Monday has indeed brought about an addition in the secondary for the Lions. Jalen Mills was among the free agents who recently worked out with the team, and it has produced a deal.
Mills is signing with Detroit, ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reports. This will be a practice squad deal, he adds. Mills made three appearances with the Lions in 2025, and he is now set up for a second stint in the Motor City.
Today’s news comes shortly after it was learned that fellow veteran DB Avonte Maddox will undergo season-ending foot surgery. Mills, 32, will look to serve as an experienced replacement. He has 126 appearances and 96 starts to his name between regular-season and playoff action in the NFL.
A full-time starter with the Eagles at various times and within the AFC East (Patriots, Jets) afterwards, Mills handled a much smaller defensive workload in 2025 in Houston and Detroit. The former seventh-rounder will look to carve out a role of some kind with the Lions aiming to improve from a defensive start which has included 71 points allowed in two games. In the meantime, the safety position will remain one without starters Brian Branch and Kerby Joseph.
Both players were expectedly moved to the reserve/PUP list during roster cuts. That means Branch and Joseph cannot return to game action until at least Week 5, although players on the PUP list are now eligible to practice after two weeks. Nevertheless, Joseph is not in position to practice as things stand. His recovery from a degenerative knee condition has not gone according to plan, and head coach Dan Campbell acknowledged on Monday that a pause in his rehab progress recently took place.
“I just know we were strengthening the knee and it wasn’t a setback but there was a little time there where we weren’t able to do everything we needed to do and so now we’re back at it,” Campbell said (via Dave Birkett of the Detroit Free Press). “And until we can get the knee to a certain point to where it feels strong, as strong as we can possibly get it and he feels comfortable, we’re not going to put him out there.”
Based on those comments, Joseph – who signed a four-year, $85MM extension last offseason – should not be expected to return any time soon. Getting Branch back would represent a boost, and it will be interesting to see when he manages to resume practicing after suffering an Achilles tear last year. In any case, Chuck Clark, Thomas Harper and Christian Izien are still in the fold. Mills will aim to join that group as someone who is signed to the active roster in short order or designated as a gameday elevation as early as Week 3.