The 5 Lions I was dead wrong about this offseason and the three I refuse to back down on
Some of my summer takes died almost immediately, a few took until roster cuts, and there are still three I’m absolutely not ready to surrender.
Detroit Lions training camp is over, the 53-man roster is set, and the 2026 NFL season is here. Before the real fun begins, it’s time to eat some crow. Every summer, there are players you think won’t make it, guys you’re convinced the Lions will move on from, and then camp happens and you realize you were dead wrong. Let’s break it down.
Sione Vaki
This one feels obvious at this point. I thought the injuries meant more than they really did. Vaki is coming off two consecutive years where he dealt with injuries, and I had it in my mind that if he got hurt again at camp, that would be his undoing. The words “injury-prone” started getting thrown around, and I over-exaggerated it. I really did.
What that did was cause me to ignore all the good signs. Dan Campbell kept talking about how important Vaki is on special teams. I was seeing him do things in practice with the first team as a running back. But I just had it in my head that the Lions were going to say no because of the injury history.
The truth is the injuries were minor. The broken nose and the punched-in eye were a total freak occurrence. The back spasm that kept him out of the Commanders game? The Lions held him out of that game. He wanted to play. I kind of jumped to the conclusion that he was hurt again, but Detroit was just being cautious. Now, with Isiah Pacheco out for an undetermined amount of time, Vaki is about to have the biggest opportunity of his career. Between him and Jacob Saylors, one of those two is going to take the lead on that running back 2 job. I’m not saying he’s going to be a Pro Bowler, but I think he can absolutely show his worth. I’m intrigued to see what that looks like.
Brock Wright
I got in my own head on this one because of the money. I looked at it like the Lions want to do more tight end-heavy formations, and you’d think they’d want two receiving tight ends on the field. Brock Wright can catch the ball, but Tyler Conklin has been the more receiver-forward tight end. Then Jackson Meeks entered the picture as a hybrid option, and I started wondering whether the Lions would feel like Conklin and Meeks were more important than Wright. At the very least, I thought Conklin would be the tight end 2, and Wright was making a lot of money for a tight end 3. Maybe the Lions would just want to get out of that.
Once camp started, this one ended fast. It became incredibly apparent that the Lions love Brock Wright and have no intention of moving on from him. At all. So yeah, I was wrong.
Ennis Rakestraw
I’m not fully out on this one yet. I’m not fully willing to say I was wrong about this player. But I jumped the gun when I wrote that article saying he was done. His training camp was wildly inconsistent. One week he looked unbelievable, and I remember thinking he might beat out Rock Ya-Sin. The next week it was like he wasn’t even out there. Then he picked up minor injuries in the first preseason game and again at practice.
I think I underestimated the amount of hope the Lions have for Rakestraw and the potential they see in him. He’s only played eight games. That’s because he was hurt, but the flip side is that of course he still looks up and down. He’s technically, in the very smallest sense, like a rookie out there. Maybe I should give him more time.
Eric O’Neill
I never said O’Neill was bad. My thought process was that he’s a rookie, and I valued who can help you right now over long-term upside. I thought the Lions would too. Detroit has a great defensive line with 11 guys on the roster, and O’Neill is probably the 11th. But they felt good enough about him to keep him on the 53. Then Campbell talked on Monday about how fans might see more of O’Neill than they think, maybe on some pass-rushing downs beyond special teams.
I figured the Lions would stash him on the practice squad and build him up for 2027. That’s not how they feel. At the same time, we’ve seen Detroit do this before, where they’ll keep a player on the 53 all year and you barely see him. Maybe they were worried another team would claim him off waivers. You saw the Erick Hunter situation, where the Lions released him, probably had plans to bring him back to the practice squad, but the Patriots gave him a shot at the 53-man roster and he took it. I would have done the same thing.
Miles Frazier
At one point this offseason, I thought Frazier could beat out Christian Mahogany, Ben Bartch, and the rest to win the starting left guard job. When training camp started, it became evident that’s not possible right now. I’m not telling you Frazier is a bust or a lost cause. I’m telling you he is not ready. He has a ways to go and needs more reps.
That makes a ton of sense because his rookie year he didn’t get to participate in training camp. We didn’t see him until later in the season when the Lions were dealing with a bunch of offensive line injuries and had no other choice. He survived, but I think we maybe overhyped the little amount he was able to do with that limited practice and no experience. The Lions repped him at both guard and tackle this summer and saw some dividends at tackle. There’s a good shot that come 2027, Larry Borom isn’t on the team anymore and Frazier is your swing tackle. That might be the Lions’ hope.
The things I don’t think I’m wrong about
I don’t think I’m wrong about Josh Dobbs. I believe the Lions are going to bring in another quarterback to compete with him at some point. All summer we barely saw him practice. He was repping third team. Luke Altmyer was repping higher than him all summer. There were practices I attended where Altmyer was taking 95% of the reps and Dobbs would come in for the other 5%. I do not think the Lions feel they are set at QB2 just because Dobbs had a good third preseason game.
I also don’t think I’m wrong about Jackson Meeks. By the end of this season, you are going to look at Meeks and say this guy is invaluable. He’s not going to get 500 yards or 1,000 yards, but he is going to participate more in this offense, and you’re going to see it.
And I was not wrong about Greg Dortch. There is this weird reaction where Amon-Ra St. Brown goes on a podcast and mentions that Dortch was initially wowed by Lions practices, then came along and bought into it. Somehow people took that as St. Brown saying Dortch wasn’t a culture fit. I don’t know what you guys are talking about. That guy never complained about anything. I watched him block all summer. I watched him get hit all summer. He was repping as the No. 1 kick returner, No. 1 punt returner, and with the first team as a receiver. I don’t know why the Lions cut him, but I don’t think it’s because of something St. Brown said on a podcast. It’s the most shocking cut I’ve ever seen this team make, and it wasn’t just me. Everybody on the beat was trying to figure it out. Even Dortch was like, “I don’t know what I did.”
My thought process is this: I think the Lions look at Meeks as a hybrid receiver-tight end who can play both spots, making him technically a wide receiver 5. I think they look at Vaki as a guy who can function as a receiver too, making him technically a wide receiver 6. That might be what Detroit is thinking. But there was nothing about this summer that led you to believe Dortch was going to be cut and they were going to go this route. Nothing at all.
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