Detroit Lions inactives: Ziggy Ansah returns, no Dwight Freeney debut

The Detroit Lions have released their list of gameday inactives for the Thanksgiving game against the Minnesota Vikings. See who will and won’t play today.

The Detroit Lions have missed the presence of Ziggy Ansah the last two weeks. Ansah hurt his back in the team’s Monday Night Football win over the Green Bay Packers and was out of the lineup against the Cleveland Browns and Chicago Bears. In the meantime, the Browns and Bears ran all over the Lions defense. The loss of Haloti Ngata in the middle certainly hurts the run defense but the return of Ansah could be a big help.

Ansah’s status for today’s Thankgiving Day game against the Minnesota Vikings was left in doubt on the final injury report of the week that was released Wednesday afternoon. After a full week of being a limited participant in practice, Ansah’s status was left as questionable.

His return was expected but that has been made official with the release of today’s gameday inactives.

Two of the seven inactives were known ahead of time with Jamal Agnew (knee) and Dwayne Washington (hip) being ruled out when gameday designations were released on the final injury report.

One more was the result of simple logistics. The Lions claimed pass rusher Dwight Freeney yesterday after he was waived by the Seattle Seahawks this week. Freeney was reportedly quickly on a plane to get to Detroit but had not even taken his physical as of this morning. The turnaround was just too quick to even get Freeney a handful of situational pass rush snaps.

Freeney has had quite a week as he played as a Seahawk Monday night, was waived Tuesday, claimed by the Lion Wednesday afternoon so playing today was a stretch. With a struggling pass rush, picking up Freeney is about bolstering a weakness down the stretch rather than trying to plug a week 12 hole.

The Lions get more good news in the form of the return of linebacker Jalen Reeves-Maybin, who has been out with an ankle injury. Like Ansah, Reeves-Maybin was listed as questionable on the final injury report but he had a full week of practice.

The Lions’ full list of inactives for week 12 is as follows: DE Dwight Freeney, CB Jamal Agnew, RB Dwayne Washington, RB Tion Green, OL Don Barclay, DE Jeremiah Valoaga, OL Emmett Cleary.

In the end there are no surprises. Jeremiah Valoaga heads to the inactive list with the return of Ansah.

Next: A reflection on what the Lions Thanksgiving game means

The Minnesota Vikings inactives are as follows: QB Kyle Sloter, WR Stacy Coley, RB Mack Brown, T Mike Remmers, T Aviante Collins, DE Tashawn Bower, DT Jaleel Johnson