Mocking the Detroit Lions 2023 Draft: Pre-Combine Edition #1

Welcome back to another NFL Draft season here at Keck Thoughts. We're getting the ball rolling earlier than usual because frankly I felt the need to do some writing. I've been toying around with mock draft simulations for weeks now whenever I have some downtime largely to get myself acquainted with this year's draft class, but now that the NFL Combine is happening in Indianapolis this week, I felt the need to start really figuring out what the Detroit Lions could do come April.

As usual, some explanation for how I typically handle mock draft simulations for these posts:

Some ground rules for how I performed today's mock draft simulation: 

• I try to think along the lines of Lions GM Brad Holmes and Head Coach Dan Campbell...but ultimately I'll be making a lot of picks with what I think just makes sense given the circumstances.

• Due to the nature of mock draft simulators being an algorithm and subject to randomness, let's keep in mind that some players may fall in these simulations and be available to me when they probably won't be available for Detroit in real life. Each site also has their own rankings for the players in the draft, so there will be some variance in that alone. In this particular exercise I used Pro Football Focus' simulator and, because I'll be doing another one of these posts soon, this first exercise I manually adjusted the settings so the player rankings/board were based entirely off of PFF's Users and not PFF's own rankings. That will be my next post.

• As part of the exercise I will be doing my best to address the needs of the Detroit Lions' roster. Typically I go through and compile a list of Team Needs, but this particular simulation took longer than I expected it to so I didn't get a chance to make a Team Needs list yet. I will at some point in the future.  My apologies. 

And as I always mention, this is more of a thought exercise to see who the Lions might have available to them and who they might draft in reality. Two years I did three different exercises, three different scenarios, and at various points in those exercises I had Detroit draft Levi Onwuzurike, Alim McNeil, and Amon-Ra St. Brown, all of whom Detroit actually did draft that year. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about here. 

With that lengthy intro out of the way, let's move on to the lengthy body of the post!

DETROIT LIONS MOCK DRAFT SCENARIO: Pro Football Focus User Rankings Version

This year the Detroit lions don't have a Top 3 pick, so there's a short wait until we make our first pick. In that time the first 5 picks go in a fairly predictable fashion. In this scenario Chicago sticks at #1 and drafts Jalen Carter while in reality it's likely they'll trade down a bit and someone else will take a QB with the 1st pick.

1 – CHI – JALEN CARTER, DT, Georgia
2 – HOU – BRYCE YOUNG, QB, Alabama
3 – ARIZ – WILL ANDERSON JR., DE, Alabama
4 – INDY – CJ STROUD, QB, Ohio State
5 – SEA – TYREE WILSON, DE, Texas Tech

For Detroit's pick this leaves a "best available" board of Kentucky QB Will Levis, Illinois CB Devon Witherspoon (PFF’s top-rated CB), TCU WR Quentin Johnston, Alabama DB Brian Branch, Oregon CB Christian Gonzalez, Florida QB Anthony Richardson, Iowa DE Lukas Van Ness, Ohio State OT Paris Johnson Jr., Pitt DT Calijah Kancey, Northwestern OT Peter Skoronski, and Clemson DT Bryan Bresee. 

Aside from maybe Levis there’s an argument any single one of those players would be a good pick for the Lions. Because of this I think it might be wise for Detroit to look into trading down a few spots and picking up more draft ammo. Thankfully the Carolina Panthers are calling, looking to trade up from the 9^th pick. To drop 3 spots I ask for Carolina’s 39^th overall pick. But before we go further, let’s take a look at the draft pick trade value charts.

According to Jimmy Johnson’s trade value chart, Detroit’s #6 pick is worth 1600 points, Carolina’s #9 is worth 1350, and Carolina’s #39 is 510 points. That’s a clear win for Detroit and a bit of an overpay for Carolina (1900 points to 1600 points), but if the Panthers are looking to trade up for their QB of the future, it’s not uncommon for them to pay a little extra.

According to the Rich Hill trade value chart, Detroit’s #6 pick is worth 446 points, Carolina’s #9 is 387 points, and Carolina’s #39 is 153. Again a bit of an overpay, but same deal as above.

In our simulation we’re running Carolina does accept our trade terms and we swap picks. The Panthers indeed jump up and draft a QB in Will Levis. Oakland follows by taking Florida QB Anthony Richardson, then Atlanta drafts Ohio St OT Paris Johnson Jr., leaving us with our pick of the best cornerbacks in the draft.

6 – CAR (TRADE) – WILL LEVIS, QB, Kentucky
7 – OAK – ANTHONY RICHARDSON, QB, Florida
8 – ATL – PARIS JOHNSON JR., OT, Ohio State

At this point for Detroit I think it comes down to two guys – Devon Witherspoon and Christian Gonzalez. Witherspoon is smaller than Gonzalez but seems to play a better all-around game with his play recognition and tackling. Gonzalez is bigger and faster. Both guys are strong playing man-to-man coverage, which is a pillar of Aaron Glenn’s defense. So Detroit really can’t go wrong with either, but I’m leaning Witherspoon because he just screams “I’m a Dan Campbell player” to me.

Round 1, Pick 9 (TRADE): DET – DEVON WITHERSPOON, CB, Illinois

Eight players get taken off the board between Detroit’s two 1st round picks: