Could Lions trade for former Defensive Player of the Year?

The Lions enter 2024 with the seventh most salary cap space ($58.61M) in the league, per Pro Football Focus. With plenty of money to work with, could they trade for a former Defensive Player of the Year this offseason? PFF's Brad Spielberger thinks so.

Spielberger suggests that Detroit could trade a 2025 fourth-round pick to the Los Angeles Chargers for edge-rusher Khalil Mack, the 2016 NFL Defensive Player of the Year.

"Detroit and general manager Brad Holmes have done remarkably well to add young talent through the draft and came quite close to a Super Bowl appearance in 2023," Spielberger writes. "And while they don't want to get too aggressive with a bunch of key in-house extensions on the horizon, picking their spot in adding a savvy veteran difference-maker like Mack could push them over the edge."

Mack could certainly do that coming off arguably the best season of his 10-year NFL career, posting a career-high 17 sacks along with 74 tackles, five forced fumbles and 10 passes defensed.

However, the former No. 5 overall pick in the 2014 NFL Draft comes at a cost outside of the draft compensation it would take to acquire him. The Lions would have to take on $23.25M of his $38.51M salary in 2024.

That would still leave Detroit with plenty of space to make some moves in free agency and sign its 2024 draft class. But Spielberger believes "any team acquiring Mack would almost certainly have an extension in place as a part of the trade."

How long the extension would be is up for debate, but it would help spread the money into future years.

The main risk in the trade, however, would be what version of the soon-to-be 33-year-old the Lions would be getting. Mack has been somewhat up and down the past few years and hadn't eclipsed double-digit sacks since the 2018 season prior to this season's resurgence on that front.

Nonetheless, Detroit needs to make a splash play this offseason if it hopes to contend for another Super Bowl in 2024, and Mack may just prove to be the missing piece.