QB Caleb Williams, CBs who may interest Lions top list of prospects attending NFL draft
Detroit Lions fans attending the April 25-27 NFL draft in Detroit should be able to cheer — or boo — whatever quarterback their division rival Chicago Bears take with the No. 1 pick.
Top quarterbacks Caleb Williams, Jayden Daniels and Drake Maye are among 13 players scheduled to attend the first night of the draft. Missouri defensive lineman Darius Robinson, a Michigan native who played high school football at Canton, and Toledo cornerback Quinyon Mitchell also will be in attendance.
Williams, Daniels and Maye are widely projected to be three of the first players off the board, and could go 1-2-3 to mark just the fourth time quarterbacks have been selected with the top three picks in modern draft history.
Trevor Lawrence, Zach Wilson and Trey Lance went 1-2-3 in 2021. Tim Couch, Donovan McNabb and Akili Smith were the first three picks in 1999. And Jim Plunkett, Archie Manning and Dan Pastorini went first, second and third in 1971.
Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy, who is not attending the draft, also is a candidate to go in the top five. Quarterbacks have never gone1-23-4 to start a draft.
The Bears traded starting quarterback Justin Fields to the Pittsburgh Steelers this offseason and are expected to take Williams, the 2022 Heisman Trophy winner at USC, with the draft’s first pick.
Williams has drawn comparisons to Patrick Mahomes for his arm talent and ability to extend plays with his feet. He threw for 3,633 yards and 30 touchdowns last season with five interceptions.
“I think there’s no debate on that from what I’ve been hearing and what I would do,” ESPN analyst Mel Kiper Jr. said in a video conference Thursday. “It’s Caleb Williams all the way.”
The Washington Commanders and New England Patriots, who pick second and third, respectively, also have zeroed in on quarterbacks during the pre-draft process, and there are enough other quarterback-needy teams picking near the top of the draft that Daniels, Maye and McCarthy are expected to come off the board early.
The New York Giants at No. 6, Minnesota Vikings at No. 11 and Denver Broncos at No. 12 have holes at quarterback, and the Vikings acquired a second first-round pick, No. 23 overall, in March to have the ammunition to move up.
Daniels won the Heisman last season at LSU when he threw for 3,812 yards and 40 touchdowns, and had 1,134 yards rushing.
Maye threw for nearly 8,000 yards and 62 touchdowns in his two seasons starting at North Carolina, and McCarthy led the Wolverines to the national championship last season, and went 27-1 as a starter.
Los Angeles Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh, who coached McCarthy at Michigan the past three seasons and whose team could be in a position to trade down if one of the top quarterbacks is available at No. 5, called McCarthy “the best quarterback in the draft.”
“That’s just what I think, just my opinion,” Harbaugh said at the NFL’s annual meeting in March. “He’s the one who plays quarterback. Of all the quarterbacks that are in the draft, and there’s great quarterbacks in the draft, I think he plays quarterback the best of any quarterback in the draft.”
Mitchell, the Toledo cornerback, is a potential top-15 pick and could be the best defensive back off the board. Robinson is projected to go in the second half of Round 1 as a versatile pass rusher.
Both Alabama (cornerback Terrion Arnold, edge rusher Dallas Turner and offensive tackle J.C. Latham) and LSU (receivers Malik Nabers and Brian Thomas Jr., in addition to Daniels) have three players attending the draft.
Ohio State receiver Marvin Harrison Jr., UCLA edge rusher Laiatu Latu and Washington receiver Rome Odunze also will be in attendance.