Detroit Lions Offseason Thread 2023

[RandyMarsh]

7 hours ago, MichiganCardinal said:

Post-draft Power Rankings

Elite: (1) Kansas City Chiefs, (2) Philadelphia Eagles, (3) Cincinnati Bengals, (4) Buffalo Bills

Very Good: (5) San Francisco 49ers, (6) Miami Dolphins, (7) Detroit Lions, (8) Dallas Cowboys, (9) Pittsburgh Steelers

Good: (10) Baltimore Ravens, (11) Seattle Seahawks, (12) Jacksonville Jaguars, (13) New York Jets

Average: (14) Los Angeles Chargers, (15) New York Giants, (16) Atlanta Falcons, (17) New Orleans Saints, (18) Minnesota Vikings

Not Good: (19) New England Patriots, (20) Green Bay Packers, (21) Cleveland Browns, (22) Tennessee Titans, (23) Los Angeles Rams, (24) Chicago Bears, (25) Denver Broncos

Very Bad: (26) Indianapolis Colts, (27) Carolina Panthers, (28) Houston Texans, (29) Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Putrid: (30) Washington Commanders, (31) Las Vegas Raiders, (32) Arizona Cardinals

I feel pretty similar to this except I'm not as high on the Steelers, Id probably put them near the bottom of the Good tier. Also would move Seattle and Jax up to the Lions tier. Unless Geno is a one year wonder I think both those teams are going to be really good. 

[RandyMarsh]

On a side note the Cardinals are the perfect example of how quickly things can change in the NFL for better or worse.  A year and a half ago they were riding high looking like they may have a chance at a 1st round bye, then we destroyed them and they haven't been the same since. 

[buddha]

8 hours ago, MichiganCardinal said:

Post-draft Power Rankings

Elite: (1) Kansas City Chiefs, (2) Philadelphia Eagles, (3) Cincinnati Bengals, (4) Buffalo Bills

Very Good: (5) San Francisco 49ers, (6) Miami Dolphins, (7) Detroit Lions, (8) Dallas Cowboys, (9) Pittsburgh Steelers

Good: (10) Baltimore Ravens, (11) Seattle Seahawks, (12) Jacksonville Jaguars, (13) New York Jets

Average: (14) Los Angeles Chargers, (15) New York Giants, (16) Atlanta Falcons, (17) New Orleans Saints, (18) Minnesota Vikings

Not Good: (19) New England Patriots, (20) Green Bay Packers, (21) Cleveland Browns, (22) Tennessee Titans, (23) Los Angeles Rams, (24) Chicago Bears, (25) Denver Broncos

Very Bad: (26) Indianapolis Colts, (27) Carolina Panthers, (28) Houston Texans, (29) Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Putrid: (30) Washington Commanders, (31) Las Vegas Raiders, (32) Arizona Cardinals

athletic power rankings has lions at 13.  

5th in nfc behind eagles, niners, cowboys, and seahawks.

[Jason_R]

Yeah, until proved otherwise on the field, Seattle is better than Detroit. They may have had a better draft than Detroit too. 

[Motown Bombers]

Seattle had the same record as the Lions, faded down the stretch, and Geno Smith is much more of a question mark than Goff. 

[RandyMarsh]

Id put the Lions ahead of the Seahawks and Cowboys. Yeah they lost to them but 1 head to head matchup doesn't necessarily determine who the true better team is. Inferior teams win every week in the NFL. Basically every metric and stat suggested that the Lions were better than the Seahawks and while most had Dallas higher they weren't noticeably higher and if you weighted it more heavy on how they were playing in the 2nd half then the Lions would be higher. 

Plus I just think the Lions had the better offseason and has more players likely to grow and get better than Dallas does. 

[Motown Bombers]

I bet that Seattle game goes differently if they played each other the 2nd half of the season. The Lions over a 10 game stretch were one of the best teams in the league. 

[Jason_R]

6 minutes ago, Motown Bombers said:

Seattle had the same record as the Lions, faded down the stretch, and Geno Smith is much more of a question mark than Goff. 

Still Geno Smith put up 48 points on Detroit in their last contest. 

I don’t expect that to happen again, but Detroit is not the only team who drafted players and signed free agents. 

[Motown Bombers]

1 minute ago, Jason_R said:

Still Geno Smith put up 48 points on Detroit in their last contest. 

I don’t expect that to happen again, but Detroit is not the only team who drafted players and signed free agents. 

And Jared Goff put up 45 on Seattle. Seattle finished the season 3-5 with two of those wins coming against the Rams. These are power rankings for next year. I think the Lions did more to secure their areas of weakness, Seattle was regressing, and I simply trust Goff more to repeat his performance than Smith. 

[Jimbo]

This is an estimated depth chart from this year to last year.  Can argue exact placement of certain players.  I am really liking the improvements on both sides of the ball.  Still incomplete with what they do with cap space and after June 1rst cuts.  Always room for improvements although I think at the end of last year we were a top 6 team in the NFC even with our weaknesses.  Biggest weakness was definitely rush defense and secondary.  Secondary is night and day better.  Might take a few weeks to mesh although I think that went from the worst in the league, to a strength.  Run defense with health and Campbell (and improvements in the secondary) got better.  Defensive line got better with more experience and health.  For offense, I think WR's are about the same, maybe not week 1 although after Jamo gets back from suspension and adding Gibbs will make this group better than last year (debatable).  RB's are better and more explosive in my opinion.  OL is about the same.  Older although more depth. 

 

Edited May 3, 2023 by Jimbo

[RandyMarsh]

I think I like the Lions offseason more than others is because the Lions had a clear liability in the secondary and they appeared to have upgraded it greatly. 

I don't think any of the comparable teams upgraded a weakness that basically single handedly cost them games like the Lions did with their secondary..... atleast on paper anyway which is all we can really go on at this point. 

To sum it up other teams may or may not have added better players but I don't think they are as big of upgrades over what they were playing with before as the Lions made. 

[RandyMarsh]

With all this said I certainly don't think it's egregious or or out of line to have the Lions 5th but personally as of now I only see 2 teams that I would put above them in the NFC.

[Motown Bombers]

Not that I'm thinking about Seattle, Hendon Hooker reminds me a lot of Geno Smith. The good Geno Smith at least. 

The good thing about the Geno Smith comparison is that Smith finally figured it out at 32 so Hooker isn't too old yet. 

Edited May 3, 2023 by Motown Bombers

[NYLion]

On 4/30/2023 at 12:10 PM, TP_Fan said:

People are too concerned with where players were taken.  For example, no one would have been too upset if the lions would have taken Branch with the 18th pick. He was considered a sure fire first rounder, even invited to the green room.

If you blinded the first 5 picks from what order they were picked in most everyone would agree the lions got a haul. That’s why I think perceived value is such a nerd argument, it’s meant for a vacuum. 

Look at Campbell and Branch.  Lions didn’t absolutely need Branch, they were fortunate to get him where they did.  But they were willing to not get him. Different philosophy for Campbell. Holmes and Dan concluded the was their guy.  He was the one they wanted because LB was such a need on this team. They went and ensured they got him, didn’t leave it to chance that he was there in the 2nd round. Love the strategy.  The numbers of this draft class is in historic category for Holmes and the Lions. Let’s see how it plays out on the field now. 

I don't think even think it's about draft value, I think it's more about positional value. The positional value hounds say that you can't take RB, off ball LB or TE early unless they're generational and that's exactly what the Lions did so those that put a lot of stock in positional value hated their draft. 

Personally, I see it as good football players being good football players. If you see a good player that is the best player on your board and a culture fit go get him and that's exactly what the Lions did. It presents some risk but so does every draft pick really. I'd prefer that they don't reach for a less desirable player just because they need to fill some positional value quota. I have some questions about this draft but they got good players that will present matchup problems for the opposition in the cases of Gibbs and LaPorta specifically. Holmes probably felt content with the roster and felt that he could take some luxury picks.

Edited May 3, 2023 by NYLion

[RandyMarsh]

I agree with the positional logic if you are a team starting from scratch but that wasn't the case with the Lions. 

They have their qb, both tackles, top 2 WRs and pass rushers so basically all the more valued positions so what should they do? Draft inferior players that wont start and thus probably not contribute as much just cause they play a more valued position? If so I don't agree with that line of thinking. 

[NYLion]

On 4/29/2023 at 5:29 PM, MichiganCardinal said:

 

 

DT: Alim McNeill / Isaiah Buggs / Josh Paschal / Brodric Martin / Levi Onwuzurike... C+

The only true "weakness" I see on this team right now. This was a position group that definitely could have stood to improve in the offseason, but no real improvement has been made to this point, unless Martin is better than I think he is out of the gate as a rookie. These players performed well enough down the stretch, and if they can replicate that performance, I think they'll be alright, as in not actively costing us game. I worry about ground-and-pound teams with really good offensive lines (notably the Eagles and 49ers) having their way though.

 

I didn't see this until now, good breakdown.

I isolated D-Line because I agree that it can really use improvement. There's still time for Holmes to add a piece there after we see some cuts or maybe there's somebody in free agency he has his eye on (I can't imagine that he created cap space for nothing) but if he stands pat, it tells me that either he feels like Levi is good to go or that he sees Martin as ready to make an impact now (which I highly doubt) because that's a pretty thin group depthwise at a really important position especially come playoff time. Paschal is a guy I could see making a jump but he's more of an edge than a 3T tackle so there's definitely a need alongside McNeil.

Also, I would add Ibrahim to the running back room. I like him a lot and see him usurping  Reynolds as RB3

Edited May 3, 2023 by NYLion

[Motown Bombers]

If you aren't taking a player because of positional value, then who do you take? I think the argument could be made for Gonzalez. Of the players taken after Gibbs, that's the only one. You could also make the argument they stay at 6 and take one of Carter, Wilson or even Robinson but you also have to factor in they picked up LaPorta in the trade. 

[Stanley70]

Positional value isn't a one size fits all argument. If you have a team ready to win in the playoffs and they fill a few need with top draft picks, that is different than a bad team with holes all over the place taking a RB early for example. When they really need impact players. They wind up wasting a few years of RBs career while they are building a team

I don't think SF giving up a bunch of picks for McCaffery last year regrets what they did. 

 

 

[Motown Bombers]

I'm curious to see how the Packers do. I like that Holmes didn't just go defense and continued to build on an already good offense and still address the defense. The Packers haven't spent a 1st round pick on offense since 2011. It will be interesting to see if the same phenomena happens with Green Bay that happened with New England. Was it Rodgers carrying that team and their neglect of the offense finally shows, or have they really been building a good supporting cast? 

[buddha]

i'll believe detroit is better than seattle when they make them punt.

once.

seattle has bitch slapped the lions two straight seasons.  beat them first before we start crowing about how good we are.  dallas too.

the lions in that same group as seattle and dallas is about where they belong.  below the niners and eagles.

[buddha]

the lions have some money to burn, so they may be looking to add some more folks that could make them better.

[NYLion]

1 hour ago, Jason_R said:

Yeah, until proved otherwise on the field, Seattle is better than Detroit. They may have had a better draft than Detroit too. 

Yeah but Detroit had a much better free agency.

I always find it hard ranking NFL teams because there's so much fluidity from year to year but I feel comfortable putting the Chiefs, Eagles, Niners, Bengals and Bills in the top tier.

@buddha The Lions are a MUCH better team than the one Seattle played early last season defensively and Seattle really got exposed as the season wore on. I think they had a bit of fools' gold to start last season so I'm not as high on them as you are.

I agree that the Lions are in the Dallas tier, probably along with the Giants and, don't be surprised if the Rams bounce back to being respectable, still lots of good players over there.

Edited May 3, 2023 by NYLion

[RandyMarsh]

3 minutes ago, buddha said:

i'll believe detroit is better than seattle when they make them punt.

once.

seattle has bitch slapped the lions two straight seasons.  beat them first before we start crowing about how good we are.  dallas too.

the lions in that same group as seattle and dallas is about where they belong.  below the niners and eagles.

I wouldn't say bitch slapped. The Lions put up 45 on them despite playing without their 4 best offensive weapons.(st. Brown, swift, jamo and chark) 

[NYLion]

1 hour ago, Jason_R said:

Still Geno Smith put up 48 points on Detroit in their last contest. 

I don’t expect that to happen again, but Detroit is not the only team who drafted players and signed free agents. 

The Lions added Houston, Okwara, Paschal, Sutton, CJGJ, Moseley, Walker eventually, Campbell and Branch since then. It's a completely different defense than the one Seattle faced last year.

Edited May 3, 2023 by NYLion

[RandyMarsh]

2 minutes ago, NYLion said:

The Lions added Houston, Okwara, Paschal, Sutton, CJGJ, Moseley, Walker eventually, Campbell and Branch since then. It's a completely different defense than the one Seattle faced last year.

Yep and on offense the Lions added St. Brown, Jamo, Gibbs and Marvin Jones to the team that faced Seattle. I didn't add Laporta or Montgomery since we lost Hock and Jamaal from that game. 

I'm sure Seattle added or lost some players too but the point is that these two teams are drastically different then the ones that played early last year so I don't see how you could put any stock in that game to determine who's better. Unless of course youre a natural Lions skeptic and want to find any reasons you can to temper the expectations.