Sam Laporta: A Steady Presence in the Lions' Offense

Sam Laporta Remains Optimistic

Sam Laporta isn’t sweating his slow start. The second-year tight end has had a couple quiet performances on the stat sheet to begin the year after a hamstring injury kept him out a few weeks in training camp. LaPorta said this week his hamstring feels good, and he’s not worried about the limited production early on.

Looking Forward

“Only Week 3, so looking forward to a long, healthy season and a lot of wins,” LaPorta said.

The Lions have tried to be smart with LaPorta early in the season after he missed so much of training camp, and they’ll be looking for him to be a key component in this offense like he was last season when he caught 86 passes for 889 yards and 10 touchdowns.

• Creative Coaching Staff: “It’s great that we have a really creative offensive coordinator and the offensive coaching staff in general, so I know they're going to find ways to spread the ball around,” LaPorta noted.
• Contribution Over Targets: “Some games, targets might find you. Sometimes, they may not. If I can help contribute with a couple of catches, it’s great. If not and we still win, that's awesome.”

Red Zone Challenges

It feels like LaPorta could have been a bigger answer for some of the team’s woes in the red zone in the 20-16 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers Sunday. The Lions went 1-for-7 in the red zone against the Bucs. LaPorta had just one target on a pass into the end zone from quarterback Jared Goff on which the Bucs got flagged for roughing the passer. LaPorta only got one red-zone target, an incompletion, against the Rams Week 1.

“Coach Johnson, he said to blame himself,” LaPorta remarked.