The biggest advantage the Lions have over the Rams in Week 1 and how it could help the Lions establish they've fixed a weakness from 2023
It's a new season for the Detroit Lions and with a new season comes a new weekly article series. Every week we'll go over the one big advantage the Lions have over their opponent and what could bring home the win that week. As far as Week 1 goes, this is the big advantage this […]
It's a new season for the Detroit Lions and with a new season comes a new weekly article series. Every week we'll go over the one big advantage the Lions have over their opponent and what could bring home the win that week. As far as Week 1 goes, this is the big advantage this week.
Rams offensive line is dealing with a lot
For a Lions team that's looking to go out and be a lot better at getting to the quarterback in 2024, this is a solid first opponent for them to go up against.
The Rams will be without their starting left tackle Alaric Jackson. He will be serving a two game suspension and therefore will be out. On top of that, the Rams might have another issue on the other side of the line with right tackle Rob Havenstein.
Havenstein has been dealing with an ankle injury this summer and there's no word yet on if he's going to play in this game. Havenstein did participate in practice on Wednesday, but it was in a limited capacity. Even if he did play, he's still dealing with an ankle injury.
Then you go to the interior of the line. Former Lions guard Jonah Jackson is now in L.A. In an interesting change, the Rams don't plan to play him at guard, they're moving him to center. A place he's never played in the NFL. Then they're moving second year center Steve Avila to guard. So there's going to be some growing pains on the interior.
By the way, there's some worry that Jackson's knowledge of the Lions playbook could help the Rams out in a big way. Lions head coach Dan Campbell has already talked about how the Lions have game planned for that and how it shouldn't be an issue.
With Alaric Jackson out, the Rams will go with Joe Noteboom. He's coming off a rough season in which he led the Rams in sacks allowed. If Havenstein doesn't play, the Rams' next guy up would be Warren McClendon Jr. This would be the third game of his career and his first start.
The Lions need to take advantage of this right away and get after Matthew Stafford early and often. If they can do that, they will win this game and start the season 1-0.
Final 2024 stat predictions for the Detroit Lions offense: Jared Goff has career season and Lions become first team since 2019 to do this…
Last July we sat down and took a look at the Detroit Lions offense and projected what the statistical outcome for most of the players would be. We came fairly close on some of the projections. Of course some players went over our projections. We're looking in the direction of Sam LaPorta and Jahmyr Gibbs on […]
