Lions wide receivers Kenny Golladay (7) and Marvin Jones Jr. (6) have a combined 13 receiving touchdowns this season, tied for the most by an NFL tandem. Golladay has 640 receiving yards on 35 receptions. Jones has 40 catches for 535 yards.
"I ain't gonna lie, me and Marv compete with that type of stuff," Golladay said. "That just makes it fun, you know, even Danny (Amendola) gets in on it. Who gonna make the next play? That's just us inside the receiver room competing with each other and it makes us all get better."
Golladay and Jones have been a terrific complement to each other on the outside in Darrell Bevell's offense. It's tough for defenses to double both outside receivers when they have proven they can win one-on-one matchups more often than not.
"They're both big talented guys, move well, and obviously track the ball in the air really well – (they) go up and make good plays," quarterback Matthew Stafford said. "Marvin made a great catch last week, and then Kenny caught one, and then obviously ran with it afterwards and got it in the end zone. They both kind of do it their own unique way, but they're both making plays for us and we're obviously looking for as much of that as what we can."
Golladay and Jones are the first pair of Lions receivers since Terry Barr and Gail Cogdill in 1963 to have six-plus receiving touchdowns at the midway point of the season.
STAFFORD'S BACK
Stafford took a shot late in the Raiders game last week trying to scramble for a touchdown at the Oakland 8-yard line. He ended up sandwiched between defensive end Benson Mayowa and linebacker Nicholas Morrow.
Stafford showed up on Wednesday's practice report with a back injury, but he didn't seem too worried about it when we talked to him after practice.
"I'm fine," he said. "I'll be good to go. I'm not really worried about it."
He was limited in practice Thursday as well.
PROMISING PERFORMANCE
Defensive tackle Damon Harrison Sr. has played well below the level of play we saw last year and the year leading up to his trade from the New York Giants to Detroit midseason last year.
After recording 81 tackles in 17 games last year, Harrison has just 24 through eight games this season, but is coming off probably his best game of the season last week vs. the Raiders, when he had five solo tackles and six tackles total. Leading up to last week, Harrison had recorded two solo tackles in a game just once (Week 6 in Green Bay).
"Hopefully coming off that, we can build on the confidence part of that," Lions head coach Matt Patricia said of Harrison's performance. "He was able to kind of use some of the leverage, the strength, and some of the lower body, maybe things that he's been dealing with in a positive way. Hopefully we continue to build on that from that aspect of it and try to do it a little bit more."
"You definitely saw some of that strength back in his lower body ... his pad level, things like that that he was able to do. That was good to see."
