Caldwell skips one OTA to help Lions recover


Allen Park — Many NFL coaches have expressed frustration with the limited amount of practice time under the most recent collective bargaining agreement.
Lions coach Jim Caldwell, meanwhile, effectively gave players a day off on Wednesday, cancelling one of the Lions’ 10 organized team activities as players instead spent most of the day in meetings.
“We changed it a little bit because of the fact that we wanted to emphasize a little bit more just in terms of their recovery and those kinds of things,” Caldwell said Thursday. “We think we’ve been getting real good, solid work, so we took a little different slant to it.”
Players have lauded Caldwell the past couple years for emphasizing recovery, whether that’s giving a player an extra day off when he’s hurt or allowing others to take precautionary measures. Now, Caldwell has taken those precautions to the offseason as the Lions used just nine of their 10 practices during the past three weeks.
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