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He’s a bit of a forgotten entity for a lot of Lions fans, and certainly for national media pundits. However, the Lions themselves know the name Josh Paschal very well.
The second-year EDGE had a rough start to his Lions career. Coming off an injury that ended his college career at Kentucky, Pashcal then suffered a different injury during training camp that cost him half his rookie season.
Paschal came in and played the final half of his rookie season, and he showed glimpses of why Detroit valued him as a second-round pick in the 2022 NFL draft. In 10 games, starting four, Paschal registered 16 tackles, two sacks and two TFLs.
Throughout the offseason, the Lions have quietly set expectations pretty high for Paschal in his second season. Defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn made those aspirations for No. 93 public this week.
Here’s what Glenn said about Paschal prior to Thursday’s OTA session:
“I mean this is a guy, when you think about his path, like he really didn’t get a chance to have an OTA last year because he was injured. He really didn’t have much of a training camp because he was injured. I think he only played eight games, if I’m correct. So, we’re expecting that player to be the player that we drafted in the second round and actually end up improving because he’s had this time to be in the training room to work with our strength staff, to work with our coach and understand exactly what we need out of him, so absolutely I feel like this player is going to be a good player for us.”
Expect to see Paschal get every chance to keep the starting job he held down the stretch last season, a period which coincided with the team playing much better defense.