Lions' Campbell talks evaluation process, practice squad's importance, and hunting for outside talent ahead of roster cuts

Allen Park — For the next day or so, the optimism of the upcoming season is muted by each NFL team having to inform nearly 30 players they didn’t make the cut.

It’s an unfortunate aspect of being a coach or general manager in the league. However, it’s part of the job, and Lions coach Dan Campbell believes being direct and honest is the best way to traverse the process.

“I appreciate all those guys and all the hard work they put into it,” Campbell said. “…It's something that has to be done, and you want to do it as respectfully as you can. You don't want to lie to the player. You just tell them straight up, and it's hard. But it's the right way to do it. We do that.”

Campbell emphasized that as difficult as these days can be for him with having to break so much bad news, he understands it’s worse for the individual players having to hear it. He tries to use those conversations to provide some motivation.

“What I tell them is, 'Use this as fuel and move on to the next step of this, whether it's another team or it's another shot at it. Whatever it is, man, attack the next day, and don't let it shake your confidence,’” Campbell said.

The silver lining is the Lions will be able to bring several of those cuts back into the fold a day later, once they clear waivers and the team establishes its 16-man practice squad. The way the Lions have operated under Campbell and general manager Brad Holmes, there’s stability with that unit, and many of those players end up contributing on the main roster at some point during the season.

“We love our practice squad,” Campbell said. “That's another one of those things that we've done a really good job of here, found guys that fit us and that we can count on, really over the last two or three years. You know, those guys are a big part of what we do. So, yeah, we feel pretty good. There will be a number of those guys that we'd be excited to have back that we trust.”

Campbell did acknowledge the Lions won’t necessarily use all 16 practice squad spots on members of their offseason roster. The personnel department is scouring other teams’ potential cuts for talent who can serve as upgrades. That’s how the Lions landed wide receiver Tim Patrick a year ago, who ended up being a significant contributor in 2024.

Just know, the Lions won’t lower their standards, even with that group. Campbell said it will always be important that the team adds players they are passionate about.

“We'll do our legwork,” Campbell said. “We have enough people who have an idea of who that person was. What was their background in college coming out? That's always going to be big. Chances are, if it's somebody we weren't really fired up about coming out, because of character, we're probably not going to look at them if they're available now.

“Usually, that's already been checked off, you'll do a little legwork, and then the rest is up to the tape,” Campbell continued. “What does the tape look like? Do we feel like that's something that fits our system? Do we feel like we can help them grow and get better? Are we excited about the player? That's a lot of it, too. It's hard for Brad and I to bring in guys we're warm about. You want to feel like you're hot over them because there's somewhere to go or they have something about them that you feel like you can develop.”

Detroit and the rest of the league's teams are required to trim their rosters to 53 by 4 p.m. Tuesday. Campbell said he expects the Lions to have most of the conversations with players by the end of the day Monday.

The process is the culmination of months of work, 18 training camp practices, four preseason games, and a number of behind-the-scenes meetings and sessions in the weight room that media and fans don’t see. It all matters.

“You're going to take the totality of it,” Campbell said. “I know for me, that's big. I want to know, from start to finish, what did it look like and was there constant improvement? Do you feel and see development through that time?”

Campbell said one thing that does concern him in the evaluation process is when the practice tape is good and a player is unable to transfer that success to the exhibition games. He also acknowledged that he, as a coach, can’t become enamored by a small sample size, such as a strong performance in a single preseason game.

The coach also mentioned the eventual returns of several key contributors, notably Alim McNeill and Malcolm Rodriguez, as being considerations during cuts. But Campbell also said the team has to think big picture based on historical trends.

“You've got to be careful and worry about today, worry about what's right in front of us a little bit,” Campbell said. “The odds, unfortunately, it will shake out where we won't have to make that decision. I hope not, but that's how it's been here going on five years.”