Dan Campbell: Lions wanted to sign players ‘with something to prove’
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Lions head coach Dan Campbell held a press conference on Monday that was devoid of any fantastic one-liners or “did he really just say that?” moments. Coach Campbell’s deeper poignancy was more on display on this zoom session.
One answer that stood out from Campbell’s docile presser dealt with the type of players the Lions were attracted to signing in free agency. Campbell talked up the enthusiasm the new players, guys like RB Jamaal Williams and LB Alex Anzalone, brought to the team.
“All these guys that we’ve signed, salary aside, they’re fired up to be here. It’s a genuine excitement. Look, you can call it… There’s a little bit of a leap of faith on their part. Shoot, man, we appreciate that. But it kind of tells us that we feel like we’re going in the right direction.”
Later in the call, Campbell started rolling off the attributes of all the new players. He summarized the signings by saying,
“…probably the best thing about all of these guys we’ve signed is I think they’ve all got something to prove. They’ve got a little bit of a chip on their shoulder, whether it’s ‘I’m coming off an injury’ or ‘they were trying to reduce my salary’ or ‘I’m a guy that they didn’t want anymore’ or ‘I’m a guy they think is washed up.’ All these guys have something to prove and man, so do we.”
Campbell continued,
“I mean, Brad’s (GM Holmes) got something to prove, I’ve got something to prove. My staff has something to prove. I mean, everything we’ve kind of done – Sheila’s (Hamp) got something to prove – has been a little bit unorthodox, I guess you could call it. But that’s a good thing, man. We want hungry people here that want to be there, they all wanted to be here and wanted to win.”
