LIONS HEAD COACH DAN CAMPBELL TRAINING CAMP DAY 5 QUOTE SHEET
July 25, 2025
Opening Statement: “Alright, first day of pads, so we’re excited, the guys are ready to roll. This is where the real evaluation takes place, so it’s kind of been building to this, getting their bodies ready for this, and now we go. So, this is where you find out who is who. This is how the game is played and it is played in pads. So, we’re excited, staff is excited, players are excited, ready to roll.”
On what went into his decision to move Lions OL Graham Glasgow to center and Lions OL Tate Ratledge to right guard yesterday and if the two will flip flop during training camp: “Well, I guess in training camp it’s like dog years, right? So three days ends up, really one day is like three days I guess. No, just, when you get the day off, you have the ability to kind of sit back, look at it all, think about it. And then it’s like, ‘You know what? Why don’t we – let’s just go ahead and throw Graham back in there at center and get Tate some of these guard reps. We’re still going to work him at center, but let’s go ahead and do this and see what this looks like for a little bit. We go into pads.’ And so, like I said, we’re just seeing what we can find. What’s the best combination? Who’s going to play best where? And so Graham’s, I mean Tate will get some center reps. He can go back inside on some stuff.”
On his impressions of how Lions OL Christian Mahogany is fitting in with the offensive line starters: “He’s promising. I go back to this is year two for him. He really didn’t get a camp last year, he was coming off of the illness that he had and so had to make up a lot of ground and he did to his credit. But really, from spring and then even now going into pads – this will suit him well now. It’s like anybody else, he needs to clean up a few things – four days – but the physicality is going to be there, that’s what we know about Mahogany. It’ll show up today. So, I like where he’s at, he’s a young player that’s contending to ascend and this whole camp’s going to be great for him. He’s doing a good job.”
On what he thinks of how aggressive the guys have been without pads and if he agrees with Lions S Kerby Joseph’s statement that he would rather the guys be aggressive than have to get the energy up: “Yeah, well I think that’s accurate. You’d rather pull back than you would have to constantly prod and try to push and, ‘We need more.’ It’s a heck of a lot easier to do that. Man, I love the way our team practices, the intensity, the competition, locking in when things get hard, but we’re not here to fight because ultimately you waste so much time. We’re under the clock and if you’re going to spend 10, 15 minutes trying to break fights up, you’re getting nothing done. It’s just a waste of time, that’s all. Things are going to happen, we’ve got competitive guys, but I think the pads will clean a lot of that up too.”
On an injury update for Lions CB Terrion Arnold: “Good. He’ll be out there today.”
On how the new class of rookies have been meshing with the team culture: “It’s early. There’s nothing that has got my antenna up or my alarm on with any of those guys. We drafted them for a reason. But, there again, they’re only a few days in, so maybe ask in about a week, week and a half. We’ll see where that is. We’ll have a lot better feeling of where they are. But, they’re all doing a good job right now.”
On an injury update for Lions LB Derrick Barnes: “Yeah, he’ll be out there. Just a finger.”
On how he views Lions LB Alex Anzalone’s importance to the team: “Yeah, so look. You guys know how I feel about Alex, how we feel about Alex. He’s one of our dudes, man, we’ve leaned on him, he’s a productive player. We’re good, still talking. There’s no animosity here, there’s nothing like that, so I’m not going to go into anything else outside of that. But, just, we’re going to be good. We’re going to be good. And yes, we’re going to need him.”
On if he is looking to add somebody else to the pass rush: “Just worried about evaluating the guys we got here right now. We’ve got a good crop of guys in here, young players. We’re about to go see what we can pull out of them, see what we can develop, see what comes from it and we’ll take it from there. As you know, the evaluation process is never done. I mean, there’s so many things out there. You’ve got the other 32 teams, they’ve got whatever, 90 on their roster. And so, not only do we evaluate ours, I mean, (Lions Executive Vice President and General Manager) Brad (Holmes) has got, he’s looking at all these other rosters. And you’re predicting, ‘What about this guy? Could something happen here? How does he match up with what we have here?’ And so you’re always looking to, ‘Man, how do we bring in more competition?’ But, as far as where we’re at right now, we’re good. Let’s just go compete.”
On what it is like to experience watching guys he drafted five years ago grow and start families: “It’s just flown. It’s crazy, it really is. It’s awesome. It’s a good feeling to see that, to watch these guys just grow and mature and now here they go. The young families and they’re just starting their life. Really, I mean they’re just starting their life. And to know where they’ve come from and then you realize how old you are and it just happens fast. It really does. But, I’m happy for all those guys. I love our dudes, man.”
On how he views where Lions S Erick Hallett II could play on the defense: “Well, one of the reasons we like Hallett is because he can play multiple roles. He’s a little bit in that niche of (Lions DL) Pat O’Connor who can do so many different jobs. Hallett can play the nickel, we can put him outside, play some corner, he’s playing safety, certainly moving him around on special teams. There’s just a lot of jobs he can do and there’s always going to be value in that.”
On how impressed he has been with how Lions CB Terrion Arnold has matured: “Well he’s where I would expect him to be going into year two after four days. You expected another level of confidence, of maturity and ownership, really, accountability. That’s what you feel right now at this point, which is exactly what we wanted to feel, so like where he’s at going into pads.”
On whether or not he would be open to the NFL adopting the UFL as a farm system: “Well, look, certainly, I don’t make those decisions. Nobody cares what I think about that. I think it would be great. I go back to – NFL Europe was awesome, back in the day, because that was a chance to really develop guys. But I still feel like there’s a part of it that really is that. I mean there’s – we’ve gotten a couple of players out of there now and I know other teams have. Because you get to see them, man they’re playing in the spring, so they’re in shape, they’re just coming off of running around, being football ready and so that’s enticing to us too. It’s like, man, if you need a guy, at least you know you’ve got evidence right there versus somebody that’s been home for three months. Yeah, they can say they’re working out, but you don’t know. It’s not football working out, like these guys are. So it’s still a little bit of that way, you do feel like you see some of these guys develop and maybe got a chance to pluck them and bring them in.”
On Lions LB Jack Campbell’s mental maturation: “Look he was, when he came in, he was pretty good. He was one of these guys that was a little bit ahead of everything mentally and now to see where his growth is, it’s impressive. He’s done an outstanding job. He’s got a good feel of the game, he understands the game, he knows what we’re trying to do defensively, he did with (former Lions Defensive Coordinator Aaron Glenn) AG and even more so now with (Lions Defensive Coordinator Kelvin Sheppard) Shep. And so with that, we’re going to give him a lot more, he and (Lions LB) Alex (Anzalone) both. A lot more flexibility to get us into the play because he also studies. He studies the opponent, he’s studying our offense and he’s trying to get any little key that he can and that just makes us better. So he’s, look, it’s one of the reasons we drafted him, is for that. Some of these teams that have this – some of these MIKE linebackers you think of that, man, they’re running, hitting and smart as a whip and that’s why we like Jack.”
On if seeing the chess match between Lions LB Jack Campbell and Lions QB Jared Goff is one of the more enjoyable parts of practice: “Yeah. It is. It is fun. It is fun to watch. You watch both sides go back and forth and then if something happens day one, whether it didn’t happen at the end of practice, you figured it out and were able to answer back, it’s going to happen in the afternoon practice or the next day’s practice where somebody’s going to adjust. Defense got you, offense has got to adjust, so it is good. And then, I’ve said this before, that’s how you get better. You just continue to raise the floor. Everybody gets better and better and better. And then, pretty soon when you do enough of it, your weaknesses begin to go away on both sides of the ball.”
