Chicago Bears Under Fire By Top NFL Exec For A Glaring Oversight At Edge
The Chicago Bears have completed the first leg of their offseason. Free agency saw them make significant adjustments on defense. Kevin Byard, Tremaine Edmunds, and Jaquan Brisker are all out as starters. Coby Bryant and Devin Bush were signed to help replace them. Bears general manager Ryan Poles also swung a trade for veteran Garrett Bradbury to help offset the early retirement of center Drew Dalman. The moves have earned praise from people inside the NFL, both for their discipline and for identifying talent.
Criticism has been surprisingly low. However, not necessarily non-existent. Mike Sando of The Athletic reached out to several executives around the league to get their assessment of every team’s offseason moves thus far. One of them raised serious criticism of the Bears’ continued neglect of their pass rush.
“The pass rush has been their biggest question on defense the last few years,” another exec said. “It hasn’t really been the back end, where they’ve given contracts to Jaylon Johnson and their nickel (Gordon), drafted Tyrique Stevenson. They need to improve the D-line, but they couldn’t really do it because they are locked into guys with guaranteed money. They didn’t really address their biggest defensive need.”
It is a fair statement. Fans have been saying it since last year. The Bears haven’t done enough to supplement their pass rush. It was hoped Dayo Odeyingbo might help with that, but the free agent signing was non-existent for half of last season, and then he tore his Achilles. So far, they’ve made no additions to the position, instead losing two key depth pieces to free agency: Dominique Robinson and Joe Tryon-Shoyinka.
The Chicago Bears haven’t made their intentions clear.
Poles has indicated the team would like to give Odeyingbo and former 2nd round pick Shemar Turner an opportunity to get back into the mix this coming season. That can’t happen if the team invests heavily at edge rusher in the coming draft. Still, there could be even worse backlash if they don’t do something. Banking on two guys being more effective than they were last year, despite coming off serious injuries (Turner tore his ACL), is foolhardy. The Bears have three picks in the first two rounds. One of them has to be an edge rusher.
This is a good class to do it in. Experts all agree the edge position is the deepest of any this year. You should easily be able to find a starter as deep as the 3rd or 4th rounds. Much depends on what the Bears are looking for. Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen has specific preferences for his defensive ends, so that might make landing a good one difficult. We’ll see if he relaxes those restrictions and allows the Bears to go after guys with more natural capability for hunting quarterbacks.
The Bears are already in uncharted territory.
As of now, the organization has gone ten consecutive drafts without selecting an edge rusher in the 1st round. The last time that happened was from 2004 through 2011. This is the longest drought in franchise history, and it shows. The popular saying is you have to spend money to make money. Such is the case here. The Chicago Bears can’t expect to build a dynamic pass rush without investing their most valuable draft capital in the position. It was true in 1985 and 2018. The only exception was 2005, when they had Tommie Harris, one of the league’s best interior pass rushers and a former 1st-round pick.
| Year | Player | Overall Pick | Position | College |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Leonard Floyd | 9 | OLB | Georgia |
| 2012 | Shea McClellin | 19 | DE | Boise State |
| 2003 | Michael Haynes | 14 | DE | Penn State |
| 1994 | John Thierry | 11 | DE | Alcorn State |
| 1992 | Alonzo Spellman | 22 | DE | Ohio State |
| 1989 | Trace Armstrong | 12 | DE | Florida |
| 1979 | Al Harris | 9 | DE | Arizona State |
| 1967 | Loyd Phillips | 10 | DE | Arkansas |
Poles has put this off long enough. He was justified in his selections of Darnell Wright and Caleb Williams. Both were crucial to establishing a true offense. However, hindsight suggests the Bears missed a golden opportunity with that 9th overall pick in 2024. While Rome Odunze might’ve felt right at the time, it’s hard not to wonder how different things might be if they’d gone with Laiatu Latu or Jared Verse instead. Raiding the bargain bin hasn’t worked to this point. There is no reason to think that will change.