Tag: Denzel Mims

17 WRs the Vikings can sign with Justin Jefferson on IR

The Vikings need to add a veteran wide receiver and there are plenty of options in free agency and on practice squads

The Minnesota Vikings were dealt a crushing blow on Tuesday when they placed wide receiver Justin Jefferson on injured reserve.

Sitting at 1-4, the Vikings are in an odd spot. They have played much better than their record, but a -9 turnover differential has been a major factor in their lack of success.

Without Jefferson, that will change how defenses will approach the Vikings. They will be able to play more aggressive coverages without Jefferson on the field.

The likes of Jordan Addison and K.J. Osborn will need to step up and T.J. Hockenson is going to become the top option for the Vikings. They will need to add a wide receiver to the roster to fill Jefferson’s roster spot and there are 17 intriguing candidates.

Steelers sign a pair of ex-Lions to their practice squad

The Pittsburgh Steelers sign a pair of ex-Lions to their practice squad for Week 5

Two players who spent the summer and preseason with the Detroit Lions have found a new home. Wide receiver Denzel Mims and offensive tackle Obinna Eze are now members of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Pittsburgh signed both ex-Lions to their practice squad on Tuesday.

Eze spent all of 2022 with the Lions as an undrafted rookie from TCU. He did not make the final roster cutdown and has remained unsigned since.

Mims was acquired by the Lions in an offseason trade with the New York Jets. He suffered a lower leg injury in training camp and was waived with injury designation. After going unclaimed on waivers, Mims took an injury settlement from the Lions.

Denzel Mims takes an injury settlement and gets waived from the Lions I.R.

Mims reverted to the Lions I.R. when no other team claimed him off waivers

The last vestiges of the brief Denzel Mims tenure in Detroit are now all gone. The veteran receiver reached an injury settlement with the veteran wideout and waived Mims from the injured reserve list.

Mims reverted to the I.R. on Sunday after being waived by the Lions with an injury designation. No other team claimed Mims, who is dealing with a lower leg injury suffered on August 5th in a practice collision with teammate Tracy Walker.

Mims is now free to sign with another team. He is not eligible to re-sign with the Lions until after the terms of the injury settlement, which is typically four weeks but has not been specified. The Lions did bring S C.J. Moore back last season after an injury settlement, but that is not common.

[lawrence-related id=94606]

The Lions no longer owe the Jets any draft picks for Denzel Mims

The Lions will keep their own 2025 6th-rounder and the Jets hold onto their 7th-rounder that year now that Mims is waived

The Denzel Mims experiment ended earlier than hoped for both the Detroit Lions and the fledgling NFL receiver himself. The Lions waived Mims on Friday with a waived/injured designation.

Mims had not practiced in two weeks since suffering a leg injury in a practice-time collision with teammate Tracy Walker on August 5th. He had been working primarily at that point with the second-team offense, with mixed results. Mims had been emerging as a potential special teams asset, however.

Now that Mims is gone, so is the conditional draft pick that the Lions agreed to send to the Jets in the trade for the 2020 second-round pick earlier this summer. The Lions and Jets effectively canceled the trade, which involved a late-round pick swap in the 2025 draft. Both picks involved were conditional, based upon Mims making the Lions initial 53-man roster.

Mims is subject to waiver claims, though that seems unlikely given his injured status. If he goes unclaimed, the wideout reverts to the Lions’ injured reserve, with a five-day window to reach any potential injury settlement.

Lions to waive WR Denzel Mims and sign WR Jason Moore

Lions to waive WR Denzel Mims and sign former Chargers WR Jason Moore

Denzel Mims, we hardly knew ye…

The Lions are waiving Mims a day after Detroit head coach Dan Campbell hinted that a move was in order with the injured wideout. Mims had not practiced since leaving the field on August 5th with an ankle injury.

Acquired via trade with the New York Jets earlier this summer, Mims never suited up for the Lions beyond a handful of early training camp practices. The former Jets second-rounder is still dealing with the ankle injury.

Aaron Wilson of KPRC reports that the Lions already have the Mims replacement ready to roll. Per Wilson, the team is signing former Chargers wideout Jason Moore. The 28-year-old Moore has spent most of the last four seasons on the Chargers practice squad. He played collegiately at D-II Findlay.

Lions waive/injure WR Denzel Mims, Jets won’t receive 2025 pick

Mims’ time with Detroit is already over.

The Lions are moving on from wide receiver Denzel Mims after just a few weeks. The team is releasing the former Jet with an injury designation, per Ian Rapoport. A practice ankle injury led to a calf injury during rehab for Mims.

As a result of the Lions cutting Mims, the Jets will not receive a 2025 draft pick from the Lions. The condition for the pick to convey to the Jets was that Mims had to make the 53-man roster. That will obviously not happen now, so Detroit will keep their pick.

Mims reportedly was impressing during camp and seemed to have a shot to make the roster. The Lions could release him with an injury settlement and he could land elsewhere. For now, he’s done with the Lions and the Jets won’t get their pick down the line.

Lions WR Denzel Mims remains out, his Detroit future uncertain

Lions WR Denzel Mims remains out with a leg injury and his Detroit future uncertain after Dan Campbell’s comments before practice

It’s been 12 days since we’ve seen wide receiver Denzel Mims on the Detroit Lions practice field. Mims got hurt in a friendly-fire practice collision with safety Tracy Walker on August 5th and has not been seen since.

It’s a disappointing development for the Lions and Mims, who the team traded for earlier this offseason. Based on what Lions head coach Dan Campbell said before Thursday’s practice, it might already be the end of the line for Mims in Detroit.

In his pre-practice press conference, Campbell was asked directly about Mims. But immediately before the inquisition on Mims, Campbell was asked if the team was looking to bring in any wide receiver help.

Campbell’s response,

“We’re kind of in that a little bit. We potentially may need to add somebody after today. We’re looking into that … to do that, you have to move on from somebody.”

It’s an important pretext for the answer and the tone Campbell gave when talking about Mims.

“He’s in the room,” Campbell blankly said of Mims.

When asked if Mims was close to returning, Campbell responded,

“We’ll see. Wish I could give you more.”

With Jameson Williams likely out for the preseason and Amon-Ra St. Brown hobbled with an ankle injury suffered in Wednesday’s practice, the Lions have a shortage of bodies at the position. Mims had been working as Williams’ primary backup in the early part of training camp, but that has been derailed with the unspecified leg injury.

It is extremely difficult to not read between the lines Campbell drew on Mims, though the coach did not directly or overtly indicate that Mims’ status with the team was in peril.

 

Lions training camp notebook: 1st day of joint practice with the Giants

Breaking down the notes and noteworthy news from the Detroit Lions first joint practice session with the New York Giants

Tuesday morning brought the New York Giants to the Detroit Lions training facility in Allen Park for the first of two scheduled joint practices between the two teams. As promised by Lions head coach Dan Campbell, it was a good situation for Detroit to go against guys in other jerseys for a change.

Here’s some of what stood out from the first joint practice session on Tuesday, August 8th.

 

 

Will Detroit Lions WR Denzel Mims make an impact in fantasy football?

Mims was acquired recently by Detroit, but does it even matter?

An argument can be made that Detroit Lions wide receiver Denzel Mims has been as big a victim of circumstance as a second-round bust from the 2020 draft. To sum up his three years with the New York Jets is brief. He missed the first six games of his career. In his first six games with then-heralded Jets savior Sam Darnold, he caught 19 passes for 325 yards and had at least one catch of 23 or more yards in five of them. When the Jets moved on to Zach Wilson in 2021, in his final six games, Mims was targeted nine times and caught just one of them for four yards. Last season, he played in just 10 games – because he was inactive seven times and caught 11 passes in the 10 he played. It seemed clear he wasn’t a good fit with what the Jets wanted to do.

Make no mistake. Mims isn’t a bum. He has legit 4.38 speed, but the Jets have proved organizationally willing to move on from first-round quarterbacks quicker than most – much less second-round receivers. Loyalty is in short supply with the Jets.

The window of opportunity for Mims was minimal at the end of last season and made worse with the signing of Aaron Rodgers and the arrival of his running buddies Allen Lazard and Randall Cobb to go along with significant franchise investments made in Corey Davis and Garrett Wilson. It was time for Mims to go. He was the WR5, at best, in New York.

[lawrence-related id=479541]

His release was eventual, but the Lions saw enough in him to offer a minimal trade deal – a conditional sixth-round pick in 2025 for a seventh-round pick from the Jets in 2025. If Mims doesn’t make the 53-man roster in 2023, the deal is off and everybody walks away.

In the NFL, once a guy leaves the team facility, those who kept quiet start talking. Mims isn’t immune. The word from Florham Park was that Mims struggled to pick up the offense at an elemental level. He comes to the Lions with a clean slate to prove himself and show he can make an impact.

Fantasy football impact

If Mims wants to reclaim his career, the best thing he has going for him is a Lions offense that is going to throw 600 times or more this season. The suspension of Jameson Williams for the first six games of the season will be critical for Mims to make an impression beyond being a core special teams player.

In terms of fantasy value, Mims will be drafted by friends and relatives only. That said, he is a player to watch – the Lions open the 2023 season in the Thursday opener. Depending on what you see in snap counts and production, he could be the first roster pickup in your league, but having never shown any semblance of sustainability, he doesn’t have fantasy value until he’s shown it. He’s a reactive fantasy commodity, not a proactive one.

Lions sign wide receiver Trey Quinn, waive Tom Kennedy

The Detroit Lions sign wide receiver Trey Quinn, waive WR Tom Kennedy

The Detroit Lions waived wide receiver Tom Kennedy, the team announced on Friday. Kennedy was waived with injury status. To replace Kennedy on the roster, the team signed wide receiver Trey Quinn.

Coming out of SMU for the 2018 NFL Draft, Quinn was a 6’0″ and 203 pound receiver that ran the 40-yard dash in 4.55 seconds and had a 3-cone drill of 6.91 seconds. He originally played football at LSU before transferring to SMU.

When going through the draft process, there was speculation that he could be a 4th or 5th round pick in the 2018 NFL Draft. However, he ended up being the Draft’s Mr. Irrelevant as the last pick after he was selected by Washington.

Quinn ended up playing two seasons with Washington before being waived in September of 2020. During that time, he recorded 35 receptions for 273 yards and two touchdowns.

After being put on waivers, he was signed to the Jacksonville Jaguars practice squad. As his practice squad contract expired, he ended up in Las Vegas before being placed on injured reserve.

Since then, he has had a brief stint with the Denver Broncos and ended up being a key contributor at receiver for the Michigan Panthers this spring in the USFL. For the Panthers, he ended up posting 37 receptions for 438 yards and four touchdowns.

As the Lions continue to look for depth at wide receiver, Quinn will look to make the teams 53-man roster. Players such as Marvin Jones and Jameson Williams not practicing due to injury and being on the NFI list will give Quinn the opportunity to compete.