Detroit Lions lose an OTA practice for violating offseason player work rules

The Detroit Lions have been docked a day of practice next week for violating NFL rules on offseason workouts.

The Lions were planning on using only nine of their 10 allotted organized team activity practices already, but on Friday evening they said they would forfeit Monday's practice as punishment for the violation, which occurred during the second week of OTAs held May 25-27.

"On Friday evening the organization was made aware by the NFL and NFLPA that Organized Team Activities (OTA) practices held the week of May 27 violated player work rules pertaining to on-field physical contact pursuant to the Collective Bargaining Agreement," the team said in a release. "As a result, the team’s OTA practice scheduled for Monday, June 10 has been forfeited. We take very seriously the rules set forth within the NFL’s Offseason Program and have worked to conduct our practices accordingly. We will continue to be vigilant with our practices moving forward."

An NFL Players Association representative attended the Lions' final day of mandatory minicamp Thursday. Linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin, the newly-elected NFLPA president, was expected to speak with reporters after practice but left the field before meeting with the media.

Lions coach Dan Campbell explained Tuesday why he only scheduled nine practices out of 10 allotted to teams during Phase 3 of the offseason program.

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The Lions were among 10 NFL teams who held minicamp last week, followed by a final week of OTAs. They excuse most veterans from the final week of spring practice, which limits the work they can do in their final OTAs.

"I think that we’ll do an offensive-defensive (day on Monday), we’ll do a special teams (day) on Tuesday and then we’re just going to have them work with (strength coaches) Mike Clark and (Josh) Schuler and those guys in the weight room, and so a lot of it is you can’t do full team," Campbell said. "If you’re going to cut most of the vets loose, then we don’t have enough. But we’ll still get good work, fundamentals, individual. It’s still a chance to develop.”

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The NFL offseason is separated into three phases of mostly voluntary work, with two weeks of strength and conditioning workouts in Phase 1, followed by three weeks of limited on-field work in Phase 2, and four weeks of pad-less practices in Phase 3.

Teams can only hold seven-on-seven and full-team periods during minicamp and organized team activities in Phase 3, and all offseason workouts except minicamp are voluntary.

The Lions' May 27 practice was open to reporters and included periods of 11-on-11 and seven-on-seven work. Several players got into a brief shoving match after the first play of full team drills.

It was not immediately clear how the Lions will tweak their Tuesday-Wednesday practice schedule to account for the lost work day.

Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on X and Instagram at @davebirkett.