The Lions are not done with project players, but Detroit plans to be picky and there's two good examples of what that looks like

The Detroit Lions and general manager Brad Holmes have been very good at drafting players since 2021. There are multiple Pro Bowl and All-Pro players on this team these days. But the Lions have also spent a lot of time looking for projects and developmental players.

Some of those guys have worked out. Guys like Kerby Joseph, Christian Mahogany, Malcolm Rodriguez, and Isaac TeSlaa have all come into Detroit as players who were not expected to be what they turned out to be. Or at least they weren't expected to grow into their current forms so fast. Just because they're good now, that doesn't mean they weren't a project to start out, and that the Lions successfully developed them.

On the flip side, there are guys like Hendon Hooker, Brodric Martin, James Houston, James Mitchell, and Colby Sorsdal. These projects have not worked. No matter how much the Lions have put into these guys, it just didn't work out.

There have been some Lions fans who have been begging Holmes and company to stop picking up projects and only pick good players, as if anyone knows who is going to develop into a good player. It's part of the game for sure. Still, the Lions may be leaning towards drafting fewer "projects" after Brad Holmes said a variation of this over and over again this summer.

”What’s gotten really hard—and it’s really been visible this year—is that in the past, especially in our first couple years, we had a lot of just young, developmental players that we really liked and we had a lot of room for. And as the guys have made these leaps and bounds and the talent has gotten better, it’s hard to always find room for those young, developmental guys.”

On Wednesday, we got to ask Holmes to elaborate on this on little more to find out if the Lions plan to maybe stay away from the player they deem a project right off the bat.

"It's not that we won't go for that anymore," Holmes said. "I think everyone is case by case. So it's not just, oh, every developmental prospect is in a vacuum, but it's just, I think, where we're at as a roster right now, you're just more cognizant of it. I think there's times and windows to strike here and there, but you know, you just, you're more aware of it, as opposed to when we first started. We just had a lot more room for those guys and have a lot more time. So I would never say that we would not take a developmental player, but you just gotta be in the right situation."

So there you go, the Lions aren't done with the projects, but they do plan to be a little more picky with them. What does that mean for some of the projects that are currently on the team, like Giovanni Manu or Sione Vaki? It doesn't mean the Lions are just going to stop developing them. They're pretty good examples of what being picky would look like. These are two guys with talent and athleticism that was worth developing. As long as that's there, the Lions may be looking to find a way to get them in the building. They just might not be looking to use high draft picks on them anymore.