Jahmyr Gibbs fidgeted with the mostly empty Gatorade bottle in his right hand as he stood in the end zone talking to Jameson Williams and Amon-Ra St. Brown.
As a gaggle of return men took turns fielding kicks a few yards away, Gibbs, the biggest Detroit Lions star who has yet to receive a contract extension, spent the period passing time with the team’s top receivers who have.
Gibbs, wearing black Nike shorts and a sleeveless gray Lions hoodie pulled snug over his head, made his first public appearance at Lions training camp Sunday, Aug. 2 in Allen Park, but sat out his fourth straight practice as part of a “hold-in” while he waits for a new deal.
He watched practice with his teammates, spoke briefly after one period with running backs coach Tashard Choice, walked off the field alongside fellow running back Sione Vaki, then declined interview requests from reporters as he tried to slip through a back entrance to the team’s indoor facility.
“It’s good [to have him out here],” Williams said. “Cause he’s the best of the best and hopefully coming up we get to see my boy get something done, so he can be back out here with us in his jersey and stuff. I’m real excited for him. I know what he can do for us and I know what he can do for his self and his team. He’s a real great player, I think one of the best in this league.”
Williams, who signed a three-year, $83 million extension with the Lions last September, said Gibbs deserves to be the highest-paid running back in the NFL, but laughed when asked if he had any negotiating advice for the two-time 1,200-yard back.
“We probably in two different situations,” Williams said. “His is different. He’s like the best player in the NFL, so I don’t know.”
Gibbs led the Lions and finished seventh in the NFL with 1,223 yards rushing last season and added another 616 yards receiving while making his third straight Pro Bowl.
He’s set to make $3.183 million in base salary and bonuses this season, and is seeking a deal that will make him one of the highest-paid running backs in the NFL. Saquon Barkley currently holds that distinction at $20.6 million per season.
“I think it means a lot to him to come out here honestly,” said defensive tackle Alim McNeill, who signed a four-year, $97 million extension with the Lions in 2024. “I don’t really know per se what all is going on, but I know business’ll get done with Jahmyr and I’ll be glad to see him back out here. But yeah, I think it’s cool of him to be out here with the guys. He’s still doing everything, though, lifting, all with the meetings and everything. He’s just not doing this. So I know everything’ll be good and all that, so I’m not really worried about it.”
More observations from Sunday’s practice:
Lions injury news
Two Lions left practice Sunday – rookies Derrick Moore (groin) and Miles Kitselman (leg) – and the Lions held another handful of players out of team drills.
Rookie right tackle Blake Miller, an ironman at Clemson who missed two practices in his college career, went through position drills but sat out team work with a compression sleeve on his left leg. I don’t recall seeing Miller wear the sleeve in any of the Lions’ first three practices.
Larry Borom took first-team reps in Miller’s place but still worked as the team’s “muscle tight end” in six-lineman packages. Miles Frazier lined up at the traditional right tackle spot in those packages and got some right tackle work with the second-team offense and left tackle work with the third-team offense. Juice Scruggs took most of the first-team work at left guard with veteran Ben Bartch still not taking part in team drills as he recovers from ankle surgery. Christian Mahogany worked primarily with the second-team offense.
On defense, pass rusher Payton Turner missed his third straight practice with a back injury and new linebacker Devin White got time with second team.
Keith Abney has best showing
I thought the rookie defensive back had his best practice of camp.
A fifth-round pick out of Arizona State competing for playing time as a slot cornerback, Abney had two pass breakups in red-zone drills while playing with the third-team defense and another in one-on-one drills (though backup quarterback Teddy Bridgewater motioned for a pass interference penalty on the play).
On his first PBU in team drills, Abney showed as if he was playing man-to-man in the slot but dropped off his receiver to get a hand on a Luke Altmyer pass intended for ex-Michigan standout Tarik Black. On the second, Abney did a good job shadowing Tay Martin in coverage.
Abney said the first PBU came on a defense the Lions installed Saturday.
“I need to pick that,” Abney said. “That’s really the main thing. I’m still critiquing myself. I got to pick that play. It was a good play, but it’d be a great play if I can get the ball back so Jared Goff can go score. So that was pretty much it, but it was teach tape. That’s how our coach [drew] it up.”
Christian Izian, Roger McCreary and Ennis Rakestraw have all taken slot reps ahead of Abney this summer, but the rookie said he’s finally starting to feel comfortable in the defense and with the new terminology he’s learning.
“I feel like the first couple days, I caught myself trying to think too much and I really wasn’t like just letting the game come to me and having fun with it,” he said. “But today I just came out here, everything just came to me, things were just clicking, I feel like I was having fun out here and that’s when I play my best ball, so that’s pretty much what it was.”
OL vs DL: Who won the day?
The Lions had two periods of one-on-one pass rush and receiver-cornerback drills Sunday. I watched most of the pass rush drills and thought the offensive line got the better of the defensive front again. Penei Sewell and Aidan Hutchinson only worked in the second one-on-one period and split their reps. Sewell did a good job mirroring Hutchinson on his first snap, but Hutchinson got into Sewell’s chest and knocked him off balance on their second.
Second-year guard Tate Ratledge has quietly had a nice camp and had good reps Sunday against McNeill and Levi Onwuzurike, and I thought Frazier looked good at tackle in the first set of pass rush in reps against Anthony Lucas and Moore.
Moore got good push in his first rep against Colby Sorsdal at left tackle, then tried to spin off a good punch from Borom in the second rush period. I didn’t see Moore take another rep after that play.
I didn’t watch much of the receiver-cornerback drills, but D.J. Reed intercepted a Goff pass that Williams bobbled near the goal line, and Thomas Harper nearly came up with another pick but landed out of the back of the end zone on the catch.
Isaac TeSlaa yet to dazzle
TeSlaa has had a quiet camp so far and couldn’t come up with two would-be touchdowns in 11-on-11 red-zone work Sunday.
TeSlaa had one pass glance off his fingertips in the back of the end zone while being covered by Rock Ya-Sin and Avonte Maddox, and Ya-Sin knocked out of TeSlaa’s hands as he tried to bring it into his chest. Maybe it’s unfair to expect TeSlaa to make those types of contested catches all the time, but he hasn’t made many of them this summer after he dazzled in that department as a rookie last season.
The first-team defense kept the first-team offense out of the end zone in two sets of red-zone downs. On the first, Goff threw one way and Sam LaPorta broke the other on a choice route on third-and-goal from the 3, one play after Reed and Chuck Clark made a nice run stuff on Isiah Pacheco near the goal line.
On the second, Malcolm Rodriguez broke up a fourth-and-goal pass to LaPorta from 3 one play after Clark forced a throw-away with tight coverage on St. Brown.
Cedrick Wilson Jr. beat McCreary for a touchdown with the second-team offense and Bridgewater threw another TD after taking a timeout when he didn’t like what he saw from the defense. Anthony Firkser motioned himself wide open into the left flat for an easy score on the next play. Ahmed Hassanein made a nice read to slide down the line and stop a Jabari Small run in the same series, drawing praise from coaches.
Jared Goff leads winning drive
In the situational period, with the Lions offense down 24-23 and 4 minutes on the clock, Goff was 4 of 5 passing to lead a would-be winning field goal drive. He opened with a short pass to Brock Wright, and after Pacheco ran for a first down, the offense had to dig itself out of a second-and-15 following a false start on Scruggs. Williams caught a 20-yard comeback on Reed, when he dropped his hips and stopped on a dime to get separation down the hash. A short pass to St. Brown put the offense in field-goal range and Jake Bates drilled a 43-yarder to end practice.
Bates has been shaky from that distance through four practices. He missed two 43-yarders from the right hash going the same direction early in practice and pushed two more kicks wide right from the same distance in practice Thursday.
Dave Birkett covers the Lions for the Detroit Free Press. Contact him at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Bluesky, X and Instagram at @davebirkett.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Lions observations: Jahmyr Gibbs sits again, teammates say he should be top-paid RB
Reporting by Dave Birkett, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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By Dave Birkett, Detroit Free Press | USA TODAY Network
