.png)
Updated: Sep. 06, 2022, 1:37 p.m.|
Published: Sep. 06, 2022, 1:33 p.m.
Detroit Lions offensive guard
Tommy Kraemer (78) plays against the Pittsburgh Steelers
during the second half of an NFL preseason football game, Saturday, Aug. 21,
2021, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Don Wright)AP
By Kyle Meinke
| kmeinke@mlive.com
ALLEN PARK -- The Detroit Lions have listed
Tommy Kraemer as their starting right guard for the season opener on Sunday
against the Philadelphia Eagles. He beat out Logan Stenberg for the job,
on paper at least.
The job opened
up this week when Halapoulivaati Vaitai was moved to injured reserve. The
injury is a blow for an offensive front that has been dealing with huge
expectations going back to last season, although left tackle Taylor Decker
suffered a long-term injury just days before that opener, Frank Ragnow suffered
a season-ender before Decker returned and the starting five never did play a
snap together.
A year later,
days before the opener, deja vu.
But one silver
lining to all the injuries is a lot of backups have acquired a lot of
experience heading into the 2022 season. In Kraemer’s case, he wound up starting three games as an
undrafted rookie last year, and played 238 offensive snaps overall. He played
pretty well too, allowing no sacks and just two hits on 125 pass blocks
according to ProFootballFocus.
“One of the
benefits of having some of the injuries we had is that Evan Brown gets a load,
(Matt) Nelson gets a load, Kraemer gets a load,” head coach Dan Campbell said
the other day. “Now you’re seeing those guys, they’re better players this year
than they were last year because they have a lot of experience under their
belt, a lot more for sure. You’ve got to have depth in this league to survive,
so that’s pretty good.”
Now before the
season has even kicked off, Detroit is already leaning on that depth once
again.
Elsewhere on
the depth chart, the Lions have listed Chris Board ahead of rookie Malcolm
Rodriguez at linebacker (a helpful reminder these things are very unofficial)
and Kalif Raymond is the starting kick/punt returner. Here’s a look at the rest
of it.
OFFENSE
WR: DJ Chark, Quintez Cephus
TE: T.J. Hockenson, Brock
Wright, Shane Zylstra
LT: Taylor Decker
LG: Jonah Jackson, Drew Forbes
C: Frank Ragnow, Evan Brown
RG: Tommy Kraemer, Logan Stenberg
RT: Penei Sewell, Matt Nelson
WR: Amon-Ra St. Brown, Kalif
Raymond
WR: Josh Reynolds
QB: Jared Goff, Nate Sudfeld
RB: D’Andre Swift, Jamaal Williams, Craig
Reynolds
DEFENSE
EDGE: Aidan Hutchinson, John Cominsky, Julian Okwara
DL: Michael Brockers, Levi Onwuzurike, Demetrius Taylor
DL: Alim McNeill, Isaiah Buggs,
Benito Jones
EDGE: Charles Harris, Austin Bryant
LB: Chris Board, Malcolm
Rodriguez, Josh Woods
LB: Alex Anzalone, Derrick
Barnes
CB: Amani Oruwariye, Bobby Price
CB: Jeff Okudah, Will Harris
SLOT: Mike Hughes, Chase Lucas
S: Tracy Walker, Ifeatu Melifonwu, Kerby
Joseph
S: DeShon Elliott, JuJu Hughes
SPECIAL TEAMS
K: Austin Seibert
H: Jack Fox
P: Jack Fox
LS: Scott Daly
PR: Kalif Raymond, Amon-Ra St.
Brown
KR: Kalif Raymond, Amon-Ra St. Brown
