It will be a little odd not to see No. 99 as the central anchor of the Rams defensive front. The future Hall of Famer retired this offseason after a stellar career. This is obviously a big loss for the Rams defense, but they still feel very good about some of the young talent they’ve amassed on offense, including Kobie Turner, who had nine sacks inside last season, and the signing of rookies Jared Verse and Braden Fiske.

“I expect them to be better than they were last year,” Lions head coach Dan Campbell said this week. “They’ve added a lot of young players this year, all players we really liked in the draft, and that’s why I think they’re going to be a better team.”

Campbell also believes the Lions are the better team, which should make for a great match tonight.

If there was an MVP award for training camp performance, third-year defensive end Aidan Hutchinson would have won it for the Lions, hands down. He was a beast all training camp.

“Hutch had a great offseason,” Glenn said this week. “He had a great training camp and now he’s at the point where he has to set his sights on being, if not the best defensive player in this league, then at least one of the best players — which he is, but now it’s time to see himself as the best player.”

With a more talented secondary behind him and some new running mates alongside him (most notably DJ Reader and Marcus Davenport), the stage is set for Hutchinson’s monster season. With 101 total pressures last season, he was only better than Micah Parsons (103), but his 11.5 sacks were 12th best. Improving his sack numbers could have a big impact on defense. Last season, offenses leaguewide only scored a touchdown (TD or FG) 22.9 percent of the time when they suffered a sack on the drive. They scored a touchdown only 7.6 percent of the time when they suffered a sack on the drive.