By Mike Bonts, Florida Sports Wire
ALLEN PARK, MI – The Jacksonville Jaguars and Detroit Lions held their second of two joint practices Thursday. One focus of head coach Doug Pederson was to see the young guys in the secondary against Detroit’s top caliber receiving corps.
“We’ve got a lot of young secondary guys, taking away Tyson Campbell [CB Tyson Campbell] and Darious Williams [CB Darious Williams] the starters,” Pederson said. “Up front, we know how the big guys are going to compete, our offensive line against their D-line and vice-versa. Those are all things we want to see, but at the same time, we’re trying to get better. This is Week 2 of the preseason for both teams and we’re just trying to get better and improve.”
Detroit veteran defensive back C.J. Gardner-Johnson began the first team period against the Jaguars offense with an interception off QB Trevor Lawrence on a deep ball intended for Calvin Ridley.
Gardner-Johnson hit former Lion Jamal Agnew and jarred the ball loose. It was picked up by cornerback Cam Sutton and returned for a touchdown. Gardner-Johnson forced two fumbles during practice.
“Out here, you can kind of protect yourself a little bit but also get the work in, get a lot of plays, get a lot of different situations worked. That’s really good,” Lawrence said. “I thought it was a good week for us just situationally, going to another team, another defense, we’ve been seeing our defense all of camp. Going against another squad where we haven’t really seen some of their stuff and get to just work that. I think it’s been good for us.”
Jaguars’s second-year linebacker Devin Lloyd had a one-handed interception off Lions QB Jared Goff and a couple pass breakups.
“Yeah, I thought it was good. It was really competitive, I thought in both teams it was really competitive. We were battling and you love to see that. It got fiery and that’s what this game is about. It was cool to see and just to see that competitiveness come out of everybody, that was great,”added Lawrence. “Like I said, situationally it was great work, a lotto learn from. It was a lot of good and a lot of bad in the last two days. Just to watch the tape and to have this, it’s going to be really valuable for us and I’m sure for Detroit as well. It just does a lot of good.”
To end practice both offenses were given the scenario where the score was 10-10 with 1:18 left on the clock and the offense having one timeout in their pocket.
The Jaguars first-team offense was limited to a three-and-out in part to a first-down sack by defensive lineman Aidan Hutchinson. The Jaguars hit for a couple big plays in team periods on the first day, including a Lawrence to Ridley bomb down the right sideline.
Former Jacksonville wide receiver Marvin Jones, Jr. is now on the Lions and practiced against hsi old team.
“Marvin? Oh, man. I can’tsay enough great things about Marvin. What a great leader, helped us get into the postseason last yearand came up big a lot during the year,” Pederson said.”He’s well liked in the community. I know he’s been here andfitting in really well. I just wish him the best.”
Former Jacksonville kicker Riley Patterson connected a short field goal try as time expired to win the drill for the Lions’ offense.
(Photo by Jeff Nguyen/Detroit Lions)
