The Detroit Lions are not in a great spot. They lost their only playoff game this year after earning the No. 1 seed in the NFC. No sooner did their season end, they also lost both their offensive and defensive coordinator to head coaching jobs.
And to make matters worse, the winning culture Dan Campbell has instilled since taking the team over won’t allow for him to have a down season despite a lot of turnover. In fact, if the Lions do regress, he could enter Doug Pederson in Philadelphia territory, or even Nick Sirianni before he just won a championship.
Yet, even after losing their top two coordinators, they have a lot to address player-wise to stay competitive next season. The biggest question mark is their defensive line. They traded for Za’Darius Smith before the trade deadline to stop the bleeding after losing Aidan Hutchinson to a gruesome leg injury.
But Smith was never a long-term solution. So the question becomes who will? With Myles Garrett demanding a trade from the Cleveland Browns, the Lions could make a massive move to anchor down two of the NFL’s premier pass rushers. But would it be worth it?
The Detroit Lions have to decide the best way to address their pass rush to remain NFC contenders in 2025
However, it might not be wise to go all in for Garrett to bolster their defensive line and pass rush. The Eagles presented one of the best defensive fronts in the NFL this season and it was all homegrown, as Jeremy Reisman of Pride of Detroit noted on X/Twitter following the Super Bowl.
The Eagles’ entire defensive line was drafted: Nolan Smith, first-round pick; Jalen Carter, first-round pick; Jordan Davis, first-round pick; Brandon Graham, first-round pick; Josh Sweat, fourth-round pick.
The Lions may not have the patience to wait for multiple drafts to anchor down their defensive line. That said, this is a deep draft when it comes to pass rushers and defensive linemen. Andrew Berry has made it clear he doesn’t plan on trading Garrett.
Which means if the Lions were to even consider swaying him, what they’d have to give up would hurt them miserably. Yes, the Browns are rebuilding, but in their particular position, they’d probably prefer players over draft picks scattered over the next two to three years.
If the Lions were smart, this class is deep enough, they should look to trade up in the first three rounds and build through the draft. With the right coaches, it can work. Campbell was able to take Aaron Glenn and turn him into a head coach, there’s gotta be confidence he can do it with Glenn’s incumbent.
Garrett is obviously a one-of-a-kind player that would make Detroit’s pass rush better instantly. But the Browns’ asking price for Garrett, especially since they don’t want to trade him, wouldn’t be worth entertaining.
With a little patience and smart drafting though, they could build a defensive front like Philadelphia and we saw how that worked out for them.