I spend most of my day on Lions Twitter because the Lions beat the writers at AtoZ Sports.One thing we’ve seen time and time again since November 29 is fans trying to come up with scenarios where Hendon Hooker could play for the Lions.
The latter is the idea that if the Lions lose to the Cowboys on Saturday and a few other things happen, the Lions will be locked into the third seed and have nothing to play for in Week 18. How about putting Hooker in the middle? ? About it. This will not happen. I can’t say I’m 100% sure, but I’m 99.9% sure Hendon Hooker won’t be playing football this season.
Reason: Training has just started.The Lions began Hooker’s 21-day clock on Nov. 29. This year alone he trained 13 times. That’s great. He had to train like an NFL player. He spent most of his time working. He is not with the doer or other people. I practice a lot and work with two teams. We need more time to find out what he does with this team. Reading a script and actually doing it are two different things.
The Lions weren’t sure if they would activate it.The Lions began a 21-day home run on November 29 and advanced to the finals. It has been activated since the 20th. Lions coach Dan Campbell wasn’t sure that would happen a week ago. “We want to hire him so we can work with him here. Otherwise you can’t do anything. But ultimately, I don’t think we can commit until we see what’s going on here and what parts are coming back.
The Lions considered placing him on injured reserve at the end of the season if they felt they needed additional cap space. In the end, they decided to release it a day before the clock ran out. It doesn’t seem like a situation where the team believes the player is ready to take the field for back-to-back starts. He hasn’t hit a ball in over a yearHooker’s last live football recording was played on November 19, 2022. That was over a year ago.
I agree he needs time on the field to get his feet wet, but Week 18 against a team that could still be in a playoff situation is not the place to do that. The right time and place to do that would be in training camp, when he would work with the team all summer and then play in three preseason games. What will change now? This makes sense to me as well. I understand that you really want to see him and I understand that it takes time. But what are we talking about here? Two soccer balls, so what? This is Week 18.
He would play a half or a quarter of a game of football and then go right back to the bench for the playoffs and never see the field again in the preseason. So why waste your time? There is no continuity there. You only need 2 semesters, 3 semesters, a week of camping, and not 3 semesters, just a few months. It makes more sense to wait. Teddy BridgewaterIf the Lions have Tim Boyle and David Blow as back-ups, they could try earlier. I still don’t think so, but it would be nice if there were. They do not have. There’s Teddy Bridgewater.
Arguably the best backup quarterback in the league. If anyone wants to play a few quarters of meaningless football, it’s him against his former team in the final regular season game of his career. Everyone, please be patient. I’m also curious what that person can do. The Lions won’t do that this year. August will be interesting. We’ll talk about that later.
