2015 Pre-season Game 1: Detroit Lions vs New York Jets

The Detroit Lions won the first pre-season game 23-3 against the New York Jets. The Lions showed good depth and never looked "lost" like so many teams are prone to do early in the season (or pre-season if you will). Instead of breaking down the game I'm going to just mention some players who surprised me, for better or for worse.

I haven't seen enough of Orlovsky or Moore yet to determine which should be #2 (Stafford's backup)... or I should say, I didn't see enough good things from either to determine who should win the job. More time required for this one.

At RB I thought Ameer Abdullah looked great, Theo Riddick looked much better then previously, and Zack Zenner is ahead of George Winn, pretty much as I suspected he would be... it's just nice to see it actually playing out that way.

At TE I didn't see much after Pettigrew and Ebron so that race for #3 is still wide open, and Fauria may yet claim the job.

At WR I was surprised to see how well Greg Salas looked. I will need to see a continuation of this the next game to see if it was a fluke or not, but at the moment consider my eyebrows raised. T.J. Jones looked pretty good on kick returns but his route running isn't there yet. No one else really stood out to me this game but it's early yet.

On the OL the one who surprised me a little was the converted TE Michael Williams, they just might make an offensive tackle out of him yet. Good thing too, since no one else is claiming the RT job yet, though Lucas didn't do anything to lose it either. This may turn out to be a very competitive battle.

At DE no one really jumped out, though it appears Taylor is starting to "get it" as far as the new D is concerned. AT DT I thought Reid and surprisingly Cudjo looked pretty good. Cudjo should have earned more looks a little sooner in the game I believe, but we'll see if the coaches saw the same thing. Tyrunn Walker may want to get it in gear, sooner rather then later.

At LB Whitehead looks better then Van Noy or Tulloch, not that I want to see them go, depth at LB is a good thing.

The secondary looked ready to play, I see what the talk is about Diggs at nickel, he stood out in that role. That said, they all seemed to do okay at one time or another as the D overall held the Jets to just one field goal. In fact, it wasn't until quite late in the game that the 2nd converted 3rd down happened. This bodes well for those that didn't follow the doom-sayers when Suh left for way too much money... not that one game proves anything.

In summary, competition is ramping up especially at RT, RB, DT, and LB. A few of last year's 53 (or perhaps I should say the consensus 53 for this year) need to step it up as there are guys behind them who are getting ready to prove they deserve more playing time and that is quite unexpected, both to me as it is to those who may think they have their job locked in.