If D'Andre Swift has personal goals this season, he wasn't divulging them Friday after practice: "Team success brings individual success. I’m ready for the team to succeed and everything else comes second."
He did divulge one: Playing every game.
It's something Swift has yet to do through two seasons in Detroit. He missed three games to injuries in year one, four more in year two. This is part of the reason, maybe the biggest reason, he remains somewhere in the middle tier of NFL running backs. Swift's talent has popped, but it's yet to really shine.
He plans to change that in year three.
"It's time to take it to another level," he said.
And how does he plan to get there?
"Being available," he said. "Playing every game."
This goes back to a conversation Swift had with Lions running backs coach Duce Staley in the offseason. Staley, one of the toughest runners of his era, told Swift there's a difference between being injured and being hurt and challenged him to "fight through some things" starting this season.
"It’s not all about what you think you should hear. Duce is going to tell me what I need to hear, and that’s kind of what you need," said Swift. "That’s the type of guy I want to play for."
When Swift has been healthy, or at least healthy enough to play, he's been a menace to opposing defenses. He's a bull with quick feet and one of the best pass-catching backs in the NFL. He went over 100 scrimmage yards in six of the Lions' first 10 games last season. Then he got injured. Staley might say 'hurt.'
Swift missed the next four games with a shoulder sprain, and wasn't quite the same when he returned for the final two games of the season. It was a rather fitting way for his year to end: he had also missed all of preseason with a groin injury.
"Sometimes that injury bug hits a player one time, two times, three times — a lot in a year," Staley said. "You’ve got to be lucky, but you’ve still got to let it go. You can’t let that hold you back as a running back. We’ve had those type of conversations. He has to be smart in certain situations, of course, but he has to leave it all out there on the field.”
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Dan Campbell and the Lions are in a tricky spot with Swift, like most teams with dynamic all-purpose backs. They want to ride their most explosive player, without riding him into the ground. During his time in New Orleans, Campbell and the Saints faced the same dilemma with Alvin Kamara.
"My gosh, you want those guys out there every play, but you also know ... "
It comes at a cost.
Campbell said the Lions will be smart with Swift in training camp. At the same time, they want him ramped up by Week 1. It's a delicate balance, a constant tug and pull, a little more work for two days, a little less on the third. The goal, said Campbell, is to "get the intensity and volume under him" this summer so they can let him rip this fall.
From there, Swift wants to keep running into the winter.
"Being sore and all that type of stuff, that's not being hurt. That's not being injured," he said. "You got to push through those type of things. The position I play, you got to push through a lot of different things to be available for your teammates."
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