The Lions have met with Cincinnati nose tackle Dontay Corleone, and he gives them a real chance at a big steal in the 2026 NFL Draft<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t![\"Sep](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/USATSI_27021408.jpg\")
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSep 6, 2025; Cincinnati, Ohio, USA; Cincinnati Bearcats defensive lineman Dontay Corleone (2) stands on the field against the Bowling Green Falcons in the first half at Nippert Stadium.
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\u00a9 Aaron Doster-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Well, here is an interesting one that you don\u2019t always see. As everyone should know by now, the Detroit Lions are on the lookout for more interior defensive line help. Pretty much every top-30 we know about is an interior guy. <\/p>\n
That doesn\u2019t mean that\u2019s all the Lions are looking for on their line, but it\u2019s clear they want to get better all over the line. They also seem to be looking for a value deal there. That\u2019s likely why they talked to Florida\u2019s Caleb Banks. Because he could fall out of the first round. Then there\u2019s this guy: <\/p>\n
Cincinnati\u2019s Dontay Corleone has met with the Lions, and apparently, only the Lions<\/p>\n
Sports Illustrated\u2019s Justin Melo<\/a> spoke with Corleone on Thursday, and the giant nose tackle said that he\u2019s met with just the Lions. <\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI met with the Detroit Lions. I had a formal interview with the Lions at the NFL Combine. I\u2019ve pretty much shut it down [physically]. I haven\u2019t done any private workouts or anything like that. I\u2019m getting healthy. I think teams know and understand that. They\u2019ve also been scouting me for a long time. They know who I am.\u201d<\/p>\n Now that is where the potential value comes into play. In 2024, Corlone was diagnosed with blood clots. Now, it\u2019s important to note that Corleone made a full recovery from this and cleared medical checks at the NFL Combine and then cleared them again at Medical rechecks. But this could give some teams pause. <\/p>\n This has pushed Corleone\u2019s draft stock down from a low second-round grade to a sixth or seventh-round grade. As I said, teams are concerned. But that doesn\u2019t mean that there isn\u2019t a big situation for the Lions to take advantage of here. <\/p>\n If they take him in the seventh round and he proves to be totally ok, then what a steal, right? If not, then it costs you a seventh-round pick you weren\u2019t super likely to hit on anyway. <\/p>\n Now let\u2019s talk about the player. When I see Corleone, I\u2019m reminded of this scene from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. <\/p>\n Dontay Corleone is a refrigerator-shaped gentleman. He\u2019s a 340-pound guy that looks like a 500-pound guy with nothing but muscles. He\u2019s a Mack truck. <\/p>\n He absolutely brings what the Lions want from the nose tackle spot. He had an 80.9 run defense grade from Pro Football Focus in 2025. In terms of pass rush, Cincinnati used him more as a space eater, which is what the Lions had with DJ Reader. But in the past, he\u2019s shown that he can get after the quarterback. In 2024, he had 27 pressures and three sacks. <\/p>\n Part of that could be that Cincinnati changed its defensive coordinator ahead of the 2025 season, and that changed how the team used him. <\/p>\n He could really help the Lions in multiple areas, and a rotation of Alim McNeill, Tyleik Williams, and Corleone could be tough for opposing offensive lines.<\/p>\n \t\t\t Detroit Lions News<\/p>\n 2026 NFL Draft<\/a> Detroit Lions News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Lions have met with Cincinnati nose tackle Dontay Corleone, and he gives them a real chance at…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":868116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2071],"tags":[4955,146,113,153,2506,7,147,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-868115","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-detroit","10":"tag-detroit-lions","11":"tag-detroit-lions-news","12":"tag-detroitlions","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-lions","15":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116417785860885357","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868115","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=868115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/868115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/868116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=868115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=868115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=868115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/USATSI_18497964.jpg\")
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