After a very short stay, the Detroit Lions released tight end Jordan Thomas on Wednesday.
In their run of players signed to reserve/futures contracts after last season, the Detroit Lions took a flier on tight end Jordan Thomas. On Wednesday, according to Aaron Wilson of Pro Football Network, they released Thomas with a non-football injury designation.
Thomas was a sixth-round pick of the Houston Texans in 2018. After playing all 16 games as a rookie, starting 10, he played five games in 2019 and the Texans cut him coming out of 2020 training camp. He spent time with the Arizona Cardinals and New England Patriots in 2020, playing a total of six games.
After being waived by the Patriots late in 2020, the Indianapolis Colts picked Thomas up. But they waived him with an injury settlement before last season started, and he never latched on anywhere else.
Jordan Thomas continues a weird recent run with tight ends for the Lions
As noted by Kyle Meinke of MLive, the Lions’ release of Thomas with a non-football injury designation continues a weird recent stretch for the Lions with tight ends. Thomas had not even been assigned a uniform number yet, and he obviously never got to his first workout with the team.
The attrition at tight end continues to be astounding. The Lions have lost guys to non-football injuries, football injuries, retirement, requests to leave, even a car crash in the last 12 months https://t.co/vUMze52vsa
— kyle meinke (@kmeinke) March 23, 2022
Looking at the situations Meinke mentioned, Thomas joins Josh Hill (the sudden retirement after signing last year), Daniel Fells (the request to be let go during last season) and Charlie Taumoepeau (injured as a passenger in a then-teammate’s car crash in August 2021) among sudden departures and odd situations for Lions’ tight ends. No. 1 tight end T.J. Hockenson missing the final five games last season was straight-forward, and frankly ordinary, by comparison.
The signing of Garrett Griffin in free agency was surely not some kind of epiphone for the Lions that told them they didn’t even need to carry Thomas into OTAs. The circumstances of his non-football injury will never be known, but Thomas’ Lions’ tenure is over before it even started.