00:00All right, draft.
00:02How do you feel about the draft, Gator?
00:05I actually ran through some emotions over the weekend watching the draft
00:11when picks are being selected.
00:19And I started off being upset.
00:24I started off being upset just mildly.
00:27Upset might be the wrong word.
00:29Like with every pick.
00:29Like you look at the first pick they had and like, okay,
00:34I want a Monroe Freeling or Monroe Freeling,
00:37but I'm fine with play.
00:38I'm fine with play.
00:39It works.
00:40It's Miller time.
00:41Here we go.
00:41That's fine.
00:42So it was mild.
00:43Then a second round, they ended up trading up for Derek Moore.
00:50And I didn't love that pick for the Lions at the time.
00:56A, I didn't want them to move up to select the guy unless it was like you can't miss,
01:02got to have him guy, right?
01:03Um, but then I started to relax a little bit.
01:07I don't dislike Derek Moore.
01:09I actually think he's a pretty good player.
01:10Um, but if you're going to take a, uh, an edge rusher, I was hoping, you know, my guy was
01:16Denny Dennis Sutton.
01:17I was hoping they could, you know, maybe wait a little bit longer and get him.
01:19Um, but I also recognize that the team that behind the, uh, Lions was Baltimore and they
01:26were looking edge.
01:27They took Zion young to pick right after.
01:29I don't think they were on a design young.
01:31My guess is they wanted Derek Moore.
01:35Well, I think that's pretty safe.
01:37No, no, no, no, no, not the Lions.
01:38I think I don't think Baltimore.
01:40Yeah.
01:40I think Baltimore won.
01:42I can buy that narrative that the Baltimore wanted to take him.
01:47They're like, well, we got to take him.
01:47We got to get ahead of Baltimore.
01:49Um, and they did, and that's fine where things start.
01:53Then I start to get to, you get to the fourth round and there's maneuvering or whatever.
01:58And the Lions are, are ready to pick at one 18.
02:04And there's my guy.
02:06Then he done a Sutton is available, but they already took the edge rusher in the second round.
02:10So that's probably not going to happen.
02:11Mike Washington jr.
02:13The running back from Arkansas was 225 pounds and runs a four, three 40.
02:19Kind of excited about that.
02:20If they wanted to get him.
02:21Nope.
02:21Nope.
02:22They needed a corner.
02:23Malik Muhammad was there.
02:25Nope.
02:25When, when they're going to do that, my, my throw it up the, off the wall, pick the, uh,
02:31the Connor Lou, the center from Auburn was available there and they didn't take him.
02:35Instead.
02:35They selected Jimmy Rolder, the linebacker for Michigan, that one got the most visceral
02:40response for me where I was upset.
02:43And then as the draft goes on, I calm down again a little bit.
02:48Um, the more I hear about Rolder, the more I like, but I also can't think I can't get
02:54past thinking that, okay, he came out at the end of the season, but for Michigan, is
02:59this a guy I want with their third pick in this draft, which is their fourth round pick
03:04could they have done better there?
03:05I'm, I'm, I'm a little concerned about that, but I'm willing to, to see how it plays out.
03:11But then the rest of the draft happens and I'm pretty satisfied actually with the way
03:14that the, that it went.
03:16I think they got a steal with, uh, the corner from Arizona state, Keith Abney.
03:21Yep.
03:21Like him a lot.
03:22The other guys, there's, there's upside with those other players that they got.
03:25Interesting that they took a wide receiver, uh, and hearing Brad Holmes talk about him
03:30saying, you know, he looks more like a running back than he does a wide receiver.
03:33And he played Alabama and Kentucky, and there's a lot to like.
03:36He's got pretty good high end speed and all right, fair enough.
03:40I, I think overall, if I have to give it a letter grade, I give it a solid B, a
03:45solid
03:46B.
03:46And I think what they did was they, they went out there and they, they addressed
03:50needs clearly needed a tackle.
03:53Got it.
03:53Needed a edge rusher.
03:54Got it.
03:54Need a linebacker.
03:55Got it.
03:56Need a corner.
03:56Got it.
03:57You know, they, they addressed a lot of these needs.
04:00Um, and then even with the undrafted free agents, there's some guys that might have a
04:04chance to make the squad too.
04:05So I, I liked it, but there are guys that would have preferred.
04:08So I didn't love it, but I liked it.
04:11And I'll have, well, of course, with everything else, you let it play out.
04:14Yeah.
04:15I think that, uh, yeah, the tandem from Michigan might end up being really good.
04:18Derek Moore might be really, really good.
04:20So there's a few things about this and, you know, there's some of its draft related, some
04:25of its overall roster related, and some of its Brad Holmes related.
04:29I'll start with the Brad Holmes stuff.
04:31I've, I'm a huge Brad Holmes fan, but I also am more than willing to acknowledge that the
04:36work he's done here has not been good enough.
04:38He needs to be better.
04:39He's got them into a place where I consistently like the roster and who they're putting out
04:45there.
04:45And I think he's put together a sustainable model as long as he continues drafting well.
04:51And I've said it a whole bunch.
04:53This is a big off season.
04:54I loved that when he was meeting with the media on Friday, or I guess it was Saturday
05:00after day three, he made a comment about something.
05:03And then he kind of, I think, regretted saying it because he said, I'm not going to get into
05:07details, but he mentioned that he's got a few things that he put up on his wall and as
05:14constant reminders.
05:15And one of them was, we didn't make the playoffs.
05:20Exactly.
05:20And I think that is a Brad Holmes self-starter rehabilitation of my beliefs kind of thing.
05:31I need to be better.
05:33When I heard him say that, and then the reporters asked a few follow-up questions, he said, look,
05:37I'm not going to go into details, but I'm thinking, yeah, last place team didn't make
05:44the playoffs.
05:45You've been very good and you've drafted some great young players and you're in the process
05:51of locking those players up through the primes of their career.
05:56However, when you put that kind of note up on your wall, that is the general manager saying
06:02what has happened here was not good enough.
06:06And I, I love that acknowledgement.
06:09Here's the other thing.
06:10If someone said, show me what a draft looks like of a team drafting for need, it would look
06:19like this.
06:21So he constantly talks about best player available, but he did again, something that we've talked
06:29about in the past, and that is when you say best player available, you mean the best player
06:34that's available when you are selecting, right?
06:38Oh, the player at the position that we need, that is the best player available might not
06:44make it here.
06:46I'm going to move out of here.
06:48And he did it with Derek Moore.
06:50Now, whether you believe in Derek Moore or not, he clearly saw a gap between Derek Moore,
06:58Derek Moore, Zion Young, Gabe Ackes, and your guy, Danny Sutton, Danny Dennis, yes.
07:06Danny Dennis Sutton.
07:08Yes.
07:08And your guy, right?
07:09He saw that gap.
07:11He wasn't going to sit there and let the board take the last player.
07:16And he said in that moment in time, he was the number one player on their board.
07:19And he wasn't going to let him go.
07:21That is aggressively.
07:23Number one at that time.
07:24Yes.
07:24Yes.
07:24At that time when he was sitting there, that's the number one player.
07:27And he wasn't going to let him go.
07:29That's manipulating the board.
07:31That is making sure that BPA doesn't have the player at the position you need gets snatched
07:38out from under your nose.
07:39And I like that aggression.
07:41And so I'm a huge fan of the way he went about this draft.
07:47And do I think it's a shift in his philosophy?
07:50Maybe.
07:51I mean, he did it before we turned in Arnold where he didn't want to wait and he moved
07:55up.
07:55Now, of course, it's important to get the player, right?
07:57And the book's still out on Arnold and the book will be out on Derek Moore.
08:01But that's a philosophical thing that I'm happy.
08:05I think Brad did a lot of soul searching and has made some adjustments.
08:10He probably wouldn't say that publicly, but I think he's made some adjustments.
08:14This is a need heavy draft.
08:18He did kind of address that again with the note about missing the playoffs.
08:23So when he did an interview with Dan Miller from Fox 2, it was like an eight-minute interview
08:27that he did with Dan talking about all the picks and the philosophy.
08:29And the first thing Dan asked him about was, you know, you looked after the season.
08:33The big difference was you guys didn't make the playoffs.
08:35And he's like, oh, yeah, that played a huge role in what we're going to do.
08:39I think it also lined up that this team had a lot of needs.
08:44And you could make the case that, of course, you're going to take the address of what you
08:48needed in that dress.
08:48You took a corner, you needed a corner.
08:51You needed a linebacker, you took a linebacker.
08:53You needed a defensive tackle, you took a defensive tackle.
08:56You know, the one that kind of throws a monkey wrench in that a little bit is maybe the fifth
09:00round pick of the wide receiver from Kentucky.
09:04That might be the one you're like, okay, weird, but talented player without question.
09:10But you go back to that second round, and it's clear that they had Derek Moore as the top
09:15player on their board, not just at the position, but the top player on the board.
09:19If you look at other players that were taken in the second round, guys, we talked a lot
09:23about D'Angelo Ponds, the corner from Indiana, who went 50.
09:27Emmanuel McNeil-Warren, the safety, who went at 58.
09:30The Lions didn't draft a safety.
09:33Now, does that say that they don't think that there's a need there?
09:35Brad Holmes said afterwards, well, you know, we expect these guys to come back and be able
09:40to play next year when it comes, this season, when it comes to Kirby Joseph and Bryant Branch.
09:46But I thought it was interesting they didn't take a safety, but they thought that the player
09:51they were getting with Derek Moore was more important to have, and he was number one on
09:56their list at that point in time, as opposed to the safety McNeil-Warren.
10:00He did say they wanted a safety, but it was pretty clear.
10:03Every time they were on the board, the safeties didn't line up, and he didn't get a chance
10:06to move around to get that safety, 248-539-9797.
10:11We asked a question on Twitter, and we've got plenty of time.
10:14Of all the players they got this weekend, who's your favorite, and who is your least favorite?
10:20Given all circumstance, we're talking about round, value, underrated, overrated, if they
10:27had to move around to get them, which acquisition this weekend was your favorite, which is your
10:33least favorite?
10:34248-539-9797.
10:37Questions out there on Twitter, a bunch of people have answered it, but we want to hear
10:40from you now.
10:41If you want to keep talking Pistons, let's go.
10:44Massive, massive game tonight, pretty much the first 90 minutes of the show have been
10:47dedicated to them, but it's a big story, and Detroit on edge going into this game four
10:52tonight in Orlando.
10:54Champ and Chubb votes, keep them coming in here on a Monday on Carson Anderson on 97.1.
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