Detroit Lions wide receiver Kenny Golladay‘s injury-plagued 2020 season is over and now the question shifts to whether or not he’ll be with the franchise in 2021.
Lions interim head coach Darrell Bevell ruled Golladay out of the team’s season finale against Minnesota — the wide receiver hasn’t played since Nov. 1 against Indianapolis — saying “I don’t think that will happen this week.”
Golladay finishes his season appearing in five games, making 20 catches for 338 yards and two touchdowns. This comes after a 2019 season where he made the Pro Bowl with 65 catches for 1,190 yards and an NFL-best 11 touchdowns.
The Lions had hoped Golladay would take another step into an elite class of receivers this fall. In August, Bevell said he hoped Golladay would eventually be thought of in the same level as Arizona’s DeAndre Hopkins and New Orleans’ Michael Thomas, “and those type of players where he really is dictating to the defense how they have to cover.”
But a nagging hip muscle injury kept him from the field for the second half of the season. Golladay also missed the first two weeks of the season with a hamstring injury.
The team’s third-round pick in 2017 had over 100 yards receiving in two of the four full games he played before leaving the Colts game on Nov. 1 with the hip injury at halftime after just 18 snaps and no catches on four targets.
“It’s a very hard season to assess what he was able to do,” Bevell said. He wasn’t about to be out there enough for us this year to really, I think, make those steps that I was hoping that he’d be able to make. So right now, obviously he’s not there.
“Does he have the ability to be there? I think he does, and obviously that’s what we’re looking for from him. But the most important thing for him is to get healthy, get his body right and then be able to handle the rigors of a 16-game plus season.”
The 27-year-old said earlier this month he would rather get a long-term deal done than be franchise-tagged by the Lions, although he knows he has no control over whether or not the team would decide to tag him.
Golladay said earlier this month he knew nothing could be done, contract-wise, until the Lions figure out what they are doing with the general manager and head coach, decisions that should come next month. He did reiterate he wants to be in Detroit — something he’s steadfastly said since conversations about his contract began last year.
“They drafted me here so I just want to show my loyalty,” Golladay said. “They believed in me and say if a contract, if it doesn’t work out, it doesn’t work out, you know. Then I go somewhere else and just ball out and play. “But I’m a loyal person and of course I want to be here. I started my career here.”
Bevell wasn’t as fast to rule out quarterback Matthew Stafford for Sunday even though the quarterback did not practice Wednesday and would not practice Thursday with right thumb, ankle and hip injuries. Bevell said he would like to see Stafford take some practice reps this week but even that wouldn’t rule him out of the season finale.
“You’re going to have to convince me a lot that this guy is not going to go. He’s as tough as they come, tough as nails. He wants to be out there,” Bevell said. “I think, really, those two things are probably the most important. If the guy wants to — I always say this, I always say that your mind is a powerful thing. You can do a lot if you just believe in that. The guy wants it.
“There’s not a doubt in my mind that he won’t make it happen, but obviously, we’re going to continue to go through the week and see how it goes.”