NFC North Notes: Lions, Packers, Vikings

Lions

The Lions made a number of personnel moves on Thursday, according to Dave Birkett, including:

• Mark Stephenson – new director of player performance
• Joe Kelleher – moved from college scouting coordinator to pro scout
• Ron Miles – new college coordinator
• Eloy Ledesma – new BLESTO scout
• Steve Neal – area scout
• Roman Phifer – area scout
• Dylan Thompson – character coach/team development

Packers

Frank Bauer, the agent for Packers WR Davante Adams, explained that while his client took two “hellacious” hits last year, there are no long-term concerns for him moving forward.

“He called me after the first one and said, ‘Frank, I’m fine,‘” Bauer told Rob Demovsky of ESPN. “There’s no long-term concern. I’ve talked to Davante quite a bit, and we’ve had everything checked out.”

Adams suffered concussions on both plays but managed to return soon after.

“He took two hellacious hits,” Bauer said. “Hellacious. And he responded so fast to both.”

The Packers elected to shut Adams down towards the end of the season and later agreed to a new four-year, $58 million extension soon after.

“He wanted to play at the end of the season, but they wanted to protect him,” Bauer said. “That was really good for the long term. Green Bay is a classy organization that takes care of their athletes. They protected the kid, and that was great.”

Vikings

• Vikings HC Mike Zimmer referred to Sam Bradford’s knee as being “degenerative” before adding that Bradford was skiing last week. According to Zimmer, it remains to be seen whether Bradford could get through a full season. (Tom Pelissero)
• Regarding the team’s quarterback situation, Zimmer said that Case Keenum, Teddy Bridgewater, and Bradford are all “definitely” options for them.
• Zimmer also stressed multiple times he’s told GM Rick Spielman they need to be careful about taking resources away from their strength: defense. (Tom Pelissero)
• Zimmer said that RB Dalvin Cook (ACL) is going to be “pretty close” to being ready for OTAs and head trainer Eric Sugarman has mentioned that Cook will be as good as new and possibly better this year. (Tom Pelissero)
• Zimmer told reporters that “if we don’t pick the right QB, I’ll probably get fired.” (Gregg Rosenthal)
• According to Andrew Kramer, the word at the Combine is that the Vikings would like to re-sign DT Tom Johnson, but his role could be a sticking point.
• We have the three quarterbacks featured in our Top 100  – 2018 NFL Free Agents list.