Skip to main content
Bear Digest

Mock Draft Traces Ryan Poles' Interest in Prospect to Senior Bowl

The Chicago Bears GM has been tied to interest in a player by Eric Edholm's NFL.com mock draft from workouts back at the start of the draft process.
Gene Chamberlain|
Missouri defensive end Zion Young goes through defensive line drills at the combine.
Missouri defensive end Zion Young goes through defensive line drills at the combine. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

In this story:

Chicago Bears

Everyone has mock drafts and picks the players for teams based on team needs and what they have seen of prospects.

One mock draft this week projects a pick for the Bears in Round 1 based on something a bit more tangible than a 40 time and some past highlights.

NFL.com's lead draft writer Eric Edholm put out his second one-round mock draft and in it he sees a player coming to the Bears at No. 25 overall at a need position but also because of an observation.

Edholm, a former Pro Football Weekly writer based in Chicago, sees the Bears drafting Missouri defensive end Zion Young at No. 25 overall in his mock released on Wednesday.

The reason is one most mock drafts wouldn't have, and one where you needed to be in  Mobile, Ala. at the end of January to know.

"General manager Ryan Poles was camped out by the pass-rush one-on-ones for much of Senior Bowl week, and the long-framed Young stood out to me in Mobile a hair more than Clemson's T.J. Parker," Edholm wrote.

Edholm had Parker going two picks later to the 49ers.

An athletic fit for scheme

At 6-foot-6, 262, Young would fit the physical mold for Bears defensive ends in Dennis Allen’s scheme

"Young is a fiery alpha who brings immense energy to the field and locker room," NFL.com's draft analyst Lance Zierlein wrote about Young. “He majors in block destruction using base power and aggression to play through opponents.”

Pro Football Focus probably wouldn’t agree with the pick, as they ranked him 40th on their big board. If that winds up being the case, perhaps the Bears gain picks and trade back at No. 25. Or maybe they move up in Round 2.

This would be a useful pick for the Bears for another reason besides pass rush ability and it was something PFF picked up on in its grading. They had Young graded even higher as a run defender than as a pass defender last season, and he was in the top 14% in both nationally.

At the combine, Young described his power as the key. It was the same type of thing he told the Bears when he had a formal meeting there with them.

"First off, in order to play the pass you've got to play the run first," Young said at the combine. "You've got to make the guy respect the run game. And you have a privilege to rush the passer and over time I felt I was pretty good at the run game and then over time I got pretty good at the pass game."

Young is a former teammate of Bears receiver Luther Burden, and could have been on Bears radar since last year when they were scouting the Tigers closely for their 2025 second-round draft pick.

Young might have gained his run-stopping ability when he went for two years to Michigan State, prior to transferring to Missouri. He was playing then for the staff of former head coach Mel Tucker, the former Bears defensive coordinator.

"It was really like an old-school coaching staff there," he said. "They was really on my rear end."

Young described his meeting with th Bears as positive. "They were pretty cool people," he added.

They could learn more about Young on Friday at Missouri's pro day, as he didn't run or do any of the jumping at the combine, only went through the on-field drills.

More Chicago Bears News

X: BearsOnSI

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