Everything's on the table for the Lions with the No. 6 pick in the draft, just like the NFC North is theirs for the taking. If they nail their first pick next Thursday, they could make serious noise next season.
"This team is going to win this division, we’re going to have a home playoff game, I think they have the capability to make a run at a Super Bowl," Valenti said Monday. "Now, this pick at 6 is one of the most important picks in the history of this team, because they are that point. If they draft a Sewell, if they draft a Hutchinson, if they draft one of those impact guys, it’s going to have a direct affect on them making the most meaningful playoff run they’ve had in 30 years."
Could the guy be Georgia defensive tackle Jalen Carter, who visited with the Lions on Monday? TJ Lang isn't so sure. He joined The Valenti Show Monday and said he has concerns with Carter's off-the-field reputation. Asked his level of concern, 1 to 10, that Carter is a "bad dude," TJ said, "A 6, 7."
"I don’t like the term necessarily ‘bad dude,’ because we all know this is smokescreen season, people tell lies, but yes, I think the concern level is a little bit higher than what you would like picking at that position," says TJ.
Beyond the issues that have played out in the public this offseason -- Carter pleaded no contest to charges of reckless driving in connection to an accident that killed one of his teammates and a Georgia staff member in January and showed up out of shape to his pro day and failed to finish his position drills -- Lang says in talking about Carter with his contacts around the NFL "there was just an overall consensus and a lot of concern, either with immaturity or making bad decisions."
"If you just turn on the film and watched this kid play and never interviewed him, it would be a damn easy process for him," said TJ. "He’s one of the best three talents in this draft class. And I put more stock into that (than off-the-field issues). But if you’re the Lions, a team that has worked so hard the last two years to do this thing right, to bring in the right guys with the right characteristics and right type of leaders, if you get it wrong with one player at No. 6 that’s going to come in feeling some sort of immortality, it could go sideways really quick."
That said, if the Lions do take Carter at No. 6, Lang says it "would ease some of my concerns" because he trusts in GM Brad Holmes and Dan Campbell.
"That means that they’ve done as much homework as possible and they feel confident enough that either Dan Campbell and the approach he has with players and the respect the players have for him or the leadership that he has is going to be enough to make this kid fit in," said TJ. "If they end up taking him, I would obviously be thrilled because the guy is a hell of a football player at a position that they need on this team."
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