Lions GM Holmes talks Day 1 and Day 2 trade options, plus Blake Miller's upside and urgency

Allen Park — Here are five quick-hitting items that came out of Detroit Lions general manager Brad Holmes’ media session following the first round of the NFL draft.

Trade chatter before making pick

The Lions ultimately stuck at their original draft slot in the first round, taking Clemson’s Blake Miller at No. 17.

The phone was relatively quiet once the Lions were on the clock. Holmes initially said he didn’t get any offers, before amending his answer to note the team had one opportunity to trade down.

“I wasn’t really surprised,” Holmes said about the lack of action.

Alternatively, when there was an early run on offensive tackles, with three coming off the board between picks 9-12, Holmes said he did make some brief inquiries about a move up to secure Miller.

“We did, yeah,” Holmes said. “Look, we talked to teams, up, you know, way up. And we just kind of talk about and try to see if we can be at peace with what the capital is that you’d have to expend.

“Yeah, we definitely explored strongly about trading up and just kind of seeing how (the board) it started to fall,” Holmes continued. “Probably about when we got to about — right after L.A. took the quarterback (at pick No. 13), I felt pretty good that we might be able to just get Blake (at 17).”

Holmes said there was some added concern that another team would jump them, simply because Detroit’s need for an offensive tackle was so clear. In the end, the team decided to keep its assets and that scenario didn’t come to fruition.

There were a handful of trades in the first round, including a swap of top-10 picks between Kansas City and Cleveland, where the Chiefs sent a third- and fifth-rounder to the Browns to move up from ninth to sixth.

For the Lions to move up from 17 to 12 or 13, the cost likely would have been in the same ballpark, with the team having two fourth-round and two fifth-round choices to leverage in talks.

Dealing on Day 2 an option

Detroit has just one pick on Friday, No. 50 in the second round.

Holmes said the team would reset its draft board to determine if they needed to attempt moving down for extra selections.

“We’ll go back and look at it and get a fresh stack and just kind of see do we have enough players,” Holmes said. “Do we feel comfortable staying at 50? Or, you know, does it look like it’s not enough? And do we need to move back just to reach our cluster?

“We’ve already kind of have gone through that process before the draft started,” Holmes said. “But obviously, you never know until you see who’s left (after Round 1). We’ll definitely go back, see what’s left, and then we’ll just kind of see.”

If you’re looking for an example of what kind of swap the Lions could be targeting with a trade down, in 2025, the Raiders were able to deal the No. 48 pick to Houston for No. 59 and No. 99.

High floor, high ceiling

Twice in the first few minutes of his media session, Holmes highlighted Miller’s high floor.

“I’ll tell you what, when we think about Blake Miller, you sleep easy,” Holmes said. “You sleep very, very good at night.”

However, the general manager also acknowledged upside, both through the lens of the player’s tremendous athleticism, as well as demonstratable development throughout his college career.

Holmes said Miller first caught his eye when reviewing some 2023 Clemson tape. The general manager liked what he saw from the then-sophomore, notably his urgency, and continued to track his progress, seeing steady growth in Miller’s fundamentals.

“He’s gotten stronger, his technique’s gotten better, his hands have gotten better,” Holmes said. “…I think there’s a lot of growth left in him, and that’s hard to find. Some guys, they have a really high ceiling, but the floor is not as high, and so there’s a little bit more development.

“Look, these are all rookies, so they’re going to have their lumps and all that,” Holmes said. “We expect that, but it’s hard to find guys that have the floor and still have growth, because this guy, when you start matching up his athleticism numbers and all of that to these other tackles, I mean, he’s right up in the mix. So, we’ll see how high it goes, but I don’t have any hesitation or any reservations that he’s going to continue to get better.”

Seeking to rediscover former identity

One of the more significant appeals with Miller, contrasted against some of the other six tackles selected in the first round, was his experience and performance as a run blocker. The Lions are determined to get that component of the offense back on track with its remodeled front and Holmes believes Miller can be a big part of that solution.

“Just looking at all the tackle (prospect)s again, just refreshing and looking at all the run-blocking snaps of all of them, Blake was just right up there among the top, in terms of just his sheer run block,” Holmes said. “This guy is a physical, gritty. I mean, he’s a finisher.

“He’s a finisher,” Holmes said. “He’s trying to finish all the time. And when you get into the interview process with him, he talks about that, how he prides himself on that. Now, look, a lot of tackles will say that because it sounds good to say in an interview, but his tape actually says that. So there’s certain guys that they might fit you, but they won’t try to strain to stay connected. But Miller, that’s why he’s such a fit. I thought that he was one of the better run-blocking tackles in this draft for sure.”

Holmes, who had praised Miller’s urgency on tape, was asked to define what that looked like from an offensive lineman.

“Just a guy that will come off the ball, especially in the run game,” Holmes said. “When he gets that initial fit, he’s going to continue to strain through the whistle. He’s not peeking back and seeing where the ball is. He knows what his assignment is, and he’s going to try and finish and bury that guy."

Not feeling a time crunch

It wasn’t that long ago that teams had 15 minutes to make their picks in the first round. That was reduced to 10 a few years back and was sliced to eight minutes this year.

Holmes was asked how much he noticed the reduction.

“I didn’t really feel a big difference,” He said. “I know that a lot of the GMs were polled about that before they enforced this new rule, and I think everybody felt good about it. For the most part, a lot of the trades, they’re pretty much kind of hammered out within a few minutes, at the most. And especially a lot of first-round trades are kind of — some range of parameters are already set before the draft even starts so guys aren’t scrambling around.

“That’s the trade component, because that’s what you worry about on the clock, but then also just who you’re going to pick,” Holmes said. “I always feel like if you’re staying true to your board like we always do, it’s really not hard. So I was all on board, and I think everybody else was on board, so I didn’t feel a difference.”