Ikaika Alama-Francis Update

The Detroit Lions held their third voluntary off-season practice today, and afterwards Coach Rod Marinelli talked about Ikaika Alama-Francis and how's he's been progressing after suffering a hamstring injury last year.

• Defensive end Ikaika Alama-Francis looks stronger entering his second year.

“Oh, yeah,” Marinelli said. “He’s spent a year in the weight room.”

Marinelli said Alama-Francis wasn’t much heavier, though, and hadn’t lost any speed.

“I call it man-strength,” Marinelli said. “He’s starting to fill out a little bit. His quickness is very good. I mean, he’s running extremely well right now.”

Alama-Francis was a second-round pick last year, a raw project out of Hawaii. He didn’t contribute as much as hoped. Marinelli blamed a lot of that on a pulled hamstring suffered in the middle of the season.

“He was making great progress in practice, and it was his time,” Marinell said. “And he pulled a hammy and it nailed him for about four weeks and slowed him up a little bit.”

From an earlier post-draft article on the Lions' site, Ikaika talked about getting ready for the upcoming season.

“I know that I have a lot of things to work on this offseason,” said Alama-Francis. “Coach (Marinelli) is really taking his time to help me out with those things and I greatly appreciate that. It’s not every day you get one-on-one help from one of the best D-line coaches ever.

“I’ll take everything I have to soak in; Coach Marinelli and Coach Cullen are always coaching me, trying to critique and help me get better. I’m trying to work as hard as I can and hopefully will have a really good year next year.”

Further down the article, he talks about being away from home and adjusting to the NFL lifestyle.

And just a reminder that the Houston Texans (Ryan Grice-Mullins) and Atlanta Falcons (CJ Hawthorne) will be holding minicamps this weekend.