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Merry Draftmas to All

On the First Day of Draftmas, this website game to thee: Eight draft day busts, Seven Mad Predictions, Six Draftmas subplots, FIVE BOB QUINN QUOTES, Four mock drafts, three snack foods, two late round gems, and a trade.

In aaaaaa tree.

That’s called bringing it all the way around kiddos. It’s Draftmas day! Can you feel that? The anticipation in the air, like everything is just clearer……. or am I having a stroke? A quick check reveals that my speech is fine, as is the movement of all of my body that is normally unimpeded.

Eight Draftmas Busts

This is pretty easy to follow, I’m going to give you the eight players I think are going to go day one, and never live up to the status of a first round pick. You’re not going to agree with me, in some cases you are going to think I’m an idiot. That’s OK. Just remember that just because they’ve been listed as incredibly high ranked prospects from the beginning of the season until now, doesn’t mean they’re ever going to be good NFL players, and even if they become decent NFL players, that doesn’t mean they will live up to their draft status. So here we go:

• Deforrest Buckner
• Joey Bosa
• Vernon Hargreaves III
• Robert Nkemdiche
• Noah Spence
• Leonard Floyd
• William Fuller
• Jason Spriggs

You want to know why? Come on over to /r/detroitlions and ask.

Seven Mad Draftmas Predictions

• Jaylon Smith is going to go undrafted
• 25 players will go exactly where I have them slotted
• There will be no trades in round one, because otherwise my mock draft couldn’t possibly be that accurate
• Artie Burns goes in the top twenty
• Myles Jack goes in round two
• Derreck Henry is taken in the top 25
• Carl Nassib goes in round one

Six Draftmas Subplots

• Where will Robert Nkemdiche go? Threw Tunsil under the bus at the Combine, and for the last few weeks Tunsil is slipping? Did teams believe that Nkemdiche got a bit of a raw deal that night because he was too messed up to come out unscathed?
• Myles Jack’s knee has a timer attached to it. How high a pick is 6-7 years of an elite athlete worth?
• Dak Prescott claims his past is where all the indiscretions were, then gets a DUI during the pre-draft process. Does anyone take the chance?
• Laremy Tunsil is being sued by his stepfather for assault and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The day before the draft, you file a lawsuit against your stepson, virtually guaranteeing he loses millions of dollars? I don’t care what happened in the past, that’s bad business. Wait two days and he’d have more money to go after. There is no potential for jail time here, hopefully he falls to a spot where the Lions want to go up and get him.
• Eli Apple can’t cook according to an anonymous scout (did the anonymous team do well last year?)……….. then Ezekiel Elliot takes to twitter and says Apple made him a fairly difficult to make dish for dinner one night. Sounds like someone is hoping he falls to them and wants to float some garbage about the kid to scare off the competition. Good luck to Eli, being the best cover corner in the draft is more important than culinary abilities if you ask me.
• Some teams are floating that they might take Jaylon Smith in the first round. Remember the old adage “How do you know someone from a team is lying the month before the draft? They’re talking.”

Five Bob Quinn Quotes

“I think I’ve mentioned this before, I think you’ve got to kind of mesh those two together and really take the best player for the Lions,” Bob Quinn

“I’m not going to make a snap judgment on anything,” Bob Quinn

“This Player is going to be the first round pick.” Bob Quinn

“I think it’s really good football business to acquire a young quarterback every year or every other year, there’s such a value in the position and nowadays in college football there’s a lot of spread offenses, which means it’s a lot different than pro football. So it takes these young quarterbacks time to develop.” Bob Quinn

“Had some really great conversations with players and representatives and agents about the opportunity that we present, as a franchise, with the ownership, the head coach, the hierarchy that we have, in terms of the structure of the organization. The position coaches. The coordinators. It’s an attractive place to go.” Bob Quinn

Four Mock Drafts

Brandon Knapp of detroitlionspodcast.com thinks the Lions will take Taylor Decker and I couldn’t agree more.

Bryce Rossler of detroitlionspodcast.com has the Lions selecting Vernon Butler in his incredibly well thought out mock which I also agree wholeheartedly with

Adam Klepp, clearly the smartest writer on the detroitlionspodcast.com has the Lions selecting Sheldon Rankins at 16.

And that worthless hack Ash Thompson (such a stupid name, what is he Canadian?) of detroitlionspodcast.com has the Lions taking Sheldon Rankins as well, though somehow Adam is clearly right, and Ash is clearly wrong. much like the reverse time chronology of this entire series of articles, just trust me it makes sense.

So the first to the post winner in case you have not been counting is that the Lions are going to take Taylor Decker. It wasn’t a land-slide, but he was selected in more mocks than any other player.

Three Draftmas Foods

• Order a pizza
• Order some Chinese
• Order your significant other to make you a sandwich; and likely receive divorce papers.

So as a summary you have been given the ability to make:

• Garlic sauce, garlic fingers, pico de gallo
• Vodka paralyzers, bloody ceasars, and tequila moonrises
• Cheese ball, buffalo chicken dip, and taco dip
• Bruschetta, baguette and lox, and steak tartare on croutes
• Honey bourbon sauce, Buffalo sauce, and Vegan low sodium, gluten free, “chicken” bites
• Order a pizza, order Chinese, arrange the end of your relationship

In short, if any party you throw for the rest of your life doesn’t have snacks that make everyone there remember that time you threw the party for whatever you were throwing a party for and had those awesome snacks – that’s on you, my friend. Though honestly, most of my football bros would be just as happy with today’s choices as any of that other stuff, and might murder me for the tofu, but my lady fair would feel much better about the social gathering with those other options having been presented. It’s all about knowing your audience.

Two Late Round Gems

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Curt Maggit

His junior season Maggit had 11 sacks for the Vols, he’s a player with burst, who comes off the edge with the speed and purpose of a first round pick. He was the unquestioned leader of the Tennessee defense, and they felt his loss painfully. He suffered a chipped bone in his hip early in the season, and could have applied for a redshirt year, but he wants to get to the league. Hip injuries are tricky, and he also tore his ACL in 2012, which will make teams question whether he can stand up to the NFL’s punishment. The truth unfortunately is that he likely can’t, but the pass rush potential this guy has, and his likely special teams impact, make him worth a seventh round gamble.

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Andrew Williamson

This is a strong safety out of Vanderbilt who runs a 4.48 forty, hits like a comet (I’m running out of analogies for hitting hard, but he really does tackle incredibly well), and gets off receiver blocks like they’re not even there. If only he could cover. He has prototypical size and speed for the position at 6’1″ and a 35″ vertical leap; if only he could cover. twelve teams were at the Vanderbilt pro day, and I’m hoping the Lions are one of them. If the coverage issue is coaching, and not with the player, this could one of those players that comes out of nowhere. did I mention that watching him tackle is like looking in to the sun? It’s so beautiful it hurts your eyes.

The List of players I like in the late rounds is as follows:

• The Matts: Iaonnidis and Judon
• Jonathan Williams and Matt Tuerk
• Devon Cajuste and D. J. Reader
• Jatavis Brown and David Morgan Jr.
• Hassan Ridgeway and Halapoulivaati Vaitai
• Curt Maggit and Andrew Williamson

One Draftmas Trade

What would Matthew Stafford get the Lio………. Nope. As much as I love messing with Bryce in these articles, I’m dedicated to at least trying to come up with a realistic trade scenario. I’ve gone up, down, hit the second round from both sides. and today, I’m going to do the one I think is most likely. The Jets and Bills are both currently without a real quarterback signed to start for their team in 2016. The Bills pick before the Jets. If the Jets wanted to move up, what might they offer? They’re in the early years of the head coach’s tenure, and thus not as likely to want to give up future picks for immediate gain. The Jets have picks 20 and 83, which hold slightly more value than the 16th pick by itself, but this is a quarterback we’re talking about here, nobody wins the trade to go up and get a quarterback, even if it’s only a few spots. I think that in such a scenario it’s likely that the Lions could get picks 20, and 83 for pick 16, or worst case scenario send their second sixth round pick, number 169 back back the other way. So the Lions get picks 20 and 83, and the Jets get picks 16 and 169.

Thus ends (or begins) our Draftmas journey my friends. I hope some of you have enjoyed it half as much as I have. @a5hcrack on Twitter, and as always, over on /r/detroitlions. Merry Draftmas to you, may it find us all well later tonight. Remember to check out the Live draft podcast tonight, I am super excited about some of the guest spots that Chris and Case are arranging for the show. I mean, other than me. Like…. good ones….. really good ones. If it’s half as awesome as it sounds like it will be, it’ll be the best thing since………… the last thing you thought was really good.