Raj Mehta-USA TODAY Sports
The yearly Madden game is soon to be released by EA Sports and the long time monopolized company is once again promising more than just another roster update. With Ratings Czar Donny Moore out at EA, they have reworked several of their calculations they use for player ratings and the results are…well…pretty bad. From what I’ve done into, Madden now uses a player’s 40 time and other measurables to calculate player speed, acceleration, etc. For the rookies and younger players, this change looks very good, with few negatives that I’ve found. The age component is where it all falls apart, which I’ll go a little more into. For now, let’s take a look at your Madden 2016 player ratings for the Detroit Lions!
Offensive Line
Not a lot of surprises from what was the worst unit for the team in 2014. Established starters Riley Reiff and Larry Warford see good scores, with the relative unknowns at the other positions looking like relative unknowns by their ratings.
| First Name | Last Name | Position | OVR |
| Riley | Reiff | LT | 82 |
| Laken | Tomlinson | LG | 74 |
| Travis | Swanson | C | 73 |
| Larry | Warford | RG | 87 |
| LaAdrian | Waddle | RT | 79 |
Of course these aren’t the only players, though. Let’s take a look at the whole unit:
| First Name | Last Name | Position | OVR |
| Larry | Warford | RG | 87 |
| Riley | Reiff | LT | 82 |
| Manny | Ramirez | LG | 79 |
| LaAdrian | Waddle | RT | 79 |
| Laken | Tomlinson | LG | 74 |
| Travis | Swanson | C | 73 |
| Taylor | Boggs | C | 67 |
| Braxston | Cave | C | 66 |
| Michael | Williams | RT | 66 |
| Cornelius | Lucas | LT | 65 |
| Darren | Keyton | C | 64 |
| Corey | Robinson | LT | 63 |
| Al | Bond | RG | 62 |
Next: Quarterbacks and Rushers