Detroit Lions hamstring injury analysis 2024-2025: Data, Patterns, and Field Surface Analysis

What can the Lions do to reduce hamstring injuries?

Many readers have had questions about the Lions multiple hamstring injuries over the past 2 seasons. The loss of DJ Reed for almost 2 months in 2025 was a big catalyst.

Here are all the hamstrings I have logged over the 2024 and 2025 seasons. (It’s possible I missed some minor or unreported ones.) Included are the location of the injury as well as month of injury.

The goal here is to see if there is any obvious pattern to the injuries.

Quick summary of Detroit Lions hamstring data

• Total injuries: 26

• Home vs road games: 100% at home or practice. 0% on the road.

• Surface split: Close to even distribution between turf and grass.

• Seasonal timing: Even spread for most of the season with tailing off in December.

Detroit Lions 2025 hamstrings - Total 14

1. Terrion Arnold - camp, July

2. Stantley Thomas-Oliver - camp, July

3. Sione Vaki - camp, July

4. Tim Patrick - camp, August

5. Sione Vaki - practice, September

6. Jacob Saylors - Ford Field, September

7. DJ Reed - Ford Field, September

8. Zach Cunningham - practice, September

9. Zach Cunningham - Ford Field, October

10. Avonte Maddox - practice, October

11. Al-Quadin Muhammad - Ford Field, October

12. Craig Reynolds - Ford Field, October

13. Amik Robertson - practice, November

14. Frank Ragnow - the forest?, November

Detroit Lions 2024 hamstrings - Total 12

1. Michael Badgley - camp, August

2. Carlton Davis - camp, August

3. Jahmyr Gibbs - camp, August

4. Sam LaPorta - camp, August

5. Kerby Joseph - practice, September

6. Ennis Rakestraw - Ford Field (warmups), September

7. Kerby Joseph - practice, October

8. Emmanuel Moseley - practice, November

9. Levi Onwuzurike - Ford Field, November

10. Ennis Rakestraw - practice, November

11. Kevin Zeitler - Ford Field, January

12. Ifeatu Melifonwu - Ford Field, January

Do the Lions have more hamstring injuries on turf?

There is no obvious pattern. Hamstrings appear to occur evenly on both surfaces. Ford Field is turf. Training camp uses grass. The Lions use both grass and turf for regular season practice. Their indoor turf field is more likely used for practice when the weather gets colder.

• Ford Field was the location for 9 of the hamstrings.

• Training camp accounted for 8 of the hamstrings.

• Regular season practice accounted for 8 of the hamstrings, with an estimate of about half being on turf.

Does seasonal timing matter for hamstring injuries?

There is an even incidence through November with a tailing off in December. (July and January are only partial months due to timing of season start/end.)

Takeaways of Detroit Lions hamstring injury data

(With caveat that this is simply an observational study and does not account for any variables. Also, correlation does not mean causation.)

• It’s interesting that no hamstrings have occurred on road games the past 2 seasons. Why might that be? I’m not sure. Random quirks in data are always possible.

• Hamstrings occur evenly spread out over the course of the year until a tailing off in December. There isn’t a noticeably increased incidence during the acclimation period of training camp which suggests the Lions are doing a good job there. The drop-off at the end of season could have many possible explanations including easier practices, muscle fatigue slowing down players, or susceptible players already having been injured.

• As far as turf vs grass, hamstrings occur evenly on both surfaces.

Is there anything actionable with the hamstring data?

• The Lions could explore the practice differences in December/January compared to earlier in the season to see if anything can be done to reduce hamstring injuries that occur in practice.

• If the home/road split continues for another season, it will be worth exploring a possible cause like any differences in pregame routine.