Dan Campbell Reacts to Injuries Piling Up: May Be 'Thin' Against Falcons

Detroit Lions must weather injuries piling up early in the season.

The Detroit Lions are battling the injury bug early in the 2023 season. 

Dan Campbell, appearing on 97.1 The Ticket, expressed the team found out the results of what was ailing C.J. Gardner-Johnson Monday evening. 

Detroit's third-year head coach indicated the veteran safety was able to return after getting banged up against the Seahawks, but was impacted by his injury. 

While early reports indicated the 25-year-old could miss the rest of the season, Campbell noted there is a "chance" the talented safety could return this season. 

"Ended up being bad news," said Campbell. "I hate it for him. You know, that's tough. But look, we'll see where this thing goes. And there's a chance he comes back this season. Listen, we got Tracy, man. And that's why Tracy Walker's here. He's somebody that -- there's a reason why we wanted to resign him. He was coming off injury, and man,  it's next man up."

Against the Falcons, the Lions could be without several key players, including left tackle Taylor Decker, who Campbell could not say with a ton of confidence would return this week. 

"I can't say that with a ton of confidence, right now, that I know we'll have Decker back. Solook, we may be thin this game. I mean, we did, we got hit -- and we've been pretty good up to this point in this part of the season, but we got hit with the bug," said Campbell. "Look, we got hit with it last year, early in the year. And so, we got to weather this storm. It's why we've got the guys that we have on this roster that we have at these positions."