On Thursday, ESPN concluded their top-10 positional rankings, as determined by a polling of NFL executives, coaches, and scouts. We’ve been covering each of the positions as they’ve been unveiled, and if you’ve been following along, you know Detroit has been heavily featured in the series.
Now that the series has concluded, our own Al Karsten collected all of the data from the surveys to determine which teams have the most top-end talent. His methodology was quite simple. If you have a player who finished first in the rankings, you get 10 points. A second-place ranking earns nine points, all the way down to 1 point for ranking 10th. Karsten also awarded teams 0.5 point if a player of their earned an “honorable mention” and 0.25 points if a player was listed in the “received votes” section.
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Putting it all together, Karsen found that the Lions have the most high-end talent of any team in the NFL, and it isn’t particularly close:
In this scoring system, the Lions finished with 56.5 “points,” well ahead of the Eagles and their second-place 42.75 points. Even if you were to remove the points Detroit received for both safeties—who could both be in danger of missing most of the 2026 due to injury—the Lions still would be in first place by a couple of points.
Does this mean the Lions are the best team in the NFL? Hardly. A team’s performance is largely dependent on depth, schedule, injury luck, and a million other factors. But it is a nice perspective for fans and analysts who think Detroit is on the downswing and no longer a Super Bowl contender.
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If you’re interested in getting caught up on the ESPN ranking series, you can catch our coverage for all the lists below:
Over in The Feed, UpAllNight has some thoughts on the Lions and trick plays. Could we see more in 2026, especially with the addition of Mike Kafka to the coaching staff?
Happy birthday to Barry Sanders! The Lions offered a highlight reel of the GOAT, with each subsequent clip being more ridiculous than the one before it:
I joined the Not The Same Old Lions podcast on Thursday morning to have a long-ranging discussion about the upcoming 2026 Lions season:
