talent.

3. Lions rookie camp is set for next weekend, May 11-13. Many NFL teams are holding their rookie camps this weekend, but the Lions pushed theirs back because rookies will be eligible to attend the offseason workouts the week of May 14. The three-day camp, which is closed to the public, will give us the first look at the eight newly drafted players — if wide receiver Ryan Broyles is cleared to participate — along with the undrafted free agents that have been signed.

4. One of those undrafted rookies is quarterback Kellen Moore who was signed quickly after the draft, although the Lions haven’t announced it yet. Prior to the draft there was plenty of conversation about the Boise State QB who holds the all-time record for wins by a starting quarterback in NCAA Division I. His size (slightly under 6-foot) and questions about his mobility are the likely reasons he was not drafted. He will be motivated, that’s for sure. If he hangs around, he’ll have two good quarterbacks to learn from in Matthew Stafford and Shaun Hill. (That is photo of him at his pro day workout in March.)

5. Coach Jim Schwartz is highly competitive, except not so much when it comes to Twitter followers. He has 70,490 followers while Seahawks coach Pete Carroll has 591,907. Of course Carroll arrived at Seattle from USC which makes a difference.

Schwartz was asked about this during a quick interview on the NFL Network’s Total Access show on Thursday.

I only tweet about once in a blue moon, so, uh, yeah, anything we can do to connect to our fans is important. I very rarely tweet about football-related things, most of them are sort of music, pop culture, or different things like that,’’ Schwartz said. “Those college coaches, they run a lot deeper, use a lot of that for recruiting. It's true. ...’’

Schwartz quite often tweets from the bus on the ride to the stadium on game days. What does he share? Inactives? Injury situations? Deep personal thoughts? Nah. Usually it’s what he’s listening to on his iPod and usually it’s heavy metal. His certified account is @jscwartzlions.

(Follow @PaulaPasche on Twitter. Get Lions news delivered directly to your phone by texting the keyword "Lions" to 22700. Msg & Data Rates May Apply. Text HELP for help. Text STOP to cancel.)

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

I been to contact you about your writing I started reading your column ater the jerk was fired and I really found you to be very informative and enjoyable I learn about grading the draft from your column and I was one who was upset with sopme of the choices thanks for explaining it

7:27 AM 

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