SideLion Report » Akeem Ayers

The Mock Draft: What Went Wrong

Fri, 29 Apr 2011 19:09:41 +0000

The NFL Draft is fickle in the sense that one unexpected selection by a team (can you say Christian Ponder) renders months of analysis meaningless. Now that Round 1 is in the books, let’s take a look at the mock draft that was done here at sidelionreport.com to see where it got close and where it went off the rails.

In determining what picks I thought each team would make I first had to determine what each team’s needs were. This is a daunting task that is complicated by what the primary need was, what the secondary needs were and further complicated by whether a General Manager would take the best player available and throw need out the window.

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Detroit Lions Draft Prospects: Akeem Ayers

Zac Snyder — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 00:31:41 +0000

Akeem Ayers’ twitter account said the following at about 6 p.m. local time:

Ready to get off this plane to see what Detroit has in store for me.

Life in the blogosphere runs on a funny clock that ticks when one thing is said so it can tock when the opposite happens. I guess that means I get the credit for Akeem Ayers landing in Detroit to visit the Lions thanks to my post this morning that he doesn’t appear to be a fit for the Lions.

Continue reading as I wipe the egg off my face by profiling Akeem Ayers, the former UCLA linebacker.

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Akeem Ayers Not Looking Like a Fit for Detroit Lions

Zac Snyder — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 16:54:51 +0000

Akeem Ayers garnered a lot of attention as a possible Lions pick in early mock drafts due to their need for an outside linebacker. Questions about his value as a potential 13th overall pick and where exactly he fits scheme-wise have pushed him down the board.

Ayers isn’t one of those freak workout warrior type linebackers but his pro day improved upon his combine performance. Even if it helps his draft stock it doesn’t figure that he will enter into the Lions plans given the list of teams that are showing strong interest according to the National Football Post:

The 6-foot-3, 254-pound all-around linebacker has excellent film, but doesn’t test particularly well.

However, teams are extremely high on Ayers, including the Baltimore Ravens, New York Giants, New England Patriots, New York Jets and the Kansas City Chiefs.

What stands out to me is that four of the five teams run a 3-4 defense. That bias towards teams with 3-4 alignments tells me that he is looking a lot more like a linebacker for that scheme than the 4-3 the Lions run. He may not have been an option based on where the Lions will be selecting but it now looks like he may not be a candidate to be targeted with a trade down.

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