One of the more candid tidbits from last week’s press conference featuring Detroit Lions GM Brad Holmes and assistant GM Ray Agnew came with the very last question. Holmes provided an honest answer that confirms what his actions in two years of running the Lions have indicated:
Do not expect this team to draft a linebacker early. Not with Holmes in charge.
In two draft cycles, Holmes has made it clear he doesn’t see value in selecting an off-ball linebacker early in the draft. His Lions held tight until trading up to get Derrick Barnes from Purdue in the fourth round in 2021 and waited until the sixth round in 2022 to snag Oklahoma State’s Malcolm Rodriguez. Barnes and Rodriguez will have prominent roles in the Lions’ 4-2 defense in 2022, along with veteran Alex Anzalone and free agent signee, Chris Board.
Eschewing popular, highly-rated prospects at linebacker is not an accident for Holmes. He strongly believes the value in the position is late in the draft, not early.
“You can always look at past success at certain positions that you may be able to hit on in the later rounds,” Holmes said, speaking in response to a question about Rodriguez specifically. He cited safety as well,
“I was talking with Ray (Agnew) about when we were with the Rams, drafted (safety) Jordan Fuller in the sixth round, but had a pretty good idea that he’s a high-floor player that’s going to end up being a starter, so – but there’s certain positions that you can kind of look at and assess that you may be able to find gold in the later rounds, and inside linebackers, it’s a good volume of them throughout the draft.”
It’s something Holmes has learned from his long tenure in the Rams front office. The Rams almost never valued LB before Day 3. Holmes surrounded himself with people whose history tells the same story. Special assistant John Dorsey took one off-ball LB before Day 3 exactly once in six drafts. From the research into their draft tendencies when Holmes and the front office were brought in,
In the time Holmes was the director of collegiate scouting, they took exactly one non-EDGE linebacker in the first 120 picks. That was in the first draft of that era when the Rams tabbed Alec Ogletree at No. 30 overall. After that, the organization did not value the off-ball LB above taking Samson Ebukam (who is as much an EDGE as an off-ball guy) in the fourth round in 2017. Guys like Bryce Hager, Micah Kiser, Josh Forrest, all later Day 3 draft picks, are the manifestation of how the Holmes-era Rams valued the off-ball backer.
It is the same with Dorsey, who was the GM of the Kansas City Chiefs and Cleveland Browns before joining the Lions,
Dorsey’s drafts showed a similar pattern. In his first draft in Kansas City, he picked Nico Johnson in the fourth round, No. 99 overall in 2013. He didn’t take another off-ball LB before the fourth round until his final draft in Cleveland in 2019, Sione Takitaki in the third.
Believe what Holmes and Agnew said about not valuing linebackers early in the draft. It’s the cloth from which they’re cut, and it’s the same cloth woven around head coach Dan Campbell from his Saints and Dolphins days. Do not expect them to change their core value seams.
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