Windy City Gridiron
Check out our final Chicago Bears roundtable before training camp starts!
Our guy Jacob Infante shared his Chicago Bears offseason superlatives on his Twitter page, and then he expounded on those selections for us in this article. But our WCG team wanted to get in on the fun by doing our own version that we’re rolling out in this roundtable series. After checking out what we had to say, share yours in the comments section.
Yesterday’s topic was Best Move, so naturally, today’s topic is...
Ryan Droste: I’m not crazy about the lack of attention to the RB room. I would have liked to have seen Poles and Johnson draft a running back earlier in the draft, preferably within the first four rounds.
Josh Sunderbruch: I tend to dislike the moves Poles doesn’t make more than the ones he does, but I struggle to find Luther Burden to be anything other than a redundant pick. There’s only one football, and I’m not convinced that Burden was the best use of a Top 50 pick with how this team is configured.
Gary Baugher Jr.: Dayo Odeyingbo. I hope I’m wrong, but I feel like for a position of need, this did not move the needle as much as I wanted. Sweat’s production fell off a cliff in 2024, and that was mainly due in part to not having a viable Edge threat opposite him.
Sam Householder: The biggest gripe is perhaps that they didn’t do enough to address the defensive line. Dayo is a bet on young upside without a ton of proof. Outside of that... not great.
Johnathan Wood: There are a number of strong candidates here (extending TJ Edwards, overpaying Grady Jarrett, cutting DeMarcus Walker to give 3x as much money to Dayo Odeyingbo, not having an adequate 3rd LB on the roster), but my choice for worst is failing to address interior OL depth. The Bears replaced all three interior OL starters this offseason, but their depth at the position is scary. Ryan Bates is the presumed top backup, assuming his shoulder arthritis improves to the point he can play (I’m not convinced it will). Nobody else on the roster is somebody I would feel comfortable putting in a game, and the starters are either aging (Joe Thuney is 32) or have significant injury histories (Drew Dalman and Jonah Jackson missed 11 and 18 games, respectively, over the last 2 years). I worry that the interior could turn from a clear strength into a glaring weakness in a hurry, and it would have been an easy fix to cut Bates, who had no dead money, and spend that $4 million on a healthy player who could be a capable backup.
Lester A. Wiltfong Jr.: I wasn’t sure which direction I’d go here until Jonathan mentioned interior o-line depth. Ryan Bates, who has been injured for a while, is the most experienced option. Jordan McFadden has two 2023 starts in his two-year career, and the other...
