When Your Whole Draft Class is Fighting for Their Lives
Look, we need to talk about something that’s been sitting in the corner of Allen Park like an unwelcome relative at Thanksgiving dinner. Brad Holmes’ entire 2024 draft class is heading into what amounts to a collective make-or-break 2026 season. And yes, I know what you’re thinking. This is the same Brad Holmes who nailed his first three drafts, turned this franchise from a laughingstock into a legitimate contender, and generally operates like the smartest guy in every room he enters.
Sometimes the draft just doesn’t break your way. It’s a crapshoot wrapped in analytics and covered in hope. But when nearly every pick from a single class is facing serious questions about their future in Honolulu Blue, that’s worth talking about honestly.
Terrion Arnold: The Injury Bug Strikes Again
Let’s start with the first-rounder because the revisionist historians are already sharpening their knives. Arnold was the consensus top cornerback in that draft. Detroit got him because the league went offense-heavy early, pushing him down to a spot where Holmes could move up and grab him. That part isn’t up for debate.
What is up for debate is what happens next. Arnold showed flashes of being everything you want in a first-round corner during his up-and-down rookie year. Then injuries took most of his second season away. If he stays healthy in 2026 and shows that elite play consistently, we’re golden. If he can’t, well, this conversation gets a lot more uncomfortable real quick.
The Walking Wounded and the Still Fighting
Ennis Rakestraw has missed his first two seasons with injuries, which naturally has some fans ready to write him off completely. But injuries aren’t effort. Injuries aren’t talent. Sometimes they’re just cruel timing. He needs to show something meaningful in 2026, but calling him a bust before he’s had a real chance to prove what he can do feels premature.
Giovanni Manu is fighting for his roster life. Unless he can somehow beat out Larry Borom for a legitimate swing tackle role, it’s hard to see how this story ends well. Sometimes picks just don’t work out the way you hoped, and that appears to be where we’re heading here.
Sione Vaki continues to exist in football purgatory. You draft a guy to play running back, then put him behind Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery. Now with Isiah Pacheco in the mix, Vaki’s path to meaningful snaps at his actual position remains somewhere between slim and nonexistent. He’s carved out a role on special teams, but that’s not exactly what you’re hoping for from a draft pick.
The Interior Questions
Mekhi Wingo felt like highway robbery when Detroit grabbed him, but the Lions haven’t found much use for him yet. He was a healthy scratch most of last season. With the interior defensive line relatively thin behind Tyleik Williams and Alim McNeill, this could be his moment to finally show what he’s got.
Christian Mahogany was the Lions’ starting left guard when healthy last season, and there were moments in the run game where you could see the potential. But pass protection was a consistent struggle, and now he’s facing real competition from Miles Frazier, Juice Scruggs, Ben Bartch, and Michael Niese. Frazier could be a real threat here since he played fairly well in relief last year. Training camp is going to tell us everything we need to know about whether Mahogany can hold onto that spot.
Trust the Process, Even When It Hurts
Here’s the thing about Brad Holmes that makes this whole situation manageable rather than panic-inducing. He’s earned the benefit of the doubt through years of smart moves, solid drafting, and building this roster into something we actually recognize as a professional football team. One draft class struggling doesn’t erase Penei Sewell, Amon-Ra St. Brown, Aidan Hutchinson, or Jack Campbell.
But it also doesn’t mean we ignore what’s happening. These guys need to step up. The margin for error in the NFL is razor-thin, and being a Detroit Lion doesn’t come with tenure. If they can’t contribute at a meaningful level, there are other players who will.
Sometimes the draft just doesn’t break your way. Sometimes injuries derail promising careers before they start. And sometimes, despite all your research and resources pointing in the right direction, the guys you pick just can’t play at this level. That’s football. That’s life. That’s the NFL.
The question now is whether any of these players can salvage their Detroit careers before the organization moves on. Because make no mistake about it, this regime doesn’t keep players around for sentimental reasons. If you can’t help them win, they’ll find someone who can.
Is this just growing pains for a draft class that caught some bad breaks, or are we looking at Holmes’ first real whiff as a general manager? Drop your take below.
