Dan Campbell can't hide candidness about the Lions trade deadline effort

With most things, Detroit Lions head coach Dan Campbell doesn't devolve into "coach speak". He'll say or show how he feels about something easily, sometimes with what he doesn't say about the topic.

So when he has said the Lions have been looking at what's out there for trade options to fill the void left by Aidan Hutchinson, you can believe it has happened. And it is a significant need that can't be filled adequately by practice squad castoffs and retreads in a season with the legit possibility to win the Super Bowl.

A report from Pro Football Talk on Sunday said the expectation is the Lions will get a trade done to acquire Za'Darius Smith from the Cleveland Browns. ESPN's Adam Schefter has since passed along his opinion that Smith will be a Lion by Tuesday afternoon's trade deadline, while acknowledging how things can change.

As of about 5;30 p.m. ET on Monday, there have been no reports of a trade to bring Smith to Detroit.

During his press conference on Monday, Campbell was asked if he sees the Lions making a trade. He pulled no punches to fully reveal the effort that has been made.

"It’s hard to say. I don’t think it’s entirely up to us," Campbell said. "I can tell you we’re trying. Brad’s trying and looked at everything. We really have. Made a ton of calls and he’s been rolling on it. So we’ll see. We’ve still got a little bit of time here. We’ve got 'til tomorrow, tomorrow evening. So we’ll see what happens.” 

Most coaches would say next to nothing about the prospect of a trade the day before the deadline. Not Campbell, and the reporter that asked the question so directly probably knew he'd get a direct answer like that.

If a trade doesn't happen, Campbell noted (obviously) how the Lions will move forward with who they have while eyeing other team's practice squads.

"If it’s not, we’re rolling. We’ve got our guys and we’re going, and that’s the bottom line," Campbell explained. "And look, if something doesn’t get done, we’ll start poaching some of these other practice squads, see if we can find some guys that we really liked when they were coming out that have some ability, see if they can grow. And then we’ll continue to give our guys on this roster a shot.” 

The edge rusher market moved a little bit on Monday afternoon, with the Denver Broncos sending Baron Browning to the Arizona Cardinals for a sixth-round pick. Time will tell if the Lions get a deal done in the next...22-23 hours as of this writing. But, as expected, it clearly won't be for a lack of effort if they don't get a trade done.