Allen Park — Detroit coach Dan Campbell, wide receivers coach Scottie Montgomery and defensive line coach Kacy Rodgers met with the media Wednesday afternoon. Here are the newsworthy highlights from those conversations.
Vacancy filled
The Lions filled the roster vacancy created on Tuesday by signing center Seth McLaughlin off the team’s practice squad.
Since cutting McLaughlin a couple days after establishing the team’s 53-man roster earlier this month, the team had been running light along the offensive line, with just eight options on the roster.
Then, with Christian Mahogany and Blake Miller banged up and sidelined for last week’s game against Buffalo, the Lions were forced to temporarily elevate McLaughlin and offensive tackle Devin Cochran off the practice squad.
McLaughlin’s promotion provides some stability to the depth chart while starting center Cade Mays continues to recover from a training camp wrist injury.
McLaughlin swaps spots with veteran linebacker Joe Bachie, who was cut on Tuesday to create the opening, only to be re-added to the practice squad on Wednesday.
Practice participation report
In terms of practice participation, both Miller and Mahogany were back on the field on Wednesday. However, the Lions were down three players during the brief portion open to the media: Defensive tackle Alim McNeill, guard Ben Bartch and safety Thomas Harper.
McNeill’s absence was announced before practice by Campbell, who downplayed the situation.
“There's nothing to it,” Campbell said. “He'll be back, ready. I mean, he'll be back here probably just when practice ends, so no big deal, and be ready to roll.”
McLaughlin’s promotion helps ease some concern if Bartch’s status for Sunday’s game against the Jets is in question.
Harper is the bigger concern. The Lions are already depleted at safety after placing stopgap starter Avonte Maddox on injured reserve this week. If Harper has to miss any time, the Lions would likely move Christian Izien back to safety after shifting the defensive back to nickel during training camp.
The next men up both arrived this week. The team poached rookie Bishop Fitzgerald off the Steelers practice squad and signed veteran Jalen Mills — who was briefly with the Lions last season — to their practice squad.
Pre-draft thoughts on signing
Regarding Fitzgerald, Campbell said the team was intrigued by the safety during the pre-draft process and had a draftable grade on the former USC standout who was a first-team All-American in 2025.
“He was somebody that really caught our eyes and we were kind of back and forth on him that whole draft process,” Campbell said. “…He's a football player and he's somebody that, he's got some versatility to him. We felt like he's got some range, can play top down, and he's intriguing to us. So those guys we always keep tabs on. If they were somebody we had a draftable grade on and they come available, let's get a look at them.”
Fitzgerald was initially signed by the Tennessee Titans as an undrafted free agent. He appeared in all three preseason games for that team, recording eight tackles and not allowing a completion on two targets. He also saw work with multiple special teams groups.
Fitzgerald will wear No. 34 in Detroit.
Unseen improvement and contributions
To different degrees, receivers Jameson Williams and Isaac TeSlaa haven’t had the start to the season many fans had hoped.
Regarding Williams, Montgomery said the disappointing details from the season opener were addressed with the player and things were much crisper against Buffalo, even if the speedster had a quiet day on the stat sheet in the 41-31 loss.
“If you go back and look at the tape in game two, there was a dramatic change in the things that he can control — his effort on the backside, depth of route, some of the things that he was much cleaner, his win percentage and his routes,” Montgomery said. “It's very hard for people to get an understanding of this, that we're looking at a lot of things.
“There's chances to win for a receiver in the run game, but there's also several chances for a receiver to win in the pass game,” Montgomery said. “There's the release point. We want to grade that win-loss. The stem, we want to grade that win-loss. The top of the route and then catch point. All of those things, what we saw in this last game, there was a trend up in those. When all of those things start to trend up, you start to play better.”
Montgomery acknowledged this is still a production game, so he understands that Williams needs to turn those wins into catches and yards, but noted there were several times the receiver was open as the second or third read in the progression, but an earlier read came open.
Montgomery noted that Williams’ previous success played a role in that because the team has noticed early opponents are doubling Amon-Ra St. Brown less often.
As for TeSlaa, he has just two catches for 26 yards through two weeks, despite playing more than 100 offensive snaps. Montgomery stated that’s the nature of the beast with all the offensive weapons this team deploys.
“Tes, his opportunities are going to be limited just because of how we're built as an offense,” Montgomery said. “…So what he's going to have to do is — all of his (targets) are going to be critical. They’re are going to be fourth downs, they’re going to be red zone, they’re going to be third downs. They’re going to be all those situations that the progression has worked all the way to him and he's going to have to make those plays, and we have to judge him off of those plays until we get everything rolling to a point to where we are equally distributing because of the coverage.”
That doesn’t mean TeSlaa isn’t contributing, even if it’s not showing up on the stat sheet.
Montgomery noted that TeSlaa’s effort shows up as much as anyone on the stat sheet, and his unique blend of size, power and speed are creating opportunities for teammates and taking some strain off St. Brown.
“What he's able to do for us is he can still stretch the field and he can block in the box, which those two kind of deals don't usually work together,” Montgomery said. “The outside receivers usually don't have the ability to go block the box. He gives us the ability now to take some of those shots off of Saint, use Saint in different situations.
“He can also clear down the middle of the field,” Montgomery continued. “He has short-area quickness in some of those tight spots to where he's a big body, he can make plays. We'll start to see more of it as we go forward, but he has a tremendous value on this team.”
Workload concerns
McNeill has played a whopping 149 defensive snaps through two weeks. I asked Campbell if he was concerned about the defender’s workload.
Not immediately, but long-term, yes, the team would like better balance.
“I think those first two games, man, you got the first one, you go into overtime, and then the second one's on a short week,” Campbell said. “And his backup right now is (Skyler Gill-Howard) Sky, a young player who's ascending. And so, the more he grows, the more he'll play.”
Rodgers said there’s a desire to get more people involved, but game situation sometimes alters the game plan, which was the case against Buffalo. However, the defensive line coach has been really impressed by how rapidly Gill-Howard is developing.
“We knew right away the athleticism,” Rodgers said. “This guy can really run. The athleticism, you want him on third down, chasing screens and stuff like that. But then his ability to consistently win one-on-one (showed up). Then, a couple times, we mixed in a couple of packages where he dropped (into coverage) late, and he was excellent matching underneath routes.
“So, you've got a guy that can really run, do a lot of things and give guards fits on third down,” Rodgers said. “The thing we're looking at, and just kind of talked about, we've got to get him more involved because he can really do some things to help us.”
Not falling into a trap
Since the schedule release, many circled Detroit’s Week 3 matchup, a home tilt against a Jets team that won three games in 2025, as an easy win.
Campbell was asked how he protects against that mentality in his locker room.
“Well, that's the good news, our players know exactly what's coming in here because the (former) defensive coordinator (Aaron Glenn) was here for five years and turn on the tape,” Campbell said.
The coach also expected an extra dose of motivation after the roster was embarrassed by Buffalo last week.
“This is not going to be a trap game. This is going to be a knockout, 60-minute brawl,” Campbell said. “It's going to go down and we've got to be on point. We can't beat ourselves and we've got to make the plays that are there and everybody's got to do their job. So no, I don't see that in our players. I can't imagine they see that.”
Campbell praised the job Glenn is doing in his second year with the Jets, noting that the team should be 2-0. Instead, the Jets coughed up a 10-point lead late and lost to the Packers in overtime on Sunday.
Coaching corrections
Detroit’s run defense was abysmal in Thursday’s loss to the Bills. Rodgers was quick to point the finger at himself for the leaky edge sets from the defensive front and the lack of technique displayed on repeated third-and-short conversions by Buffalo.
“I think I need to coach them better,” Rodgers said. “My honest evaluation, I thought we were too high. You know what I'm saying? There's things that we can fix. (I’m not going to say), ‘We’re not as big, we’re not as athletic.’ That wasn't it. Our technique was bad, and that reverts back to me. So if we just stay lower, I think we can get there.”
Rodgers said he neglected to emphasize leverage in short-yardage situations during the short week of preparation for the Bills.
When it comes to his unit repeatedly conceding edges against the run, Rodgers again highlighted a lack of discipline. In particular, he pointed to quarterback Josh Allen getting the corner on a second-and-15 after the defensive tackle lost his footing, blowing up the schematic design up front.
“You can't be on the ground in a rush,” Rodgers said. “It's like a corner can't fall down in man coverage. It's the same thing up front. …Our end got chipped, and we have a concept that we like to call a natural. If they chip our end and the three (tech defensive tackle) is higher than you, it turns into a natural twist. That's kind of what happened, but our tackle was on the ground. Now (Allen) is out the gate. That's on us, and we'll get it fixed.”
Arrow pointing up
Montgomery is two seasons removed from coaching the team’s running backs, but, as the assistant head coach, he’s involved in far more than just leading the receivers.
Asked what kind of trust the team has in the backup running backs behind Jahmyr Gibbs, Montgomery offered praise for early-season No. 2 option, Sione Vaki.
“I thought this was Sione Vaki’s best game, not just from running the football, but protection, viewing protection,” Montgomery said. “I thought he did a good job with his eyes in protection. But we also saw his ability on the check-down to catch it, knife, get us a big time 12, 13 yards there.
“We really felt good about him prior to this moment,” Montgomery said. “…With Jah where he is right now, when Sione does come in the game, he makes plays like he does, it gives us the ability to say, ‘Yeah, we feel like we do have a guy with him right now.’
Here is a NFL Network pre-draft interview of Bishop Fitzgerald: https://www.nfl.com/videos/usc-safety-bishop-fitzgerald-wakes-up-with-gmfb-17-days-ahead-of-2026-nfl-draft
You might think they were 2-0 and had outscored their opponents by 40 points, hearing those comments. Just coach-talk, I guess.