dennehy
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Very fair price, essentially a straight extension, which is what you hope for from a guy on probably his last deal.
Washington
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Still a dumb move by Poles to give up a 4th for a one year rental on an old WR after drafting Odunze. That is the kind of move you do when your team is close to competing. Poles throws around draft picks too much.
Luke
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tbf, Poles did sign Allen before the draft but I agree that he has been trading away 4th and 5th round picks rather willy nilly.
If he had this years 4th rounder, he may have had the flexibility to move up a bit in the 2nd to get Henderson but we'll never know.
Hopefully he has learned from this, but the Thueny trade does look smart at least at this point.
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Trading for Allen gave him some insurance in case he couldn’t draft Rome. It wasn't a bad idea to give a rookie QB another vet to lean on in his rookie season too.
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Washington
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I'm OK with the Thuney trade because it is not just a 1 year rental like Allen was. That was a complete waste of a 4th rounder. Poles needs to treat his draft picks with more regard. Trading for expensive veterans and signing expensive FAs is going to kill them cap wise shortly. He needs to get more rookies in the mix quickly, especially at IOL.
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“Missouri wide receivers coach Jacob Peeler saw some of the same traits in Burden that he saw in Philadelphia Eagles star A.J. Brown, whom Peelers coached at Ole Miss.
After Brown's first season at Ole Miss, where he lined up predominantly out wide, Peeler moved him into the slot, which resulted in back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons and Brown becoming the school's all-time leading receiver.
Peeler did the same for Burden, and it paid immediate dividends with the 6-foot receiver running 75% of his routes from the slot during the 2023 and 2024 seasons. As a sophomore, Burden had 1,212 receiving yards, one more than Arizona Cardinals receiver Marvin Harrison Jr., who was the first receiver drafted (fourth overall) in 2024.”
www.espn.com
After Brown's first season at Ole Miss, where he lined up predominantly out wide, Peeler moved him into the slot, which resulted in back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons and Brown becoming the school's all-time leading receiver.
Peeler did the same for Burden, and it paid immediate dividends with the 6-foot receiver running 75% of his routes from the slot during the 2023 and 2024 seasons. As a sophomore, Burden had 1,212 receiving yards, one more than Arizona Cardinals receiver Marvin Harrison Jr., who was the first receiver drafted (fourth overall) in 2024.”
Bears WR Luther Burden finds motivation in draft-day fall
Burden viewed himself as a first-rounder, and when that didn't happen, his motivation became clear.
www.espn.com
Nelly
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Yea. We totally miss out not having 2024's Ruben Hyppolite.
Washington
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Yea. We totally miss out not having 2024's Ruben Hyppolite.
Yeah, no doubt Poles has been a failure outside the 2nd round, save for Jones who is not good enough to be signed for a 2nd contract. Good GMs can find some gems outside of the 2nd and those really help with the cap. One year rentals for draft picks are what teams who are competing can do, not bottom of the barrel 5 win teams do.
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Your argument is biased because you immediately write off Jones who was a great pick for a fifth round player. He might not get a second contract here because of cap management, but he’s going to get paid by somebody.
Smith is a good player and Hicks is a solid backup for a 7th round player too.
We don’t know what Kiran is yet.
Tory Taylor was over drafted, but he’ll be a weapon for the defense going forward. He had a huge hand in the win last season against the Rams.
Sanborn and Blackwell have been solid contributors as UDFAs. Unfortunately, Sanborn wasn’t fast enough for DA.
Kramer is a back up, but he’s not awful. Although, he’s a fumbler!
Washington
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I would not say I am biased about my opinion. I am basing it on results to date.
So what you are saying is that Poles found 1 starter outside of the 2nd round in 3 drafts and that starter Jones will not be deemed good enough to extend. He is an average LT at best. Good for a 5th round pick but not a gem who he is already trying to replace with drafting OTs in the 2nd and 3rd. He has especially been bad in the 3rd although you are right that the jury is still out on the injured OT he drafted.
Taylor should not have been drafted period and he was not even the best rookie punter.
Sanborn was a good UDFA but not good enough to re-sign and he only got a 1 year deal as a FA.
I am not sure how anyone can say Poles has been good outside the 2nd. Pace was better. Still waiting for one of his draft picks to be chosen as All Pro.
Poles has mostly built this team via FAs and trading away draft capital for veterans. Cap hell is sure to come. Poles throws around draft picks like candy at Halloween.
Midway Fields
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The Bears ended with 8 draft selections this year including 3 2nd rounders and have a pick in all 7 rounds next year.
Poles wheels, deals, and replenishes.
You’re complaining just to complain.
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The foundation of this team and most teams is early round talent.
Poles legacy will be determined by Johnson and players like Caleb, Rome, Wright, Loveland, Burden, Ozzy, Turner, Dexter, Gordon, Stevenson, and possibly Brisker.
Washington
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Not sure I would call it complaining. He has traded away picks that he did not recoup. He obviously killed it with the Carolina trade and that set him up nicely with extra draft collateral.
I still feel strongly that Poles must do better after round 2 and his continual trading of picks for established players as well as signing so many FAs is going to hurt them cap wise before long. Time will tell. After an epic failure on the trenches last year, Poles was in desperation mode and had to make lots of moves this offseason and they were expensive ones.
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Washington
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Fair enough but currently, much of the foundation of this squad is from trades and FA, at least in the trenches. The good teams have also found starters outside of the early rounds. I will say his legacy will be determined by CW. If he fails, the team fails. I like CW a lot but the jury is still out. I expect him to improve this year.
Nelly
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A GM is pretty much always tied to his QB. If he's able to get one, he'll survive for a bit or even be considered one of the greats. If not: fired within 4 years or so.
There's plenty of bad you can point to with Pace but it's Trubisky that ultimately sunk him. That 2018 team was legit. If Trubisky was the real deal then we might have been in the superbowl and certainly would have been contending for a good stretch there. Instead, Pace compounded bad decisions with more bad decisions to try to keep his teams' window open.
DefNextYear
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I'll just chime in for one point. I think the best teams at developing talent are teams with success. It's very very hard to develop talent when your team is bad. Blue chips survive chaos, but most others don't. Most humans need a strong foundation to survive. It's only a small percentage that could do it alone. We can think of this in any walk of life.
That said, reversing negative momentum is very difficult... very hard to turn that into positive momentum. It's like if anyone was hired to a job working for a terrible owner and the business is failing. It's hard to fix that. And for example, the Eagles are a team that are a success. They can more or less pick freely and know that they have a lot of safeguards in place to ensure everyone learns how to succeed and be a pro. If they wanted to get a QB, he gets to watch Hurts... any OL or DL has a number of stars to watch... They get messaging from great coaches and great players. The best teams are led by the players.
So, to turn it all around, you need great coaching and you need great leaders in the form of players. I think the Bears were severely lacking in both areas for the last 3 years. I'm talking guys like Thuney and Grady. Those two are perfect guys on opposite sides of the ball to get people motivated and push people the right way. One easy example of this is that Montez has never shown up to voluntary offseason stuff. And I do stress never... not even in Washington. Now? He's being hyped as the best guy out there. Why though? What changed? Well, I think he's being pushed by Grady. As soon as he signed, they had that ATL connection and had a bond. Grady doesn't mess around and expects greatness... and he can talk from the perspective of someone who worked hard to achieve everything and is showing up and putting in the work himself. The message comes a little differently from leaders who suit up with you. Bears have really lacked this. It's hard to develop it... so it's important to build a team by drafting well, getting good coaches, but also finding the right veterans to bring that culture.
I know this all sounds either cheesy or obvious, but it's really true. Caleb's lack of help last year is just the type of thing every player is going through when they have no one to look up to. Imagine just Darnell Wright... who did he have to learn from? Now he has Thuney. These guys add a lot to a team's personality. They can see someone and say "I want to be like that."
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I looked into it - the draft pick sent to the Chargers for Keenan Allen was ultimately dealt to the Patriots, who selected Javon Baker. He was a WR who posted one catch for 12 yards.Yea. We totally miss out not having 2024's Ruben Hyppolite.
Sure, Allen was an insurance policy for Caleb Williams rookie season. He didn't put up many WOW plays, but it was a heck of a lot more valuable than the year Baker had. It might be another two years until Baker's career numbers surpass Allen's single season here.
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SugarWalls
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Wheels deals and replenishes??? lmao
Washington
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So the Bears would have taken the exact same player in that spot?
Sorry, but giving up draft picks for one year rentals on a shitty team is not a good approach IMHO. The good teams who are competing for a SB can throw away draft capital like that.
