DJ Wonnum is starting to look like one of the better offseason additions the Detroit Lions made.
The veteran defensive end has put together a strong run of games, and his work in Week 5 against the Arizona Cardinals stood out the most. In Detroit’s win, Wonnum piled up two sacks and three total pressures, while also earning a 67.4 Pro Football Focus pass-rush grade and a season-best 69.6 overall mark.
That came on the heels of another productive showing in Week 4 against his former team, the Carolina Panthers. In that game, Wonnum notched a sack, added a couple of pressures and posted a season-high 76.5 PFF pass-rush grade.
Through five games, Wonnum has five sacks, which ties him for fourth-most in the NFL. That total already tops what he produced across all of last season by two sacks. His 2026 pass-rush grade currently sits at 65.5, placing him 43rd among 106 qualified EDGE defenders.
For Detroit, the rise has been more than just a nice individual stretch. Wonnum has given the Lions a real boost off the edge over the last couple of weeks, and Dan Campbell made it clear he’s noticed.
“He’s playing at a high level,” Lions head man Dan Campbell said of the veteran EDGE on 97.1 The Ticket. “I thought he really bounced back from last week.
He played really well in the run and certainly in the pass game. He’s creating issues opposite of Hutch (Aidan Hutchinson).
And man, he keeps doing that, with the firepower we have on that D-line, and you become very dangerous.”
Wonnum’s impact also shows up in the way he’s helped balance out the pass rush around Hutchinson, who has four sacks so far this season. Hutchinson said that kind of production on the other side changes how offenses have to play Detroit.
“Yeah, I love it,” Hutchinson said of his pass-rushing counterpart. “It's great, because if I get more attention during the game and he's winning his one-on-one's, then teams look at that and go, 'Maybe we don't send the slide here every time.
Maybe we gotta switch it up.' So to me, it's a win-win all the way around.
We just gotta keep rushing like that and keep playing fast.”
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