D-
Detroit Lions
A costly weekend of dealing drags the Lions to a D-.
by ScholarlyViking ·
2026 NFL Draft
· 16 picks
· 7 steals
· 8 reaches
If confidence were a draft strategy, the Lions would have aced it. Khordae Sydnor at the Round 7 slot is 205 spots clear of where he belonged. The math is unkind, and the D- follows.
They lost the exchange badly enough to drag the whole class down. The safety spot stays a question, and it was the one they most needed an answer at. If one pick saves this weekend, it is Dunker.
The roster is better shaped than it was, with cornerback chief among the fixes.
Bottom line, they will need several of these picks to beat their grades just to break even, and safety is still a hole.
Pick-by-Pick
In pick 24 they get a cornerstone up front. Exactly the need they had to hit.
In the Round 1 slot they get a security blanket over the middle at a price that makes it sweeter. A real need, handled.
The board had Chris Johnson higher than pick No. 47, and the cornerback fell to them anyway. Better still, it is exactly the hole they had to fill.
Anthony Hill Jr. at No. 60 is a first-round grade at a bargain-bin price, no notes. It shores up a spot that genuinely needed the help.
A slide stopped in the 78th pick, with Jake Golday worth more than the price. Top of the wish list, and they did not leave without it.
They talked themselves into Darrell Jackson Jr. at slot 85, and the board did not agree. Not urgent, but hardly pointless.
They barely believed it either: Gennings Dunker still on the board at pick No. 89. A glaring weakness, addressed head on.
They left a pile of value on the table to take Trey Zuhn III this early at No. 107. It answers the question that was keeping the coaches up at night.
A big swing on Nadame Tucker at the 118th pick, well ahead of any board in the building. A must-fix position, and they treated it like one.
The board fumbled Malik Muhammad all the way to the 128th overall pick, and they scooped it up. That was the need underlined and circled, and now it is checked off.
They liked Ephesians Prysock enough to skip the value, taking him in the Round 5 slot. The biggest hole on the depth chart just got a whole lot smaller.
Jeff Caldwell in slot 213 should not have been possible, and that is the whole point. Another box on the needs board, quietly ticked.
Riley Mahlman at Round 7, Pick 6 is a steep price for a hunch, hard to square with any board. The one spot they could not leave alone, and did not.
The board screamed and they did not listen, reaching into the next round for Reggie Grimes II. It also answers one of the loudest questions on the roster.
They reached into another round for Dasan McCullough, and the board is nowhere close to agreeing. They walked in needing this and walked out with it.
Khordae Sydnor at pick No. 245 is an overdraft of the loud, memorable kind. This was priority one on the needs board, and now it is handled.