Detroit Lions training camp injuries: Is "live" tackling worth the risk?

Analyzing Lions 2025 & 2024 camp injuries in light of the recent comments by Fred Warner

Fred Warner appeared on the St. Brown Podcast recently and had some very incisive thoughts about the Lions training camp practice philosophy…

St. Brown Podcast@StBrownPodcast

Fred Warner isn't a fan of the Lions' physical practice philosophy 🏈

10:59 PM · Jan 31, 2026 · 2.33K Views

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1 Reply · 2 Reposts · 15 Likes

The main takeaway of the discussion is that the Lions do “live” full tackling in training camp while the 49ers do not.

Increased physicality in practice certainly increases the risk of injury, but the question is how much? To help answer that question, let’s review the injuries of the past 2 training camps…

Lions 2025 training camp injury analysis

Here’s a review of some of the injuries the Lions had in 2025 training camp practices (not preseason games). The caveat is that there is very limited information on injuries during training camp (and generally no video) which makes it hard to accurately assess the cause of injury.

Most injuries were minor. Major, long-term injuries are in bold.

• Terrion Arnold - calf, hamstring

• Derrick Barnes - finger

• Graham Glasgow - left lower leg

• Ahmed Hassanein - leg

• Dan Jackson - leg, missed season

• Jamarco Jones - ankle, missed season

• Sam LaPorta - unspecified

• Dominic Lovett - abdomen

• Brodric Martin - foot

• Pat O’Connor - leg

• Tim Patrick - hamstring

• Ennis Rakestraw - shoulder injury & surgery, missed season

• Kye Robichaux - shoulder, missed season

• Sione Vaki - hamstring

Looking at the list, one key injury jumps out that is due to “live” tackling - Ennis Rakestraw’s shoulder. There were visual reports of Rakestraw going down during a tackling drill:

With the other players who had season-ending injuries (Jackson, Jones, Robichaux), it’s hard to say how much can be blamed on live tackling. None of them were projected to be key players, so the impact on the season was minimal.

There were other long-term injuries that occurred on preseason gamedays (Justin Herron - arm, Colby Sorsdal - leg, Kenny Yeboah - knee, Ahmed Hassanein - pec), and thus were unrelated to camp practices.

Lions 2024 training camp injury analysis

There were 2 major injuries that may have been related to “live” physicality:

• John Cominsky - MCL with surgery, missed season

• Emmanuel Moseley - pec rupture & surgery, missed about 4 months

BOTTOM LINE

Overall, there doesn’t seem to be a huge preponderance of acute, long-term injuries related to “live” tackling during training camp. But there may have been a few.

Does this mean the benefits of “live” tackling outweigh the risks? Maybe yes, but it’s certainly up for debate.

PROS of live tackling

• Increased player performance over the course of the season.

CONS of live tackling

• Increased possibility of losing a key player long-term.

• Possibility of accumulated trauma over time resulting in injuries later in the season.

Fortunately, no critical starters were lost in the past couple seasons due to camp practices. One key training camp injury that still sticks with me is the Mikel Leshoure Achilles rupture in 2011 which was caused by a hit or a tackle. Hopefully, we don’t see anything to that level of impact for a while.

Risk vs reward should be regularly revisited when it comes to practice methods. With Fred Warner’s revelation that there are teams that completely avoid live tackling in training camp, it’s worth it for the Lions to re-evaluate their philosophy.

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For more on the health concern levels of returning players like Ennis Rakestraw, see my story below…