Report suggests deal between Lions and Alim McNeill could be done very soon

After the Detroit Lions signed Amon-Ra St. Brown, Penei Sewell, Jared Goff and Taylor Decker to new deals his offseason, defensive tackle Alim McNeill is clearly next up for a contract extension as he enters the final year of his rookie contract.

General manager Brad Holmes has expressed some level of urgency about the situation, while most recently saying talks are in the very early stages. These things can move quickly though, and Holmes is right to not say a whole lot in general.

Ultimately it feels like a matter of when, not if, the Lions get McNeill signed to a long-term deal. The financial market for defensive tackles is on the rise, so it's fair to say the team wouldn't mind getting it done fairly soon when the price stands to be lower.

McNeill has said he told his agent not to tell him how talks are going until a deal is done. So it seems unlikely there's any kind of start of the season deadline from his end for talks to be put on hold, and the Lions probably wouldn't set that kind of deadline either.

Report suggests deal for Alim McNeill could come very soon

Buried in a bunch of recent notes regarding front offices wanting to have key contracts done before Week 1, ESPN's Jeremy Fowler had this note regarding the Lions and McNeill.

"The Lions are hoping to cap off an expensive offseason with a deal for defensive lineman Alim McNeill."

Those notes from Fowler were published on Thursday morning, before the first game of the season. But of course the Lions' season doesn't start until Sunday night, so that sits as a theoretical deadline if they "are hoping" to cap off their offseason of big contracts by getting a deal done for McNeill.

A announcement of a contract extension for McNeill on Sunday (let's say), hours before the season opener, would be pretty surprising. But it isn't out of the question either. Fowler's note is brief enough to be intriguing, especially in light of two players he also mentioned in those notes (Steelers tight end Pat Freiermuth and Bills offensive tackle Spencer Brown) getting new contracts on Friday.