Golden is currently on pace for:
- 82 Receptions
- 1350 Yards
- 7 TDs

His stats last season compared to this year through 5 weeks: credit @mattschneidman :

2025 targets: 44
2026 targets: 44

2025 TD catches: 0
2026 TD catches: 2

2025 receiving yards: 361
2026 receiving yards: 397

A top 3 QB and the top DT? Shit, that would be terrific

Does this mean he is more likely to be cut now? Or maybe in 2027 offseason?

This is how you get Packers fans to learn your name in a hurry. Dani Dennis-Sutton made rookie history against the Bears, then told them to keep it down. That’ll play in Green Bay.

I think he's earned more snaps. It's undeniable that the rookie is starting to flash something special.

He turns 32 today.

No further comment on our GOAT

graphic via lionsmemes on Insta

To start, remember we just finished week 5 of their rookie year. The 2021 class didn’t have a win to this point, and the 2022 class was 1-4 at this point. Jah got limited use at first. Yadda yadda. I’m not saying these guys are already gold jackets, and I doubt we get the same amount of elite level talent, but them already contributing this much relative to their draft positions (much worse capital than any of those 3 first years) is pretty nuts. Let’s break it down.

Blake Miller: Top graded rookie tackle (10th overall) in pass blocking by PFF (which, yes, taking PFF with a grain of salt). 9 pressures and 4 false starts is the blemish, but not the most unexpected growing pains for a rookie tackle. He’s looking good in the run game, consistently making his assignments including some impressive pushes to the second level. We might just have a Top 5 tackle duo for the foreseeable future.

Derrick Moore: Perhaps the biggest gap in draft spot to performance, but that’s less about him not playing well so much as not getting opportunities with Hutch being Hutch and Wonnum already having 5 sacks. He’s doing a decent job of getting a few good bull rushes, and using that to fake out and win with speed. We especially saw that in the Cardinals game. I say decent because it’s looking like he’s almost there. He has the power and speed to win, but he needs to play with more urgency and violence if he wants to push for more snaps.

Jimmy Rolder: Caveat that we knew he wasn’t like to get much play time on defense, and that was before the injury. He’s looked pretty darn good on special teams, and is like to get some defensive reps after the BYE. And he has the raw physical skills and has translated some of that already. He just looks very raw in coverage, and is prone to biting too hard on play action. I want to see more reps from him before I say much.

Keith Abney: He looked pretty damn good for never playing safety lol. I’m honestly a little baffled he hasn’t gotten more opportunities, but maybe he will with our decimated safety room? Or if DJ Reed continues to get torched (despite being pretty sticky on several other plays) or McCreary’s Arizona game wasn’t as “get right” as we thought. Not enough to go on but I’m so high on his potential after seeing him step up where he has.

Kendrick Law: goddamn the injury bug we need a return guy.

Skyler Gill-Howard: Keith Abney was talked about for weeks as the baffling steal of the draft and SGH might be an even bigger one. Looking like an absolute menace in the pass rush. He’s first among rookie DTs with 13 pressures, and is in the top 20 in the league (not rookies, all DTs) for pass rush win rate at 17%.

Tyre West: Cut. Was really hoping he could do some good stuff with the team after we slimmed down in the name department from Tyrus Wheat. Oh well.

Eric O’Neill: A UDFA, mind you, but a damn good depth piece for the EDGE if god forbid we need it. 7 tackles on special teams and also just seems to be around the ball all the time. Would not be surprised at all if he carves out a Skipper/Cominsky level of love from us Reddit football nerds.

DETROIT — The first call came as Dan Miller was about to board the Lions' team bus in Dallas. It was the morning of Oct. 13, 2024, and it was from his wife, Cindy. Not a big deal, she said, but the headaches were back and made her late for work a couple of times. Cindy, a preschool teacher, was never late.

It was concerning, not yet alarming. Then came a series of texts in a family thread, and Cindy's words were jumbled, nonsensical. Dan called his daughter, Sammi, and told her to take Mom to the hospital immediately.

Miller got on the bus to AT&T Stadium for the Lions-Cowboys game armed with his standard batch of meticulous notes. In a few hours, most of Detroit would be watching and listening and hoping to hear Miller's call with the familiar voice rising to declare "Touchdown Detroit Lions!"

By halftime, Dan's family had stopped returning his messages, and his stomach flipped. He called, and Cindy answered but was reluctant to talk. She didn't want to tell him, not now, in the middle of a game, in the middle of his job. With fear mounting, he pried it out of her, and the words were horrifying, even in her calm, steady tone.

The scans found two tumors in the brain, one more dangerous than the other.

What no one could know — and the Millers didn't fully realize yet — was that a hellacious two-year journey had just begun, taking them to all the awful places humans can go, through unimaginable pain and emotional swings, through tears and tests and crushed hopes.

And then eventually, mercifully, it took her to peace. Two days ago, at 2:40 a.m. Oct. 10, Cindy Miller, 63, passed away in their Northville home surrounded by her family.

"She didn't want me to miss any games," Miller said Sunday from his home, about two hours before the Lions game at Arizona. "The strength we had as a family, quite honestly, we got it all from her. There was never a point where she said anything but, 'Go to work, go do your thing.'"

Struggling through the job

He did it as long as he could, anchoring as many Fox 2 sportscasts as possible. On the day after his wife died, Dan Miller missed his first game in 22 years as the team's radio play-by-play broadcaster on 97.1 The Ticket. Cindy loved the Lions, and they loved her back. After the Lions beat the Cardinals 45-21, Dan Campbell opened his press conference with a trembling tribute to the Millers, holding up a game ball as the words caught in his throat. Jared Goff did the same, offering tearful condolences, as many in the organization had for the past two years.

"I think the world of Dan and his family," Campbell said at the podium in Arizona. "Dan is salt of the earth, and I know this has been hard. But now I know Cindy's at peace, and we love you, Dan."

At the end of the excruciating journey, there were no more words or tears to spill. Cindy battled ferociously, but as in all cancer clashes, it wasn't a fair fight. After the brain tumors were removed, she was ostensibly cancer-free, except that the pathology determined the disease had started in the lungs. There was no trace of it there, but doctors knew it lurked somewhere.

In that numbing moment in Dallas two years ago, the Millers began to discover how vulnerable humans are, and how strong they can be. Dan finished that game but could barely describe what he was seeing. Then came the wrenching moment in the third quarter, when Aidan Hutchinson grabbed quarterback Dak Prescott. Hutchinson's left leg swung and struck teammate Alim McNeill, and his tibia and fibula snapped. He would be sidelined for nearly a year.

As Miller sent the broadcast to a commercial break, his voice cracked. Listeners probably assumed he was simply shaken by Hutchinson's brutal injury.

"All my emotions came crashing down," Miller said. "This incredible player is on the field with a gruesome injury, and I just found out my wife has two brain tumors."

Fifteen months after they sawed through her skull in two different places and removed the plum-sized tumors, cancer returned in the worst possible form, in January this year. It's called Leptomeningeal Disease (LMD), and it wraps around the spinal cord. It's particularly cruel because it causes pain up and down the body, affecting virtually every extremity and bodily function, and is considered terminal.

All Cindy wanted was to hang on as long as she could with her loved ones — daughters Sammi and Rikki, sons Tony and Robbie, grandchildren Daphne and Cecilia. Tony and his fiancée moved back from Denver to be there. Rikki moved back from Washington, D.C.

Cindy never complained, never asked why. She was petite at 5-foot-1 but a bundle of energy and ferocity, until the disease and treatments shrunk her to 83 pounds. When hospice care took over, she couldn't walk and eventually couldn't get out of bed. She was in the "active dying stage," as doctors described it, sleeping for hours and hours. When awake, all she wanted to know was how the kids were doing.

"She's the strongest person I've ever been around in my life, and I would've told you that before she got sick," Miller said of his wife of 33 years. "She was the same person as she was at halftime of that Dallas game, ready to fight, the same person until the day she passed. She was beautiful, tough, fierce and loyal, an amazing mom who would do anything to protect her kids. She felt like hell, but she never gave an inch."

There were enough heartening moments to justify the fight. At one point, Chris Hutchinson — Aidan's father, a former Michigan football player and an ER doctor at Corewell Health — visited her room, astonished to discover she was diagnosed the same day Aidan was felled. Chris Hutchinson showed Cindy his hospital badge, and she looked confused. Then she exclaimed, "Oh, you're Aidan's brother!"

It was a rare moment of levity as her mind and body faded. In the end, doctors told the family she didn't lose the fight; the medicine did. That's often the case with cancer, which is devious in so many ways. The treatments — chemo and radiation — can be worse than the disease itself. There are small victories — a few clear scans in a row — followed by devastating recurrences.

Her favorite meal, one more time

She lost her appetite for food, but never for life. One day she craved a Five Guys burger and the family was delighted when she gobbled it up. Her last meal was one of her favorites, the lobster bisque from Hyde Park Steakhouse, with pretzel rolls for dipping.

The family oncologist, Dr. Waqqas Tai at Corewell, praised the fight but eventually said there was nothing left to gain.

"He said, whatever time she has left, make it the best," Miller said. "Cancer drugs wrecked her ability to enjoy so many things. When you're in oncology wards, or at radiation watching parents with a sick 18-month-old kid, one thing you realize is how many people are going through this. It makes you appreciate the gift of time, and to cherish it."

That's what the Millers now plan to do. Dan missed only one Lions game but couldn't anchor the Fox 2 nightly sportscast and couldn't do all the weekly Dan Campbell interviews. He couldn't be everywhere, but thanks to his kids and a saintly caregiver, Mechel Winder, he could keep working.

His Fox 2 co-workers all pitched in, from Jennifer Hammond to Woody Woodriffe to Greg Kanner to Will Burchfield and all the Sportsworks roundtable guests. While Cindy waged her private battle, Dan put on a public face and tried to match her strength. He didn't keep the diagnosis a secret, but how much can you reveal about something so gut-wrenching?

It was hard for Dan because he's one of the most engaging media personalities in our city — and a great personal friend. The Millers are active in fundraising, working with Friends for Animals of Metro Detroit, and currently are housing five cats and two dogs.

In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the Leptomeningeal Cancer Foundation (LMCF). Many contributions already came in for precisely $45.21, the score of the only game he missed. The outpouring has been overwhelming, and Miller struggles to find words to express gratitude. He didn't expect the gestures by Campbell and Goff after the game, and is still processing it all.

He'll have ample time now to reflect. No more days sitting in hospital rooms, listening to doctors frame awful news in the best possible way. The family put everything on hold to be home and now can resume their careers, and that makes him the happiest.

For Dan Miller, it's back to the booth, back to football, back to family and normal life, with renewed appreciation for real wins, real losses and real adversity. Sports can indeed imitate life in all the obvious ways. As his wife weakened, she passed her strength on to others, almost as if it were natural.

"People say, I don't know how you do it, going on TV during all this," Miller said. "And I'd say, how can I not be as strong as someone who had two brain tumors removed, couldn't talk or move, and just wanted to fight to be able to hold her grandchildren?"

Strength comes in all forms, another parallel between sports and real life. Sometimes you don't know how much you have until you need it. In the most unimaginable manner, the journey provided amazing clarity for Dan Miller and his family.

As it turned out, the pain was more about living than dying.

Credit to Bob Wojnowski of Detroit News.

Just briefed though a little bit of the game. I assumed Abney would be playing SS down in the box, but he is also getting a lot of reps back in center field at FS. And the more I see it, the more I like it...

I'm feeling a little bit of optimism in what could be our new safety duo.