Bears address safety need by selecting Oregon's Dillon Thieneman at No. 25
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Who did the Bears select in the NFL Draft and why?
Welcome to a post-NFL draft round one show on Rahimi Harrison-Grody on 104.3 The Score. Nicely done, Tyler Butervaugh, as we get to know the new bear and who's starting at safety opposite Kobe Bryant. Dylan Thiedemann, welcome to Chicago. And that is a question asked and a question that was answered promptly at the 25th pick yesterday. Marshall Harris, Mark Rohde, and Leila Rahimi with you on this Friday. And first segment, me was like, well, if the Bears want to trade up or if there's even a slight thought, it's got to be probably for safety. And then Marshall, you were on safety. Mark, I know you wanted Caleb Lomu or thought that that was a possibility.
Although in my first mock draft, I did say safety, but it was Emmanuel McNeil-Warren.
Which was Daniel Jeremiah's thought. Dane Brugler and David Hall, most importantly, both nail it with the Dylan Thienemann pick. And I guess it can be that simple at times where, hey, we don't know who's starting in safety. And Jeff King's like, oh, yeah, we got some safeties if we had to play tomorrow against imaginary team.
Okay, Cam Lewis.
Yeah, question asked, question answered. You can't tell me that the Bears didn't at least somewhat draft for position of need here. Ryan Pohl said they aligned, but we didn't know who was going to be at that spot on the depth chart. And the bottom line is, after day one of the draft, now we know.
The best part about this is that any angst you had about the Bears and what they would do in the first round, it kind of trickled away as the picks were coming off the board because you realize, oh, wait, they're going to have many options that you, as someone who's been following the NFL draft Bear saga at 25, would be comfortable with. And so to know that when it got to 25, Caleb was the only safety that was off the board, and you didn't expect him to be there. And my question is, would the top three safeties be off the board? And there were plenty of options there, not just at safety, but also defensive tackle, other positions. I was like, let's just keep this very simple. KISS is my motto, as you guys know.
Keep it simple, stupid. You need a safety... Dylan Thieman, he checks all the boxes. So take Thieman at number 25 and solve all your problems and still have plenty of more options when it comes to day two.
Here we're, to your point, like the way the draft was going and it was pretty wild and the mocks are pretty wrong.
What were the Bears' needs going into the draft?
By a lot of people on where people went, and we'll get into some of that a little bit later on. But when it came time for the Bears to pick, at number 24, Cleveland goes and gets a wide receiver in Casey Concepcion. So I'm like sitting there going, oh, wow, this really just opens the world up for the Bears because available at that moment were... And I may not even have everybody jotted down here, but Dylan Thienemann, obviously. Emmanuel McNeil-Warren. So you get to choose between these two safeties who most people were mocking to the Bears. You had, as Layla mentioned, Caleb Lomu was available. The tackle, TJ Parker, sitting right there for you, who a lot of people had mocked to the Bears.
Keldrick Falk was available.
Kaden McDonald, who's still available, by the way. And who said he would be available in the second round, still in my first mock draft? That'd be me.
I was going to say that. It's Mark Grody, but you're over there tooting your own horn.
I can't toot it for you, Mark. I was going to say, nobody's going to give me the wins, so I'll give myself the wins here. Peter Woods was still available. Zion Young, by the way, still available right at this very moment, was available to the Bears. There were cornerbacks that were available for the Bears. It was all right there. But the obvious pick, the fortuitous pick, the really good pick was Dylan Thienemann, and they did the right thing.
Well, and they did. I mean, it was a simple question, but they talked about best player available. Brian Pohl says he sticks to his draft board. He's been sticking to his saying of sticking to his draft board now for years, as long as we've known him as the Bears general manager.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
Who did the Bears select in the NFL Draft and why?
0:00–2:32
2
What were the Bears' needs going into the draft?
2:32–6:00
3
How did the Bears' draft strategy evolve during the first round?
6:00–6:52
4
What options did the Bears have at pick 25?
6:52–8:53
5
How does Dylan Thienemann fit into the Bears' defensive lineup?
8:53–14:04
Speakers
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