Exit interviews: Quantifying year-to-year drop-off for Detroit Lions' o-line ahead of offseason improvement project
Wrapping up the Detroit Lions’ 2025 season, we’re doing our annual position-by-position evaluation of the roster. Today, we’ll focus on the play of the team’s offensive line.
The straightforward stats
Penei Sewell: 16 starts, 997 snaps
Taylor Decker: 14 starts, 893 snaps
Graham Glasgow: 14 starts, 872 snaps
Christian Mahogany: 11 starts, 699 snaps
Tate Ratledge: 17 starts, 1,087 snaps
Kayode Awosika: 13 games (four starts), 286 snaps
Tyrstan Colon: 12 games (four starts), 183 snaps
Miles Frazier: Five games, 46 snaps
Dan Skipper: 12 games (five starts), 228 snaps
Kingsley Eguakun: Four games (two starts), 138 snaps
Gio Manu: Four games (one start), 69 snaps
Advanced metrics
Pressure is a quirky statistic because, unlike sacks, the concept of hurrying a quarterback is subjective.
Let’s look at this through different platforms. Stats Perform has the Lions allowing pressure on 24.6% of dropbacks vs. 21.0% a year ago. The 2025 rate ranked 25th in the league.
FTN, formerly Football Outsiders, is more liberal with its pressure definition, but the decline is similar. In 2024, the Lions ranked fourth with a 26.0% pressure rate allowed. This year, 17th at 30.0%.
And NFL Pro and Next Gen Stats, which uses tracking data through microchips in player jerseys, had quarterback Jared Goff being pressured 34.1% of the time vs. 33.3% last season, despite having nearly a tenth of a second less to throw.
Pro Football Focus has a metric called pass-blocking efficiency, which weights sacks, quarterback hits and pressures. Detroit’s 85.5 ranked 15th, in the ballpark of last year’s 85.2 score.
Nearly every way you slice it, the protection took a step back last season.