By Moses Joshua 
Josh Paschal’s stalled trajectory leaves the Lions with unanswered questions — but no one to blame.
A Puzzling Ending to a Season That Never Began
As the Detroit Lions prepared for their Thanksgiving showdown with the Green Bay Packers, the team moved pieces around the roster with the expectation that several injured players were finally ready to return. Three spots were initially expected to be cleared. Yet when the dust settled, only two were needed — and one name was conspicuously absent from the activation list.
Defensive end Marcus Davenport and rookie offensive lineman Miles Frazier both claimed their spots on the 53-man roster. Davenport’s return had been anticipated, and Frazier was in the final hours of his 21-day practice window. But the third player expected to rejoin them never made it.
Josh Paschal, the once-promising defensive end whose potential had long been intertwined with concern, remained sidelined. Though declared out for the Green Bay matchup, he was never activated from the Non-Football Injury list. With his window closed, so too are his hopes of playing in 2025.
His season ends without a single snap — and perhaps, so does his time in Detroit.
The Injuries That Never Loosened Their Grip
For Paschal, this isn’t a sudden derailment — it’s the culmination of a career defined by what-ifs.
The Lions spent a top-50 pick on him in the 2022 NFL Draft, imagining a powerful, versatile complement to Aidan Hutchinson. Instead, injuries quickly set the tone. A sports hernia delayed his rookie debut by five games, and when he returned, a knee issue stole two more. Two sacks across 10 games showed flashes, but not sustainable momentum.
In 2023, the story repeated itself. A knee injury during practice ahead of Week 2 cost him five games. Again, he appeared in spurts but never quite seized the role Detroit desperately hoped he’d grow into.
2024 offered what looked like hope: a career-high 14 games and 10 starts. But even then, production lagged behind expectation. His two sacks and a struggling Pro Football Focus grade left him outside the league’s top-100 edge rushers — hardly the leap the Lions needed.
Then came 2025, the most important year of his rookie contract. Instead of a breakthrough, he suffered a back injury that never fully responded. In late October, head coach Dan Campbell hinted at the uphill battle ahead, saying, “It’s a back (injury) is what it is, and there again, he is improving… He’s got a few more things to show us before we’re ready to open the window for him to practice.”
Detroit opened that window on Nov. 5. Paschal practiced. He even reached full participation. Then, abruptly, two days before Thanksgiving, he appeared on the injury report as a non-participant — and never returned.
No Scapegoats, Just Unfortunate Reality
It’s tempting to search for fault when a high draft pick fails to become a foundational player. But Paschal’s story resists assigning blame.
This wasn’t a lack of effort.
It wasn’t a coaching misstep.
It wasn’t a misread of character or competitiveness.
It was simply a case where a talented player’s body never cooperated long enough for a fair evaluation.
Detroit took a calculated swing on a powerful, polished college defender. Paschal attacked rehab after rehab with determination. Coaches handled his timeline cautiously. Yet sometimes, even when every decision makes sense, things still go sideways.
The Unwritten Chapter Ahead
Now, Detroit closes the book on a season that never got beyond the practice field. As Paschal heads toward free agency in March, the Lions face a familiar crossroads: acknowledge the miss, but resist the urge to rewrite history as a mistake.
Because not every disappointment has a villain.
Some stories just don’t unfold the way anyone hoped — no matter how well they were written at the start.