The Lions’ quarterback situation is good at the moment with Jared Goff as the team’s starter and Teddy Bridgewater as a high-level backup.
But the club picked Hendon Hooker in the third round of this year’s draft, knowing he’d be out for much of the season while recovering from a torn ACL suffered in what ended up as his last collegiate game at Tennessee last November.
Nearly a year removed from the injury, Hooker recently said he’s “probably about 90 percent.”
“I feel pretty good right now,” Hooker said, via Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press, adding he thinks it’ll be good whenever he returns to the field. “Whenever I’m on the field it’s going to be a surreal moment for sure, but I think that if I’m out there then it’s always good just to get reps whenever you can and every rep is valuable so any time that I do get to spend playing, it’s a blessing.”
But the Lions aren’t yet ready to have Hooker start practicing. He’s still on the reserve/non-football injury list and head coach Dan Campbell said this week that it’s not time to open Hooker’s 21-day practice window.
“We’re not there yet,” Campbell said Monday. “I mean, he’s getting better and we’ll make that decision when we feel like it’s ready to go, but we’ve certainly discussed him. The only way he’s going to get practice is if you put him on the roster, so we know that’s the obvious [choice], it’s just a matter of when we do it.”
We’ll see if and when Hooker makes it to practice. But given how Goff is playing and Bridgewater’s presence, there isn’t much urgency for the Lions to rush Hooker back.