Amon-Ra St. Brown Makes Clear That He Wants Lions at Eagles to Open NFL Season

The All-Pro wideout wants to show the NFL how the Lions measure up to the defending champs with a clean bill of health.
The Lions played on opening night in 2023 against the Chiefs
The Lions played on opening night in 2023 against the Chiefs / Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Detroit Lions enjoyed their best regular-season performance in franchise history in 2024, going 15–2 and securing the top overall seed in the NFC playoff bracket. They were, however, unable to capitalize in the playoffs as a truly brutal rash of injuries decimated the team's defense and left very, very little margin for error. The Lions were eliminated at home in the divisional round by the Washington Commanders and now look to 2025, where Detroit hopes a luckier campaign awaits

Star receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown, who put forth another first-team All-Pro season in 2024, is very eager to show the world what a healthy Lions roster can do. He's so eager, in fact, he wants to take on the defending champions as soon as possible.

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Speaking on his St. Brown Podcast alongside his brothers, Osiris and Equanimeous, Amon-Ra made clear his desire to see the Lions selected as the team to do battle with the Philadelphia Eagles for the 2025 NFL season opener.

"Eagles have the home opener next year, because they won the Super Bowl," St. Brown said. "Can I read you the list of teams that could be in that first game? Commanders, Cowboys, Giants, Bears, Lions, Raiders, Rams, Broncos. Out of all those teams, if you're the NFL, who are you putting in there?"

When his brothers both responded they'd choose the Lions, St. Brown emphatically agreed. "That's what I'm saying. So we might be playing opening night."

"You would see what our healthy defense, how that s--- operates," St. Brown later said.

When the playoffs first began a Lions-Eagles NFC championship game was very much in play as they were the top two sides in the conference, and home field advantage is never felt more than in the postseason. Obviously that didn't come to be, but St. Brown is clearly raring for a chance to show what his team has after a truly dominant run by Philadelphia.

It will be a few months before the world finds out whether it will indeed be the Lions at Eagles on opening night.


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Liam McKeone
LIAM MCKEONE

Liam McKeone is a senior writer for the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has been in the industry as a content creator since 2017, and prior to joining SI in May 2024, McKeone worked for NBC Sports Boston and The Big Lead. In addition to his work as a writer, he has hosted the Press Pass Podcast covering sports media and The Big Stream covering pop culture. A graduate of Fordham University, he is always up for a good debate and enjoys loudly arguing about sports, rap music, books and video games. McKeone has been a member of the National Sports Media Association since 2020.