Skip to main content
Bear Digest

Percentage Plays and Calculated Bears Risks

Big boards suggest a few things about what the Bears can look for in the draft, unless they decide to trash this and go for someone special.
Gene Chamberlain|
Percentage Plays and Calculated Bears Risks
Percentage Plays and Calculated Bears Risks

In this story:

Chicago Bears

Draft day becomes a process of trusting the big board.

The big boards are a team's player rankings. Unless they have too much time on their hands, fans wouldn't really have their own big board. There are plenty of them on line and they can help indicate the course a team like the Bears should take in the draft. 

Here's what those boards say the Bears should do in the first two days when they have four of the first 64 picks, but only one in the first 52.

1. Bears Should Draft Tackle First

NFLmockdraftdatabase tracks mock drafts and big boards posted online and comes up with a consensus, among other things, for all websites. Using the consensus big board of NFLmockdraftdatabase.com, as well as other big boards online from NFL.com, Pro Football Focus and NFL Draft Bible, it's obvious the Bears need to take tackle first unless they decide to get really daring.

This said, the Bears drastically need an edge pass rusher and a defensive tackle, as well. They also need a right tackle to help protect Justin Fields. They can always use cornerbacks but it's not as pressing of a need as the other three spots.

If you consider their three main needs, this is what the boards say:

There are six tackles ranked in the first 64 picks on the consensus big board, on the Pro Football Focus big board and five on the NFL.com big board. The NFLDB big board has eight in the top 64.

But there are 12 edge rushers in the top 64 for the consensus, 13 on Pro Football Focus, 12 on NFL.com and eight on NFLDB.

It's a very strong year for edge players. The supply of top edge rushers in this draft is deep, regardless of what big board you're looking at, and the supply of offensive top tackles is smaller.

Not only that, but on the consensus big board all six tackles that are in the top 64 are also in the first 41. On the PFF board, six tackles rank in the first 35. On the NFL.com board five rank in the first 30, but only two more until 64.

What this is saying is if they choose a defensive edge or defensive tackle Jalen Carter with their first pick at No. 9, there is a high degree of probability none of the top six tackles would be available to them in Round 2/Round 3 because their second pick doesn't come until No. 53. And, in fact, they may not even have a tackle worthy of those spots in the draft available.

If tackle isn't the first pick and it's a defensive tackle instead, they can still find plenty of edge options and cornerback options in Round 2. They're not going to have a lot of offensive tackle options in Round 2, period.

2. Bears Should Trade Back in Round 1 If...

If there are offers that give the Bears an extra second-round pick by trading down but not out of the top 20 in the draft, they should strongly consider it. A Round 3 pick might not do it.

If they're between 9-20, there should be tackle options available still in Round 1 but they could then have four picks covering Round 2 and the first pick of Round 3 that they could use a few for defensive ends, defensive tackles and cornerbacks. Or they could package them in a trade and move up in Round 2 or into Round 1 to target one. The supply of cornerbacks and defensive ends will hold up later in Round 2 and early Round 3, according to the big boards. The level of talent for defensive and offensive tackles will drop off drastically, according to the big boards.

3. Cornerback Fallbacks

If the supply of tackles and defensive linemen don't meet the Bears' pick level in Round 2, there will always be cornerback options as a fallback. All of those big boards say as much. NFLDB, PFF, NFL.com and the NFLmockdraftdatabase consensus all rate 10 cornerbacks in the first 64 picks and in all of them the talent is evenly dispersed throughout the first two rounds.

They can't go wrong taking cornerback early because talent is there and they need a few of them to bolster their overall coverage ability. 

After all, Kindle Vildor is still a starter and not particularly effective. He's also a free agent after this year. Jaylon Johnson is a free agent after this season. And the backup cornerbacks they do have are undrafted players.

4. Daring

Daring is taking a player who is a special, generational talent even if there are other needs at the moment—the big boards be damned.

There are blue chip players. And then there is truly special. Teams in earlier states of rebuild usually can't afford daring until they get their overall talent base up. The Bears obviously have a lower talent base or they wouldn't have been 3-14 last season.

It's up to GMs to recognize the truly special player and decide to take him despite possible risks, like needs at other positions or red flags.

Here's an example.

In 1998 at the second combine I attended, the late Mark Hatley told all of us Chicago reporters Randy Moss was a true generational talent. The Bears personnel director at the time had two Hall of Famers available to him, as it turned out. He proved to be exactly right about Moss. The other Hall of Fame player available was guard Alan Faneca, who couldn't be called truly special but was excellent for a long time. The two other Hall of Famers taken in that draft were Peyton Manning and Charles Woodson. Both were gone by the time the Bears picked.

So instead of truly special, the Bears went to need and picked running back Curtis Enis. He turned out to be one of the worst first-round draft picks since the NFL-AFL merger.

When special presents itself, it needs to be taken. Two years later, special presented itself again and Hatley was all over this one. It was a linebacker so fast he played safety and returned kicks, and so tall and rangy he could have been an edge rusher. Hatley took Brian Urlacher at No. 9. Special met need with that pick.

There are two special players in this draft. One is a player the Bears might not get to draft and that's Carter. Some wouldn't want to draft him because of the red flags. Moss had red flags, too. 

Need meets special in that pick for the Bears, but there are probably too many teams in front of them who would realize how good Carter is and take him despite the flags.

The other special player is at a position it seems no one wants to draft high in Round 1 these days. That's running back.

Bijan Robinson is the best running back in the draft since Saquon Barkley in 2018 and might be even better. Instincts, moves, versatility, speed and power all combine to create a threat teams should be lining up to acquire.

Instead, it's running back and you see what happened to Barkley. His special skills surface at times but injuries have been a real problem during his career. It's what happens to running backs. Taking one early truly is a risk, even if he is special.

Other names get tossed around as special. Jaxon Smith-Njigba is one. He wasn't even the best receiver on his team last year. He's good, but Marvin Harrison Jr. is a special receiver who will be available next year when the Bears have two first-round picks.

If the Bears choose special in this draft and take either Robinson or Carter, they'd always have chances for good players at other positions later.

Their chance for a good offensive tackle might vanish this year based on what the big boards say about tackles after the top 35 to 40 picks. But Poles is supposed to be a tackle savant, anyway. If anyone could strum one up out of thin air, he and assistant Ian Cunningham could. They did it last year.

Carter is special. Robinson is special.

It's something to seriously consider if the Bears look at that big board and see both or one of those names looking back at them.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven

Add us as a preferred source on Google

Loading recommendations... Please wait while we load personalized content recommendations

Published
Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.

Home/News