Detroit Lions wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown’s fame has hit another gear coming into the 2024 season. This offseason, St. Brown was one of the heroes of the Netflix series ‘Receiver,’ which highlighted his journey through the 2023 NFL season. As a result, he has become a household name within the NFL fan base.

During a recent interview on ‘Hot Ones’ alongside Las Vegas Raiders WR Davante Adams, St. Brown was urged to either eat a hot wing or express his least-favorite NFL fans. Rather than take a bite of the wing, he showed his disgust for the fans of two NFL clubs.

“That is a layup. I’m going donate two,” St. Brown added. “I dislike the Packers fans, just ’cause it’s Green Bay. But I think some of the worst fans is the Falcons.

We played them my freshman year, no one was there. ‘Cause I loathe Green Bay. They have good fans for the team, but I loathe them.”

With the next edition of the ‘Madden’ video game franchise slated to arrive Aug. 16, the ratings of players in the game are beginning to be disclosed.

As is tradition, EA Sports is sending out the ratings for athletes at launch in chunks. On Monday, the wide receivers and safeties were the players to have their traits exposed.

The Detroit Lions were anchored by Amon-Ra St. Brown, who will be a 95 overall at launch. He is tied for the fourth-highest rated player at the position. Miami Dolphins wide receiver Tyreek Hill is the highest-rated wide receiver as a 99 overall.

Here are the ratings for Lions’ wide outs and safeties, as announced Monday.

Amon-Ra St. Brown — 95
Brian Branch — 85
Jameson Williams — 79
Kerby Joseph — 77
Donovan Peoples-Jones — 76
Kalif Raymond — 76
Ifeatu Melifonwu — 75
Tre’Quan Smith — 70
Tom Kennedy — 69
Isaiah Williams — 67
Antoine Green — 66
Daurice Fountain — 65
Brandon Joseph — 64
C.J. Moore — 64
Maurice Alexander — 63

Safety competition

The Lions have plans to move Brian Branch to safety once he is cleared to fully participate. The change comes as a result of desire to deploy him in this manner as well as additions giving the defense greater options.

When Branch returns, the Lions will examine him in the safety spot. Yet, Dan Campbell left the door open to potentially returning him to the nickel position if required. Being so early in camp, the Lions are leaving their choices open.

As the Alabama product has been out early in camp, Emmanuel Moseley and Amik Robertson have been among the players to take drills at nickel position.

If the arrivals shake out and a guy secures the nickel spot, Campbell said Branch will compete with Ifeatu Melifonwu at the safety position opposite Kerby Joseph.

“There again, nothing is set in stone yet. Some of that is, we truly feel that the safety position could be extremely excellent for Branch,” Campbell said.

“We obviously know he can play nickel, but it’s one of those, is that the best thing for him and for us? Now, we sort this entire thing out and Iffy is doing what he’s doing and he’s continuing to grow and we don’t have a nickel that comes to the forefront, well it could very easily be Iffy’s your safety and Branch goes back to the nickel. So we’ve got a lot of moving parts here.

But right now, it really is, when Branch gets back and is ready to go, which he’s in a good place, he’s coming, his rehab is going well, he’s out there in walkthrough, then you’re talking about a race between those two at the safety position.”

Detroit’s kicking competition was thrown a twist when incumbent participant Michael Badgley sustained a season-ending injury on the second day of training camp. As he was placed on injured reserve, Jake Bates is currently the only kicker on roster.

General manager Brad Holmes indicated in the summer that he planned to bring in competition for Badgley, which happened in the form of Bates. However, the Lions currently have yet to recruit another player to compete with Bates.

During an appearance on Lions’ flagship radio Monday, Holmes noted that Bates is now getting meaningful opportunities and that the team is ready to evaluate him.

The Lions checked out four kickers last week, but have made no move. A kicker addition might yet occur at some time during camp.

“We were excited to be able to add Bates. Obviously it was terrible with Badge, we have a lot of trust in Badge and were thrilled for that competition,” Holmes added. “So feel very, truly horrible for him. As of right now, Bates, he’s receiving a lot of valuable reps that he’s gonna need.

He’s been in the UFL and obviously he has not had a field goal kicking history going back to college, he’s been more kickoff specialist, so just now he’s gotten an opportunity to get a lot more reps throughout this preseason and it’s a possibility that we might add more competition there at some point. But we’re really delighted to see Bates and his enormous l

eg.”