This is well put. I struggle to answer which I’d choose and which position the Lions are actually in.
I’ve long known that 3 years ago you wanted as many picks as possible to try and build depth across a depleted roster. Now, if Holmes truly believes this is a championship roster and is only 6 guys away instead of 8, then it was the right move.
It feels to me like if Holmes’ greatest strength is drafting and there is a high bust rate, 8 picks with no trade ups should have higher odds than 6 picks where you get the guy you want. We’ll have to see again if this class out performs.
The other tricky part is how does Holmes see Martin and Sorsdal. To developmental guys. Are they good enough to start if needed? He went with Manu, another project so it seems like he may be happy with both and he didn’t prioritize OL/DT in the early rounds.
Would it be fair to say, that his philosophy has worked up to this point? Would it be also fair to say, that his team was only 1 of 4 teams that could have went to the Super Bowl at the end of last year?
Lastly, would if be fair to say, that after seeing all the facts, that Brad is usually correct in what he does in the draft worked in building the Detroit Lion into SB contenders?
If you answer yes to all, what the ■■■■ does this matter? Let the man work instead bird dogging the man at his job!!!
You know all this talk has brought forward a different question.
Assuming the Lions could draft anyone they wanted. Or any 3 players.
What 3 players out of this draft would you say could walk in and for be the starter for sure. No doubt?
My only guess would be one of those top 3 WRs. After that I do not see anyone. Maybe I am missing someone. Maybe Latu or Verse? This is just an exercise on looking at this from the reverse. We are bitching about value of guys drafted and yet I am not sure outside of WRs that anyone could start for this team.
Man have we gotten snobby quick. That did not take long at all
I did not know that, and that makes those scales likely closer.
Even so, there’s still the issue of limited data compared to the number of variables. There are so few trades, so few seasons, and both so much variance year-to-year (how much is #1OA worth when Peyton Manning is there vs. another year) and systemic change (rookie contracts vs. not, trend toward more expensive WR, etc.).
I’m not saying ignore these scales, but they need to be treated as the imperfect approximations rather than the answer key.
The problem is, that wasn’t an available alternative, so I don’t know why people wail and gnash teeth over a hypothetical based on an approximation.
Like you said, the only thing that matters is how Arnold performs. If he becomes a solid (or better) #1 CB for us over time, it won’t matter a lick. And if he implodes, whatever the difference between a 4th and a 7th is won’t erase the damage.
Again, I loved the trade, so to say I’m wailing and gnashing isn’t true (though maybe you’re referring to others). This all came about for me at least when I had to defend and A- grade for the pick, which was docked solely because he didn’t maximize his trade value. That was all. People didn’t like that lol.
This is where I disagree. If he implodes but we were able to add a Maxx Crosby or ARSB in the 4th, the damage would be substantially mitigated.
I understand the subjectiveness of that statement as well. The odds of hitting on a Crosby or ARSB are slim. And yet they’re much higher than hitting on someone in the 7th. There’s also the opportunity to hit on a contributor in the 4th - they don’t have to be a star to be worth it. Someone like Barnes, another 4th rounder. It’s hard not to trust Brad with more higher value picks.
I will recap something important that Brad said during his press conference. He said when he woke up that morning, he had the overwhelming feeling that if we ended the draft without Manu and Vaki that it would be a big missed opportunity and he would regret it. Then he spoke to Dan about it, and Dan said the exact same (2) guys were on his mind that morning as well. Brad said that sealed the deal when both guys were on the same page about the same exact guys.
Brad said he doesn’t like to think in terms of “round” in how to look at the potential of acquiring a player with a certain pick. He said each draft is different, and the situations are going to change from year to year. So he thinks in terms of “buckets” of players. That’s why he lines up his draft board in tiers (aka buckets) and cross compares between positions. I don’t know what each of his buckets are. However, I do know one that Brad and Dan have spoken about is the “can start and contribute right away” bucket. I think they said Brian Branch was the final guy in that bucket in 2023, and that’s why we made a point to trade up for him. Bro Mart was in a bucket where he would not contribute the first year and would need time to develop, but the payoff could be massive. What they call that, I have no idea. I think Brad and Dan see Manu in that same bucket.
Brad also said that when it comes to the guys who are going to take 2-3 years to develop, he considers how much of a contribution the guy can make on special teams. Because the kid “has to play somewhere” while he learns how to play a regular position. Otherwise, the player is going to struggle to be active on gamedays which is going to limit the staffs ability to mix him in slowly.
Agreed, and I don’t fault Brad for it. The asking price was the asking price. The time limit definitely affects the buyer more than the seller, not enough time to haggle. In this instance it seems the only option was to settle for the first of the two options I listed, which is still very good. Just not as great as it could have been if we’d gotten historical value.
It’s not my work, it’s someone else’s, but since draft pick trade value has been a bit of a hot topic on here I thought I’d share.
The article and evaluations are based on the Rich Hill chart, which calculates the value of each pick based on a database of pick for pick trades going back over a decade, so it’s using real data from NFL front office trades to value picks. It might not be perfectly accurate, but it certainly provides very reasonable ballpark values, and that’s all you really need.
This is only really a factor in the first 10 picks or so, once you get into the latter half of the first round then picks are going to be worth roughly the same every year.
I truly think Brad decided what Terrion Arnold was worth to him, and that is the budget he had to play with. So in essence, he says “I’m willing to trade my 3rd and 29 to get Arnold.” Then he goes and calls and offers that to the Bengals at 18. They say no. Then he calls the Rams. They say no. He keeps calling until Dallas says “Yes, I’ll do that deal”. If we traded up to 18 to draft Arnold everyone would praise the trade saying we got such a steal. But we give up the same amount of draft capital, draft the same player (at a later spot which saves $) and people are worked up about the “premium” we paid. These charts are just guidelines and don’t take into account the specific players/tiers that actually make up each individual draft.
I also find it interesting that we are #1 in the value/steal category, but #32 in the trades values. It tells me Brad saw great player value on the board and paid a premium to get those premium players.
There’s also an element of what other teams were offering the Cowboys for that pick. In some cases the team that wants to trade up are the only ones interested in obtaining that pick, but in other cases there might be two or three teams calling the Cowboys making offers, which pushes the price up.
One of the analysts at WalterFootball said another team was trying to trade up for Arnold at the same time, as a top CB prospect Holmes will have known that he was covered, so maybe he paid a little extra to make sure he got his guy.
We can just ignore the details and look at the big picture LOL.
I think of this draft a lot like last year, if you switch around where we take players (and what we traded for Davis), I’d feel much better about it. For example:
29 + future 3rd for 24 and draft Terrion Arnold
61 Ennis Rakestraw Jr.
73 Christian Mahogany
92 Mekhi Wingo
5th rd pick traded for Carlton Davis
6th+future 4th to move up for Giovanni Manu
7th Sione Vaki
This nets us the same exact players and uses the same capital overall, but this allocation seems to fit better with the public perception/value of these guys.
I’m hearing his descriptions (can’t believe how much detail he did share) and believe we could piece it together pretty well and that the bucket tiers wouldn’t be too far off the Zeirlien tiers:
Zeirlein Description
The perfect prospect
Perennial All-Pro
Pro Bowl talent
Year 1 starter
Boom-or-bust potential
Will become good starter within two years
Will eventually be plus starter
Will eventually be average starter
Good backup with the potential to develop into starter
Traits or talent to be above-average backup
Average backup or special-teamer
Candidate for bottom of roster or practice squad
Priority undrafted free agent
We could probably rename a few of these to make room for Jamo, BroMart, Paschal and Manu. I don’t know that there’s as many tiers (or as few), but he was totally nerding out over looking at it horizontally instead of vertically, just to see where the players are populating the bucket. It’s how they stepped back and seen, yeah, it’s an offense-heavy draft. It’s also where he mentioned being able to go back and seeing Guard or WR or whatever in those tiers previous years.
I bet we could put this together in a pretty good estimate of what they’re doing. Not “we” as in me, but as in The Den.
