Lions Sign CB, Place TE on IR, Elevate WR Against Cowboys

Here is who was elevated from the Lions practice squad this week.

Detroit Lions cornerback Nick Whiteside (38) practices during training camp | Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

The Detroit Lions have elevated wide receiver Malik Cunningham from the practice squad against the Dallas Cowboys.

Tight end Brock Wright was placed on the injured reserve list. Also, cornerback Nick Whiteside was signed to the active roster from the team's practice squad.

Offensive lineman Kayode Awosika was downgraded to out with a foot injury.

On Wednesday afternoon, the team already ruled out Wright, Kerby Joseph, Shane Zylstra and Kalif Raymond.

Detroit's offense is seeking to improve how they start games, as the unit has not moved the football as effectively the last handful of games. Also complicating matters is the team has gone 0-7 on fourth downs recently.

Offensive coordinator John Morton addressed with local reporters if there is anything the team can do to get the offense moving quicker earlier in games.

“Yeah, there are things you can do. When you put up first plays of the game, you look at kind of what they do in the beginning of a game," said Morton. "And then you go off what you did in practice, ‘Okay what’s good? Alright, (Lions run game coordinator/offensive line) Hank (Fraley), this is good. Okay the passing game, we like this. What’s the quarterback like? What are certain running backs like in the beginning of a game?’ And usually, you want to try to do things that they’re not thinking a lot.

"That’s usually what you want to try to do, and that’s what we’ve done. Again, we just errored in execution, all around. I think that’s the biggest thing," Morton added. "We talk about changing things at halftime, stuff like that. That’s the same type of deal. Okay, what are they doing? Are they doing anything different? No. What do you guys like? When we get together at halftime, it’s, ‘What do you guys like? What are you guys seeing?’ We all do it together, put it together, ‘Alright let’s go, let’s do this.’ That’s the biggest thing."

Morton detailed further how he has been taught to address early tendencies of opponents.

"If you can do things in the beginning based on kind of what they do in the beginning of the game, that’s the way I’ve been taught, that’s the way I approach it with Dan (Campbell). I give him all the tendencies and things like that, how they’re doing things," said Morton. "And then you go from there. And it might be the quarterback likes this, the running back likes that, the O-line likes this play. So, you put that in because they like it. So, let’s go do it.”