This offseason has seemingly gone by at light speed and we are now less than a week away from the draft\u2014a pivotal draft at that for the Detroit Lions. With the Lions being so cap strapped and passive in free agency, they will once again look to build through the draft. This is where they will add the high pedigree talent that is hard to find in free agency.<\/p>\n
With that lens, let\u2019s make a case for why the Lions should draft Olaivavega Ioane.<\/p>\n
Olaivavega Ioane is a highly decorated, dominant guard prospect in this year\u2019s draft class. He played his college ball at Penn State (4th year junior) and just turned 22 years old this month. He brings a developed, dense, muscular build with excellent length and wingspan for the position. His hands are also massive. He is 6-foot-4 and 330 pound and is a good, functional athlete. He also has s-tier body control and recovery ability to go along with advanced technical proficiency.<\/p>\n
If you are unfamiliar with my evaluation process let me give you the quick 411. I use a weighted numeric scoring system that incorporates four major buckets to generate a score on a 0-100 scale: film\/traits, analytics profile, athleticism, and intangibles. Each of those buckets has a set of position\/archetype specific sub criteria. Using all-22 film, my process starts with the evaluation of every single snap a player played in his college career.<\/p>\n
For this class, I have scored nearly 250 prospects and Ioane scores as a top-10 player on my board and my #2 OL overall. That is despite receiving a small ding in my system for positional value. Positional value aside, I believe Ioane is not only the safest OL in this class, I believe he also has the highest ceiling.<\/p>\n