The Detroit Lions are very happy to have cornerback Jeff Okudah in the den as the No. 3 overall pick in the 2020 NFL Draft. Judging by the national response, they should be. But the prospect of trading back, something the Lions ultimately could not do, is a common critique in the post-draft hours.

Quinn was asked about the inability to trade back. It was a popular concept with fans and media, and Quinn himself stated the Lions were “open for business” in the days leading up to the draft. Yet there were no moves anywhere in the first 12 picks.

Quinn offered his explanation of why he believes the Lions didn’t get any real offers,

“I think that’s probably more of a question for the teams that were behind us. I don’t know. We had our normal pre-draft conversations with all the teams, and the few teams that showed a little bit of interest just ultimately – you know as we got through today, just for whatever reason decided to stay put. I think looking back, they probably got the guys they probably would’ve taken at three. So it takes two teams to tango.”

Presumably, Quinn is referring to the Miami Dolphins and Los Angeles Chargers, who landed QBs Tua Tagovailoa and Justin Herbert with the fifth and sixth picks, respectively. Each team got the QB they desired with no real threat from anywhere else.

Quinn elaborated on why it can be harder to execute a trade and the utter futility of creating a so-called smokescreen.

“Listen, teams do a very in-depth analysis of your roster and your needs and your contract situations. Not to put down the pundits out there, but the teams know better than the people who are reporting on it, about what teams need and what teams can actually do. So I think we did the best we can.

It’s pretty interesting because the two teams that are behind us directly were the Giants and the Dolphins, and I’m very close friends with both their head coaches. I worked with them for a very long time. I think they know myself, they know Matt (Patricia), and obviously we don’t share our inner secrets, but they can look at our team and can evaluate our needs and can look at our contracts. That’s just kind of how it went.”