Lions fans were hopeful the chronic issue with drops from the tight end position would go away with the departure of Eric Ebron. Unfortunately, the collective replacements for the unreliable former first-round pick dropped the ball at almost exactly the same rate as Ebron did with his new team in 2018.
Drops are a subjective stat. Some incompletions that hit the receiver are judged drops by some but not others, depending upon the defense or the quality of the throw. The trackers at FOX Sports tend to be harsher than most in assigning drops to receivers. Here’s how FOX tracked the drops for the Lions tight ends in 2018:
Michael Roberts: 3 drops in 20 targets
Luke Willson: 2 in 19
Levine Toilolo: 0 in 24
5 drops in 63 targets. That’s an 8 percent drop rate.
By way of comparison, Eric Ebron was tagged with 9 drops on 110 targets for the Colts. His 8.1 drop rate is slightly worse than the Lions assortment of tight ends.
If you don’t want to believe FOX’s accounting, here’s a look at how Pro Football Focus tracked the drops:
| Total Drops | Targets | Drop rate | |
| Lions TEs | 3 | 65 | 4.6 percent |
| Ebron | 5 | 108 | 4.6 percent |
Ebron had a drop rate of just over 10 percent in Detroit in both 2016 and ’17. Of the Lions 2018 TEs, only Roberts remains on the roster. Newcomer Jesse James had 3 drops on 39 targets with the Steelers last season, per FOX, for a 7.6 percent drop rate.
