{"id":864766,"date":"2026-04-12T11:30:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T11:30:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/864766\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T11:30:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T11:30:17","slug":"detroit-lions-2026-nfl-draft-need-analysis-interior-offensive-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/864766\/","title":{"rendered":"Detroit Lions 2026 NFL Draft Need Analysis: Interior Offensive Line"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 2026 NFL Draft is fast approaching which makes it a good time to review the Lions’ <\/a>positional needs and how it may impact their draft strategy. Last year, defensive tackle got the biggest combined need score<\/a>, and the Lions<\/a> indeed filled that position in the 1st round with Tyleik Williams.<\/p>\n

For the complete offensive positional breakdown, read Detroit Lions 2026 Draft Needs: OFFENSE Positional Rankings + Injury Impact.<\/a><\/p>\n

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The following is the review of the interior offensive line positions.<\/p>\n

The combined need score is the summation of positional need (0-5) plus medical concern level (0-5). The higher the score, the greater the need. I\u2019m reserving the focus to the starters and key backups here, with health of the starters weighted more heavily.<\/p>\n

(In parentheses are player age at the start of the 2026 season, signed-through year, and medical concern level.) *Projected starters.<\/p>\n

Interior offensive line<\/p>\n

*Cade Mays<\/a>\u00a0(27, 2028, 1\/10) – The Lions\u2019 new starting center has a low medical concern.<\/p>\n

*Tate Ratledge (25, 2028, 3\/10 ) – Did not miss a game in his rookie season, but exhibited signs of a possible neck issue.<\/p>\n

*Christian Mahogany (25, 2027, 1\/10 ) – Suffered a fibula fracture last season and has a history of a right ACL tear, but has a low concern overall.<\/p>\n

Miles Frazier (25, 2028, 4\/10) – Missed multiple months with an unspecified knee injury last season, but looked healthy in limited action over the final five games.<\/p>\n

Juice Scruggs<\/a>\u00a0(26, 2026, 5\/10) – History of a foot and a fractured L3 vertebrae, but was healthy in 2025.<\/p>\n

Seth McLaughlin<\/a>\u00a0(25, 2026, 6\/10) – No game action since Achilles tear in November 2024.<\/p>\n

Ben Bartch<\/a>\u00a0(28, 2026, 9\/10) – Lisfranc ended last season for him.<\/p>\n

Positional need 2\/5<\/p>\n

The crown jewel free-agent signing of Mays at center alleviates a lot of the concerns\u2026 as long as he doesn\u2019t show up to camp with a grade 3 hamstring. Ratledge is looking like he should be solid at RG. Mahogany is the projected starting LG, but it\u2019s not certain how the Lions feel about him as a long-term starter. Drafting a starting-caliber OG within the first three rounds is a decent possibility.<\/p>\n

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Medical concern 2\/5<\/p>\n

The backups all have moderate-to-severe concerns, but the projected starters are looking pretty healthy for 2026.<\/p>\n

TOTAL 4\/10<\/p>\n

For more\u00a0Lions<\/a>\u00a0coverage, follow us on X,\u00a0@TheLionsWire<\/a>, and give our\u00a0Facebook<\/a>\u00a0page a like.\u00a0Follow Jimmy on X,\u00a0@JimmyLiaoMD<\/a><\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Lions Wire: Detroit Lions 2026 NFL Draft Need Analysis: Interior Offensive Line<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2026 NFL Draft is fast approaching which makes it a good time to review the Lions’ positional…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":864767,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[4955,10418,644,146,113,2506,7,7463,147,112788,2281,6,117472,117471,29553,628,1491],"class_list":{"0":"post-864766","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-lions","8":"tag-2026-nfl-draft","9":"tag-cade-mays","10":"tag-christian-mahogany","11":"tag-detroit","12":"tag-detroit-lions","13":"tag-detroitlions","14":"tag-football","15":"tag-juice-scruggs","16":"tag-lions","17":"tag-medical-concern","18":"tag-miles-frazier","19":"tag-nfl","20":"tag-offensive-line-positions","21":"tag-positional-breakdown","22":"tag-projected-starters","23":"tag-tate-ratledge","24":"tag-tyleik-williams"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116391511835201520","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=864766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/864766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/864767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=864766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=864766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=864766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}