The Detroit Lions definitely have some question marks when it comes to their wide receiver corps. ahead of the 2024 season.
The Lions lost their No. 2 receiver from last season in Josh Reynolds, who is now in Denver, and that means they're going to need more out of third-year wideout, Jameson Williams, who the jury is still very much out on him.
Beyond Williams, Kalif Raymond is slated to be the No. 3 receiver and the most proven guys behind him are Donovan Peoples-Jones and Tre'Quan Smith, neither of whom exactly instill confidence.
When asked about the receivers room on Thursday, general manager Brad Holmes said he's content with what Detroit has and expressed confidence in Williams.
“We feel good about the group that we have,” Holmes said. “We have Jameson Williams, that’s been coming on very, very strong. We have high hopes for him. We like where he’s at, at this point. We know that he’s going to continue to get better.”
Holmes also expressed confidence in Peoples-Jones and said he's excited about Antoine Green.
“He was a big-time core player for the Cleveland Browns before we traded for him,” Holmes said. “But we traded for him and the guy comes in late (in the season) and he doesn’t really know the offense. So then you hadn’t really seen Peoples-Jones. We all kinda get into the recency bias of, “What’s Peoples-Jones gonna do?’ No, Peoples-Jones can play. He does provide an element of being able to play on the outside and be a contested-catch guy, being able to do multiple things.”
“We’re really excited about Antoine Green, about how he’s came along,” Holmes added. “He’s another guy that has size, he has speed. He’s a guy that kept getting better and better and better from what we’ve seen throughout the year. I know he didn’t get a ton of targets in games for the world to see, but us being internally with him every single day throughout the season, we really like where he’s going.”
Despite saying all that, Holmes isn't ruling out the Lions adding someone else.
“That’s not saying that we won’t add," Holmes said. "That’s a position that — especially when you get into camp — those guys put a lot of yardage on the field. So you always gotta at some point, you need to add a guy here or there when some attrition comes.”
What separates the Lions from a lot of teams that don't have the strongest receiving corps. is that they have a star tight end in Sam LaPorta, who proved to be a major impact pass-catcher in his first season.
But even still, the Lions can't take the wide receiver position lightly. Just one injury to an Amon-Ra St. Brown, LaPorta or Williams could spell problems for Detroit's passing attack.
