The Lions have opened the season with two tight wins, and Dan Campbell is embracing the chaos.
Detroit escaped the Jets 31-24 in Week 3 after a narrow 31-30 win over the Saints to start the year, and Campbell said the defense was the difference against New York.
“I’m just proud of that defensive staff. I’m proud of those players over there and as a whole,” Campbell said, via Eric Woodyard of ESPN. “ That was a good win.”
He also made it clear he likes the kind of football his team is playing right now - the kind that keeps everyone glued to the final whistle.
“I’ll tell you what, you’re coming to our games? You’re loving this now.
I mean, these are exciting games. These are exciting,” Campbell said.
“ Come down to the wire. Nobody’s leaving early.
And that was the point. We’re not going to let anybody leave early this year.
“
Barry Sanders was in attendance for the win over New York, and Jahmyr Gibbs said having the Hall of Fame back in the building pushes him to raise his level.
“Every time he’s here, I gotta step up my game a little bit,” Gibbs said. “So, to be in the same conversation as him is humbling.
I’m blessed to be in it. It’s somebody I’ve looked up to for a long time.”
In Green Bay, the Packers have added experience up front with Kevin Zeitler, Laken Tomlinson and Mekhi Becton, and Matt LaFleur believes that should steady a young offensive line.
“I think it just calms down the O-line,” LaFleur said, via Mike Spofford of the team’s site. “When you have veterans in there who have been through the war, certainly we’ve got young guys playing beside them, that can definitely settle things down. We’re just trying to get these guys integrated, get them up to speed, ramp them up and see what they can do.”
Jordan Love sees the same value in those additions, especially in practice.
“In the NFL you can never beat experience,” Love said. “Experience, banked reps, and just having gone through a lot of different things.
We’ll see. We’ll see how these guys do when we get to practice, and get to games, and go from there.
But obviously they played a lot of ball, they understand the game.”
Love also wants the Packers to stay balanced and let the run game set up the rest of the offense.
“I think it will help a lot of things,” Love said. “ We always talk about having a complementary offense.
Being able to lean on the run game is going to take some of the pressure off the pass protection and not let the D-line just kinda know we’re in pass situations. It’s something that we’ve got to improve.”
In Minnesota, a report from SNY’s NYG411 added another layer to J.J. McCarthy’s situation. Connor Hughes said he had heard rumblings that McCarthy wasn’t happy with how Sam Darnold played after McCarthy’s rookie injury in 2024, and that some “jealousy” surfaced in a way that reminded him of the Carson Wentz and Nick Foles situation in Philadelphia.
“I had heard rumblings, a lot of this, that when Sam Darnold had the season that he did after J.J. McCarthy went down, that didn’t sit particularly well with J.J. because J.J. was shaping up to be the Vikings’ starting quarterback as a rookie,” Hughes said.
“He had shown promise his first year, there were moments that looked good and then when he got hurt and was missing the season, and Sam took over, it wasn’t necessarily like, ‘I believe in Sam. Let’s go Sam.
Let’s go get it.’ It kind of reminded me a little bit of the Carson Wentz / Nick Foles situation in Philadelphia where there was some jealousy and that jealousy rubbed off on some teammates.”
Hughes added that McCarthy’s relationship with the Vikings started to slip when he couldn’t match Darnold’s production the next season.
“When the Vikings decided to let Sam walk and roll with J.J. and it didn’t just immediately pick up where they left off with Sam, I think that started to deteriorate. J.J.’s a little bit of an eccentric person. He has rubbed people the wrong way at times because he’s a little unique and interested in different things,” Hughes said.
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