Latest / 2nd City Gridiron / Bears Banter Ep. 238: NFL Draft Preview with EJ Snyder!

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Bears Banter Ep. 238: NFL Draft Preview with EJ Snyder! · 2nd City Gridiron

0:02
[SPEAKER_00]: That's right, fair-round bear spans aside for another edition of the Chicago Bear's podcast Bears Banner, hour by Second City Gridiron Bill Zimmerman with you, and we are here it is a, we are in the thick of draft season.
0:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we get to the thick of draft season, it is time for a fairs, banter tradition.
0:34
[SPEAKER_00]: This one, I don't think we're at 10 years yet, but we are pushing into that 7-8-9-year range.
0:40
[SPEAKER_00]: She is E.J.
0:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Snyder, of course, long time ago, Windy City Gridiron draft analyst has moved on, bootleg football with Brett Coleman, the Bear Eropodcast, as well.
0:50
[SPEAKER_00]: You get him all over the place.
0:51
[SPEAKER_00]: You get him on twitter slash xatfootball.
0:54
[SPEAKER_00]: E.J.
0:55
[SPEAKER_00]: He is my go-to guy for draft and analysis every year.
1:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And he joins me now, E.J.
1:01
[SPEAKER_00]: Bill Zimmerman, how you doing?
1:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm good.
1:03
[SPEAKER_02]: It's crazy to think that we've been doing this for that long, but we were talking about it before we started recording.
1:08
[SPEAKER_02]: And yeah, I was like, five or six?
1:10
[SPEAKER_02]: No, six or seven.
1:11
[SPEAKER_02]: No, it's longer than that.
1:13
[SPEAKER_02]: And one of my favorite traditions are out draft time.
1:16
[SPEAKER_00]: I love it.
1:17
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember having a debate if Quentin Nelson, if you could take an interior offensive lineman in the top 10, that's how long we have been doing this.
1:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Now that he is a veteran who has been paid.
1:27
[SPEAKER_00]: But let's jump into this draft.
1:30
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just going to say it right out here to everyone listening here.
1:34
[SPEAKER_00]: I have not done as much research on the draft as I usually do in terms of watching tape.
1:38
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's why we have a guy like E. J. on to bring his expertise in,
1:42
[SPEAKER_00]: We're going to talk about the draft in its totality, but obviously we're going to focus a lot on the Chicago Bears and what they can do with those day one, day two and early, day three pick.
1:54
[SPEAKER_00]: So, each a let's start with something the Bears don't have to worry about this year.
2:00
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's quarterback, because I'm interested to get your perspective.
2:03
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not worried about the deep draft here.
2:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's just talk about the top two guys for, uh,
2:09
[SPEAKER_00]: Fernando Mendoza obviously looking to be going number one of the Raiders.
2:13
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you think he has the goods to be a 10 year starting quarterback in the NFL?
2:20
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm also curious to get your opinion on Ty Simpson because his draft stock is all over the place.
2:27
[SPEAKER_00]: Some people say first round.
2:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Some people don't even think you'd be drafted in round two.
2:31
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, quarterback is an area that I'm very glad the bears are settled in.
2:36
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's put it that way this year starting when then does a, you know, 10 year starters.
2:41
[SPEAKER_02]: Not my favorite second contract guy is my new favorite because very few players in the league, quarterback or otherwise are 10 year starters.
2:50
[SPEAKER_02]: there are some, but they're much more rare than people think.
2:53
[SPEAKER_02]: So I've come to think of it, and this came from Trevor Sikama, when we were working on a blue chip committee, he said, it's really about second contract.
2:59
[SPEAKER_02]: When you get to that fifth year option, are you exercising the option, and are you signing this guy?
3:05
[SPEAKER_02]: Are you confident, no matter the position that he is good for your team, and you're moving forward, and you're going to get him paid at a NFL veteran level?
3:13
[SPEAKER_02]: I think Mendosa has the goods to be that.
3:16
[SPEAKER_02]: people talk all the time about Izia top 10 quarterback.
3:19
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
3:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if he can get there.
3:21
[SPEAKER_02]: Can he be top 15?
3:23
[SPEAKER_02]: I absolutely think he can be top 15.
3:25
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's important.
3:26
[SPEAKER_02]: You need a top half quarterback in this league.
3:29
[SPEAKER_02]: And he shows some really good things on tape.
3:31
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got good size.
3:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I like his process.
3:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And his execution is really good too.
3:36
[SPEAKER_02]: His ball placement is excellent.
3:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I put a lot of stock in that when I'm scouting quarterback.
3:41
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think Mendoza is a worthy first overall pick.
3:45
[SPEAKER_02]: And that doesn't have to do with the fact that there's almost nothing behind him in quarterback in this draft.
3:50
[SPEAKER_02]: He regardless of that.
3:51
[SPEAKER_02]: He is, I think, a first round quarterback in probably any draft and a good get for the Raiders.
3:58
[SPEAKER_02]: It's too bad for all the other teams that need quarterbacks.
4:00
[SPEAKER_02]: But I think that is a good get for Vegas moving forward.
4:04
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
4:05
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if we talk running backs because bear's fans, Notre Dame fans, there's a pretty big crossover in the Venn diagram.
4:12
[SPEAKER_00]: So let me ask you about Jeremiah love because
4:16
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I am a don't take a running back in the in the top five top 10.
4:20
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't like the idea because and again, this isn't so much anti running back.
4:26
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the idea that running backs have a short shelf life.
4:30
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're picking there odds are you're in some form of a rebuild.
4:34
[SPEAKER_00]: You're going to be two, three years away from being a true Super Bowl contender.
4:38
[SPEAKER_00]: Your your running backs already in his third season.
4:41
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, you got to pay him soon.
4:42
[SPEAKER_00]: All that stuff.
4:43
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think running back should be added later for and obviously you get a lot of quality running back stay to.
4:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Although maybe not as much, you know, moving forward here with running back seeming to come back up into the into the draft here.
4:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And that brings us to love Notre Dame running back.
4:59
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this guy.
5:00
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, obviously, even if I'm not watching tape, I'm watching plenty of Notre Dame football.
5:05
[SPEAKER_00]: I think he's got a bright future in front of him.
5:07
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's not, do you like Jeremiah love E. J.
5:10
[SPEAKER_00]: But is it team like the Titans, like the Giants, a team that's building right now?
5:15
[SPEAKER_00]: Does it make sense for them to take a prospect like love?
5:18
[SPEAKER_02]: Uh, for a lot of the reasons you laid out, it doesn't, and that's tough in this particular draft because then the question becomes, it's not a vacuum right, a draft is not a vacuum.
5:29
[SPEAKER_02]: You still have to make a pick if you're Tennessee and I've done a bunch of mock drafts.
5:33
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been on other people's shows doing mock drafts.
5:36
[SPEAKER_02]: I've done my own.
5:37
[SPEAKER_02]: And this draft gets odd at pick two, like it doesn't, it's not a typical draft in the fact that there is a ton of high end talent at premium positions, whether it be quarterback left tackle specifically edge wide receiver.
5:53
[SPEAKER_02]: There are a question mark starting very early in this draft so even if you're not going to do it for all the reasons you said and some more contract wise it doesn't make a ton of sense and also if you're a team that's going to pick a running back I am of the firm belief that you have to do it after your offensive line is built.
6:10
[SPEAKER_02]: You build the offensive line.
6:11
[SPEAKER_02]: The Raiders learned this the hard way last year.
6:14
[SPEAKER_02]: They turned they took a very good running back who I think we're going to see a lot more out of this year in Ash and Gentie it was completely unfair to him.
6:20
[SPEAKER_02]: He was getting hit on average one yard behind the line of skirmish on every single carry sometimes 1.3 later in the season.
6:28
[SPEAKER_02]: That's bananas like you can't expect anybody to be successful.
6:31
[SPEAKER_02]: That's so running back is a pick that you take to put the last gem in the glove, right?
6:36
[SPEAKER_02]: You have the offense blind built.
6:38
[SPEAKER_02]: Then you grab a playmaker and he goes off, uh, say, Juan Barclays, a perfect example of this.
6:42
[SPEAKER_02]: Giants took him.
6:43
[SPEAKER_02]: He was good for the Giants.
6:45
[SPEAKER_02]: He goes to Philly.
6:46
[SPEAKER_02]: He gets behind an offensive line becomes the engine.
6:48
[SPEAKER_02]: The powerhouse for a Super Bowl team.
6:51
[SPEAKER_02]: 2000 yard russia right if he'd been drafted into a situation like that what would it's career been early on so that's the argument against taking the running back in the top five there's a financial one like you said there's a wear and tear one and there's really just a foundational construction one of are you ready to take a running back.
7:07
[SPEAKER_02]: Titans, not quite possibly if they finished building out the offensive line in this draft.
7:12
[SPEAKER_02]: That could work.
7:13
[SPEAKER_02]: You could sort of build the plane as you're flying it.
7:16
[SPEAKER_02]: Love is worthy of it as a player in this draft.
7:19
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a top five player overall in this draft incredibly talented.
7:23
[SPEAKER_02]: But it is tough from just a foundational team building perspective to take a running back in the top 10, not only financially, but also like where, like you said, if you're in the top 10, you usually have a bunch of other problems, are you just gonna be throwing him against the rocks for a couple of years.
7:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so so let me ask you this here and then we'll kind of get more bear specific questions is I always like to ask you something like this not we'll get into day to day three guys you might like but I want to ask you because like you said this is a draft with a lot of questions with with guys and you know you're you're here and you know some people projected and
8:00
[SPEAKER_00]: in the top 10 and other people think this person's going like outside the top 20.
8:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Like Monroe Freeling from Georgia, I have heard all over the board.
8:07
[SPEAKER_00]: Like as high as like top three or 21, like you, it seems like there's a lot of, you know, variance in terms of how people see this draft playing out.
8:16
[SPEAKER_00]: So EJ, who are three or four first round graded guys that jump off the page at you a little bit more that you, you kind of have star these first round guys as EJ Snyder guys.
8:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, that's a great question and one that you know that I love in terms of top guys and I think this is going to be more important as draft because it is a draft that is strong in let's say non-traditional areas it's strong and tight end it's strong and inside linebacker it's strong and safety corners pretty good now corner is typically and position that you would invest high picks in but you know things like quarterback and left tackle and
8:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's say it edge even, you know, playmaking defensive tackle.
9:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Those are all not great or thinner.
9:03
[SPEAKER_02]: There are a few good players and then there's sort of a wider birth or just a lot of guys that you're not sure about.
9:08
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think it's going to be really important for teams in the first round to have guys like this where they go.
9:13
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't really care what you say about his value.
9:16
[SPEAKER_02]: This is a good football player.
9:17
[SPEAKER_02]: And when I look back in three years, I'm not going to feel like I wasted my first round pick.
9:21
[SPEAKER_02]: And they're just going to have to have that conviction.
9:23
[SPEAKER_02]: So some of the guys for me like that, I already mentioned Jeremiah love one of the best players in this draft.
9:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Ruben Bane.
9:30
[SPEAKER_02]: I really like his football player.
9:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't care about the arm lengths.
9:34
[SPEAKER_02]: I love the power profile.
9:35
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he is going to be one of the treasures in the straf that is going to be productive because he's already been productive at the college level against a lot of guys that he's going to see on Sunday.
9:44
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's this isn't a prove it type deal.
9:46
[SPEAKER_02]: This is a he's just going to keep doing it type deal.
9:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Monster delaying the corner from LSU love him.
9:54
[SPEAKER_02]: He's my CB1 very valuable player and I think a starting lockdown corner in the NFL day one Lancer line said he thought he was the best defense.
10:03
[SPEAKER_00]: We had a mountain my show you one of the best the best defense of player in the draft according to lands
10:09
[SPEAKER_02]: these very good.
10:10
[SPEAKER_02]: He's hard for me not to watch and you're always watching with it in the back your head because we know his draft analyst that you can be wrong and that you will be wrong like you will love a player and they will not work out or you will not like a player and they'll be fantastic.
10:23
[SPEAKER_02]: Like it happens in this line of work.
10:24
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to go back and figure out why but in doing that with the lane, I'm sitting there going, okay, how could you feel?
10:31
[SPEAKER_02]: How could he be bad?
10:32
[SPEAKER_02]: How is he not going to work out?
10:34
[SPEAKER_02]: And I struggle to find the reasons.
10:36
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's very few players like that.
10:38
[SPEAKER_02]: So I would agree with Lance.
10:41
[SPEAKER_02]: Love Lance has taken his process his work.
10:43
[SPEAKER_02]: He's one of the best Spencer Fano, the offensive tackle from Utah.
10:47
[SPEAKER_02]: I'd love him.
10:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he's a tackle.
10:49
[SPEAKER_02]: I think we're going to be talking about him like we talk about race on Slater.
10:52
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a lot of talk about race on Slater the same way.
10:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, Arm Lake might be a great guard, but an average tackle.
10:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, gets the chance to play a tackle.
10:59
[SPEAKER_02]: One of the best in the NFL, I think we're going to be saying the same thing about Fano because he has very rare movement skills.
11:06
[SPEAKER_02]: Having stood next to that guy and watched him right next to all the other tackles on the field at the combine, he is built different for sure.
11:13
[SPEAKER_02]: And still growing, still growing as a player.
11:16
[SPEAKER_02]: Good now, already very good now and I think getting better.
11:19
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, they good one.
11:21
[SPEAKER_02]: I, the guard from Penn State.
11:23
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he's a plug-and-play.
11:24
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll say second contract guy without question.
11:28
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, who were a couple of the guys from the first round.
11:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I really like a manual make Neil Warren.
11:33
[SPEAKER_02]: I have a feeling we were talking about him later, but I think he's going to be, I think he's going to be a very good player in the NFL again because of his demonstrated skills.
11:42
[SPEAKER_02]: I feel the same way about the end of it.
11:44
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't at the beginning of the process.
11:45
[SPEAKER_02]: Don't
11:48
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a really good football player and has been throughout his entire career at Purdue and then moving on to Oregon.
11:54
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got tremendous range and having a safety with that much range and instincts that are very good is wildly valuable in the NFL.
12:02
[SPEAKER_02]: There's just not that many guys that can play deep like that.
12:06
[SPEAKER_02]: and cover that much ground consistently, make tackles in the way that he does.
12:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And then also support the run heavily from depth 12, 13 yards.
12:14
[SPEAKER_02]: That's the perfect safety in a two safety set, which is the predominant system in the NFL.
12:18
[SPEAKER_02]: So I think he's going to be very valuable.
12:20
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think he's going to be on the board for very long in this draft.
12:23
[SPEAKER_00]: No, it's interesting.
12:24
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let me ask you a draft adjacent question here before we dive into the bears roster worth their needs and how they can approach this and that is that there may be a defensive tackle available who currently lives probably in the state of New Jersey.
12:40
[SPEAKER_00]: his name is Dexter Lawrence and the bears obviously need help up front and they need help up front this year something that picking at 25 or on day two you probably aren't getting you may get a contributor but you're probably not getting an impact guy as as a rookie most of the time those guys are already taken you know and in the edge or whatever it might be Jared versus is kind of the rare guy and he was still like the 21st Becky still wasn't that wouldn't have been there at
13:08
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me ask you, if the giants call the bears and EJ Sniders in charge, it says, Dexter Lawrence for 25, would you do it?
13:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Is that too steep?
13:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Would you do it for a second round pick?
13:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Or would you rather the bears focus on getting younger and not bringing in a guy approaching 30?
13:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I would do it in a heartbeat under one condition.
13:31
[SPEAKER_02]: I want my doc, the guy that I trust, to look at Dex's elbow.
13:35
[SPEAKER_02]: I think Dexer Lawrence is a singular talent in the NFL, and there are very few of those.
13:40
[SPEAKER_02]: There are very few guys that you can't replicate their success.
13:43
[SPEAKER_02]: Dex is one of them.
13:43
[SPEAKER_02]: If you look at his pressure as a true nose tackle.
13:47
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, it's three times greater than the next closest person.
13:50
[SPEAKER_02]: What's insane?
13:51
[SPEAKER_02]: He is one of one.
13:53
[SPEAKER_02]: He has not been great the last couple years.
13:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, people talk about motivation, whether or not he was with the program.
13:58
[SPEAKER_02]: I really think it comes down to the health of the elbow.
14:00
[SPEAKER_02]: How healthy is the elbow?
14:02
[SPEAKER_02]: And if my doc is satisfied, the dexteral orange is,
14:07
[SPEAKER_02]: 85% of regular Dexter Lawrence and that elbow is going to hold up for me.
14:12
[SPEAKER_02]: I do it for 25 straight up without a question because you're not going to get a player of that caliber at 25 in this draft.
14:20
[SPEAKER_02]: You're just not.
14:21
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not going to happen.
14:23
[SPEAKER_02]: So as a value, people say, oh, we got to give him a contract.
14:26
[SPEAKER_02]: again he's one of one you pay those guys and he's gonna make a difference not only for your defense and the interior defense is he gonna make a difference for Montez wet he is he's gonna be a force multiplier for him is he gonna make a difference for awesome bookric he is he's gonna come in so much attention down to down snap to snap that the rest of your guys are gonna get a couple of notches up make a difference for Devon Bush and
14:49
[SPEAKER_02]: and, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh uh, uh uh, uh uh, uh uh, uh uh, uh uh, uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh
15:10
[SPEAKER_02]: If his body is good and going to hold up, this guy's not even 30, yes, you're going to have to pay him, you can structure that as cash heavy for a couple of years and he's going to make a huge difference right now and the bears as we saw last year a little bit more ready than people thought they were I would do that in a heartbeat because I would sleep well at the end of day one knowing that what I got for my pick was a premium.
15:32
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, now let's talk about that pick because if the bears don't trade it and I think the Dexter Lawrence things a bit of a pipe tree, but hey, we it's it's we're talking about when the the man demands a trade and John harbors says everyone's available.
15:44
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's at least worth worth discussing and in podcast form here, but
15:49
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's talk about 25 because I think when people started looking at the draft, you know, post Super Bowl, it's when the eyes really start to shift.
15:57
[SPEAKER_00]: Everyone's just like, just who's the defensive tackle?
15:59
[SPEAKER_00]: The bears are going to take at 25.
16:02
[SPEAKER_00]: And then it started coming a little bit more.
16:03
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, maybe the tackles aren't going to be there.
16:06
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe you'll end up being an edge stand of taking at 25.
16:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And then you start hearing something cool.
16:11
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's
16:11
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe they go off the board and they take a corner like all these things start popping up that maybe the bit tackle we've heard that a lot.
16:19
[SPEAKER_00]: So before we get into all these other potential avenues they could take.
16:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Because there's a clear need in defensive line in both rooms tackle and on edge.
16:30
[SPEAKER_00]: And the fact that the bears may be looking elsewhere is that telling us something about the talent that maybe expected to be there at 25 on the defensive line.
16:41
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's probably just due diligence.
16:43
[SPEAKER_02]: They're doing just as much work on the draft class and interviewing those guys having him in for top or 30 visits, not top 30 visits.
16:50
[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, you have to do both.
16:53
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to weigh where can I get value again?
16:56
[SPEAKER_02]: It'd be great to get to Esher Lawrence, but if he's not available, you still gotta do something with that pick.
17:00
[SPEAKER_02]: And what is that thing?
17:02
[SPEAKER_02]: And down at the bottom of the first round, and the bears haven't been here for a while, so it's kind of new territory for them.
17:07
[SPEAKER_02]: They have to look at teams that have been successful being there for years and years and how you get talent out of the end of the first round and it's not by attaching yourself to a particular position and saying this or the highway right we have to come out of the first round with edge we have to come out of the first round defense tackle.
17:24
[SPEAKER_02]: it's looking at the board and all the unexpected things, teams have traded up in front of you, teams have traded back, you know, different players are there than you thought.
17:33
[SPEAKER_02]: Who's there?
17:34
[SPEAKER_02]: Where did this board?
17:36
[SPEAKER_02]: 2026 present you value that you can take advantage of and the Ravens are great at this for years and years.
17:43
[SPEAKER_02]: They would just take the draft as it came to them.
17:45
[SPEAKER_02]: They treated up occasionally.
17:46
[SPEAKER_02]: They treated down more often, but more often than not.
17:49
[SPEAKER_02]: They would be at the end of the first round, and they would just wait.
17:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And we would all say, oh, man, of course, that guy goes to the Ravens.
17:55
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a good football player.
17:56
[SPEAKER_02]: They just picked up the dollar that everybody else dropped.
17:58
[SPEAKER_02]: the bears need to be able to do that.
18:00
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can't do that if you say, you know, my way or the highway, it's got to be edge or that just puts you in a pace you into corner and limits your flexibility.
18:09
[SPEAKER_02]: So they're looking at this draft.
18:11
[SPEAKER_02]: The edges that they're probably going to have option for at 25 have questions.
18:16
[SPEAKER_02]: They are not complete players.
18:19
[SPEAKER_02]: The defensive tackles for the most part that they're going to have the ability to get at 25 are not playmaking defensive tackles.
18:26
[SPEAKER_02]: They are run stuffing defensive tackles and you can get run stuffers that are very good later on the draft even top a day three.
18:32
[SPEAKER_02]: They're very good run stuffing defensive tackles.
18:34
[SPEAKER_02]: So is that a value?
18:36
[SPEAKER_02]: You need to look at this board and it might be that the third safety is their best value.
18:41
[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
18:41
[SPEAKER_02]: If that guy that they want may interview and think is going to be a key piece of their defense that they can match with Kobe in the back end, that might be their best play.
18:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Their best play might be left tackle, right?
18:53
[SPEAKER_02]: And again, because we're not sure about the health of last year's left tackle and when he's coming back, if there is a great left tackle that other teams have passed over for one reason or another, and your staff loves them Dan Rochars
19:07
[SPEAKER_02]: and he doesn't have to play this year because you have two players over there, right, that you can start veterans, he can come in and be the option next year.
19:14
[SPEAKER_02]: If you think he's again a two contract left tackle, that's a position you take a chance on.
19:18
[SPEAKER_02]: So you just have to stay flexible and work with the board as it comes to you.
19:24
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, let me ask you, and I understand what you're saying.
19:28
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's what you're saying.
19:29
[SPEAKER_00]: You have to take BPA in 25.
19:30
[SPEAKER_00]: It's basically what you're saying.
19:32
[SPEAKER_00]: The bears are also in a situation where
19:36
[SPEAKER_00]: They did not create a lot of cap space this year for free agency.
19:42
[SPEAKER_00]: They signed some guys, obviously, but it was a lot of tit for tap, you know, where, you know, one guy leaves, they bring in a new player.
19:49
[SPEAKER_00]: There weren't really any additions.
19:51
[SPEAKER_00]: And what that's done is it's left the bears with some holes where you sit there and you try and look at their September week one starters and go, they don't have certain starters.
20:02
[SPEAKER_00]: They do not have a safety to go with Kobe Bryant right now.
20:04
[SPEAKER_00]: They just don't have one on the roster.
20:06
[SPEAKER_00]: they, you know, I'm sure some bear's fans would say they have a starting edgen Austin booker.
20:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to say they don't have a starting edgen, because I like Austin booker as a third defense event is more of a rotational guy.
20:18
[SPEAKER_00]: There's questions on the defensive tackle as well.
20:21
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll get the left tackle in the second.
20:22
[SPEAKER_00]: This is just more on the defensive side of the ball.
20:25
[SPEAKER_00]: The bears have left themselves in a situation and I understand they can make some more free agent signings and guys like Cam Jordan are out there.
20:33
[SPEAKER_00]: I understand that, but
20:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Right now, the bears are in a situation where they need to draft for starters.
20:40
[SPEAKER_00]: It's never a position you want to be in, but they have some holes that they simply need to address.
20:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And they kind of have to telegraph some of their moves here that they need to make on day one and day two.
20:51
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I would agree that it's going to be hard for them to look away from certain players.
20:57
[SPEAKER_02]: If any of the big three-safeties are there, that's Dylan Theoneman, Caleb Downs, Manning Lake New York Warren.
21:03
[SPEAKER_02]: If any of those guys are on the board, it's going to be difficult for them to pass because they have a need and all three of those players are rated very highly.
21:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Most teams have them rated with first round grades not all never never every team is going to say that for all three of them But in general those guys are regarded as the top three safety's on the board and they're very good players Edge the guys you're going to get a look at at 25 if you're lucky you're going to get a shot at Mesodore
21:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Keldrick Faulk is a guy that could be there, but again, Mego earlier because he has insane athletic gifts, and that's catnip for NFL GMs.
21:38
[SPEAKER_02]: And then TJ Parker from Clemson, who is more of a power based edge, and we've seen that succeed.
21:43
[SPEAKER_02]: You need those.
21:44
[SPEAKER_02]: You talked about Jared verse.
21:46
[SPEAKER_02]: He, I'm not going to say his profile is the same as Jared verse, but he is a similar player in size and execution, the way that he plays the game.
21:55
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not to the level of Jared versus power, but he does have that element to his game.
22:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Neither of those guys are huge shack creators right now.
22:03
[SPEAKER_02]: They have the pain.
22:03
[SPEAKER_02]: potential to be.
22:04
[SPEAKER_02]: Mesodoro is the best of the three, but he also has age concerns and injury concerns.
22:08
[SPEAKER_02]: He's pretty beat up.
22:09
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got some foot stuff and some shoulder stuff.
22:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, they're going to know more about that.
22:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Their doctors haven't looked at him, but really probably because of the holes you talked about.
22:18
[SPEAKER_02]: That's where they're going to be focusing.
22:19
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't see anybody at defensive tackle at 25 that they're going to be tripping over themselves to take.
22:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, again, if you're going to take a D.T.
22:27
[SPEAKER_02]: in the first round anywhere in the first round, you're not looking for a run step or you're looking for a guy with past rush production.
22:33
[SPEAKER_02]: And nobody that is likely to be available at 25 really creates that with any certainty in this round.
22:40
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
22:40
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you've brought up the safety is a couple of times.
22:43
[SPEAKER_00]: So, so let me ask you there.
22:44
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me just start just briefly just with like a 10 second answer.
22:47
[SPEAKER_00]: You brought up Caleb Downs.
22:49
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no chance he's going to be there, right?
22:51
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to be off.
22:53
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to be the first safety off the board, right?
22:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe.
22:56
[SPEAKER_02]: He is a very good football player and he is very highly rated.
23:00
[SPEAKER_02]: I have a I hold Caleb Downs in very high regard.
23:04
[SPEAKER_02]: It is, this is a flavor's draft, DJ said that early on at the combine and I picked up on that line and used it a hundred times since then because I believe it.
23:11
[SPEAKER_02]: And with safeties, it depends on what you want in your system.
23:17
[SPEAKER_02]: Caleb Downs is better closer to the line of skirmish.
23:19
[SPEAKER_02]: Can he play deep?
23:20
[SPEAKER_02]: He can.
23:21
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he better there?
23:22
[SPEAKER_02]: No, he is more effective near the line of skirmish.
23:25
[SPEAKER_02]: What was more traditionally a box safety and he is amazing at it.
23:30
[SPEAKER_02]: He is ridiculous in terms of his anticipation.
23:33
[SPEAKER_02]: His strength, his ability to shed.
23:35
[SPEAKER_02]: He is not the fastest guy.
23:37
[SPEAKER_02]: Everybody knows that, but he is effective because he is mentally very quick, he's super smart and he's wildly effective.
23:43
[SPEAKER_02]: He's really, really efficient in the way that he plays the football game.
23:46
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's why he's so highly regarded.
23:48
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you need a deep third controller, even if you have a two safety system and you want to be able to leave him back regularly and patrol the deep third,
23:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Downs might not be your favorite guy.
23:58
[SPEAKER_02]: That's probably gonna be the end of it, right?
24:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Who has a more balanced skill set?
24:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Overall, is he as good a player?
24:04
[SPEAKER_02]: Hmm, that's debatable, but for some teams, he is gonna be higher on their board because that's the need they have.
24:10
[SPEAKER_02]: Manual McNeil Warren is a little bit more in the middle for me.
24:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, not necessarily fast of foot speed, but tremendous size, great processor gets there quickly because he sees it very quickly.
24:20
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like a ton of bricks because he's like six, three, two hundred plus pounds.
24:25
[SPEAKER_02]: very, very good player, more well-rounded and I think can, you know, more, I'm not going to say scheme agnostic, but not so scheme dependent as, you know, some of the other players in this draft.
24:35
[SPEAKER_02]: So teams are going to have those three in different orders, depending on what they need.
24:40
[SPEAKER_02]: Is Caleb Downs likely to be the first one off the board.
24:43
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure, there's some concerns about his need, but I've heard that most teams are
24:47
[SPEAKER_02]: satisfied with that.
24:48
[SPEAKER_02]: They think they can manage that.
24:49
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's more of a future thing, not a now thing.
24:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, all these players have that.
24:54
[SPEAKER_02]: If you've played four or five years of coach football at this point, you're beat up.
24:57
[SPEAKER_02]: You've got something.
24:58
[SPEAKER_02]: And they seem to be okay with that.
24:59
[SPEAKER_02]: So probably he's the first guy off the board, but I could see a world where he's not.
25:04
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so let's take EJ Snyder's scouting shops and let's take Dennis Allen scheme and what he likes and how out of his safety and how he likes to utilize safeties and say that obviously it won't be the case, but all three safeties are available at 25 what is the order for EJ Snyder 1, 2, 3 in terms of who the bear should select in Dennis Allen's defense.
25:28
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a fantastic question.
25:30
[SPEAKER_02]: I love it just from a theoretical perspective.
25:32
[SPEAKER_02]: That's really good.
25:34
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that Dennis Allen would be over the moon if he could get his hands on the element because he's going to be able to do basically anything with him.
25:46
[SPEAKER_02]: That guy can cover every blade of grass and do it really well.
25:50
[SPEAKER_02]: And like downs again, the range to the deep corner
25:54
[SPEAKER_02]: not as good as a better around the line.
25:56
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he is his theme and really good around the line.
25:59
[SPEAKER_02]: He is.
25:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Make Neil Warren.
26:01
[SPEAKER_02]: I love as an all-rounder.
26:02
[SPEAKER_02]: He's the first of these three safeties that I watched and I thought, oh, geez, if they're all this good.
26:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And of course, they never are, but like I thought, because I watched him back in like October, November for a really early draft thing I did and I thought, man, he's
26:15
[SPEAKER_02]: he's a really good player like Toledo's cranking out some db's at this point.
26:21
[SPEAKER_02]: So, okay, if I had to rank them, you know.
26:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I would say Theneman would be his first because it's going to give him the most flexibility and pairing him with Kobe Bryant basically means you can do anything you want on any given play and that's tremendous for defensive success.
26:36
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't have to tip your hand.
26:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Down's just on the fact that you know you're getting such a great processor and he is going to create you explosive plays on defense and those are very valuable.
26:48
[SPEAKER_02]: If you get TFLs, if you get, you know, stops or, you know, bad and down passes on first
26:54
[SPEAKER_02]: the success probability for the overall drive plummet's, right?
26:59
[SPEAKER_02]: If you can make those big time plays where defense and down does that all the time, McNeil Warren would be great.
27:04
[SPEAKER_02]: And it looked the reality of this maybe at 25, McNeil Warren might be the only one available.
27:10
[SPEAKER_02]: I would still be fine with that.
27:11
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't feel like that's a consolation price.
27:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, like I said, he's a very good football player.
27:15
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let's jump over to the offensive side of the ball.
27:18
[SPEAKER_00]: And let's talk about left tackle here for a second.
27:20
[SPEAKER_00]: Cause obviously this is interesting.
27:22
[SPEAKER_00]: Azita Pillow was making a lot of strides.
27:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Offensive line really was hitting its stride and December with him and really coming together is I think arguably the best unit in the league certainly top five.
27:33
[SPEAKER_00]: Trepello has the as the knee injury, the bears are like, oh, maybe November, some people are just like he's not even going to play this year.
27:40
[SPEAKER_00]: And some people are saying he may especially based on his size, he may never get back to form.
27:48
[SPEAKER_00]: And I obviously, I bring this up because the bears are clearly looking at left tackles at 25.
27:53
[SPEAKER_00]: And to me,
27:54
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you say due diligence and I agree.
27:57
[SPEAKER_00]: You have to look at everything.
27:58
[SPEAKER_00]: But we're bringing guys in for top 30 visits and you're looking at these players.
28:02
[SPEAKER_00]: To me, you're wondering if Aussie Trapillo is not going to be available in 2027.
28:07
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the way I look at it.
28:10
[SPEAKER_00]: Otherwise, you are not going to spend first-round capital
28:14
[SPEAKER_00]: on an offensive tackle.
28:15
[SPEAKER_00]: When in theory, you've got your two tackles for 2027 already there, even if Trepello can't play in 2026.
28:21
[SPEAKER_00]: So to me, left tackle, especially if the bears do end up going that direction, sounds a lot of alarm bells that Aussie Trepello just may never be the guy that bears thought he could be.
28:33
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and I don't think that you can count on it, even if you want it to happen and your docs believe that it will happen, and he is on pace, there are setbacks in things like that.
28:43
[SPEAKER_02]: It happens, and if you are putting all your eggs in the Aussies, your pillow is going to be back and at the same form in 2027 basket, and it doesn't happen for whatever reason.
28:53
[SPEAKER_02]: There are a million variables between here and there.
28:56
[SPEAKER_02]: You are then putting yourself in the same spot that you're kind of in this year where you have a major hole at a premium position everybody knows it and you have to fill it but for twenty twenty seven starts because you don't have a developmental rookie he was the developmental rookie any developed and that's great.
29:13
[SPEAKER_02]: the two guys that you've got in this year are short termers, right?
29:16
[SPEAKER_02]: They can probably very well fill the gap for this year.
29:19
[SPEAKER_02]: But again, the slate gets cleaned off basically next year and you either have to sign one of those guys for big money because they played well this year, which is not a bad problem to have or neither one played great and maybe odds these need hasn't come back and then the cupboard is basically empty at left tackles.
29:35
[SPEAKER_02]: So again, if this draft presents you a gift,
29:39
[SPEAKER_02]: If there is a left tackle who you have met and scouted and again, Dan Rochard, A, thinks he can play left tackle because that's the big one here is for some tackles, that's very possible and other tackles, it's not, they simply can't do it.
29:55
[SPEAKER_02]: It's more important for tackles than it is for interior offensive linemen because the angles are more extreme.
30:01
[SPEAKER_02]: If you are a right tackle, you are used to being right-handed, stabbing with, right, or left-hand in a certain series.
30:08
[SPEAKER_02]: And as you move to the left tackle, you know that you played offensive line.
30:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Those angles increase.
30:13
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to do it more basically.
30:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Whereas your guard, you can get away with a little bit more forward facing.
30:18
[SPEAKER_02]: So we see interior offensive line players move a little bit more easily.
30:22
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, some still struggle with that.
30:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Some are purely right guards.
30:26
[SPEAKER_02]: I can't play left.
30:26
[SPEAKER_02]: So you have to have the ability for this player that this theoretical player that drops to play the left side.
30:32
[SPEAKER_02]: They're very few true left tackles in the draft in the first round conversation.
30:37
[SPEAKER_02]: However,
30:38
[SPEAKER_02]: There are a couple I'd take a shot on, if they're there and that's true.
30:43
[SPEAKER_02]: It has to be and not or.
30:45
[SPEAKER_02]: So you've worked them out, you believe their ability to shift to the left side is fine and we'll go well and you have a year to do it, which is key.
30:53
[SPEAKER_02]: They do not have to be on the field this fall.
30:55
[SPEAKER_02]: They may not have to play for the entire year and I think that would be great again, especially making position switch.
31:01
[SPEAKER_02]: because the bears have swapped offensive linemen a lot in the past don't love it, but if they feel good about it, Blake Miller or Maxahonachore are two guys that again, they felt comfortable with that the gifts are there like those guys could be locked down players on that side if they develop as left tackles and then you've got great answers.
31:22
[SPEAKER_02]: Hey, if Azzie comes back and he's fully healthy and you've got a third swing tackle that's a high
31:28
[SPEAKER_02]: That very few teams have that.
31:30
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a great position to be in.
31:32
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you don't and it doesn't work out as we often see that it doesn't, you are staring at a 2027 with a major hole at a premium position that's going to be very expensive to fill either through draft capital.
31:44
[SPEAKER_02]: You really can't get him in free agency.
31:46
[SPEAKER_02]: So basically draft capital.
31:47
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, I want to I want to address one other position with you and then kind of circle back to defensive line and safety is when we get into day two picks here and that's corner back because, you know, the one thing I've heard at talking to a couple people is that the bears could do something that surprises a lot of people and take a corner early in the straf and when you look at their current.
32:09
[SPEAKER_00]: defensive back room.
32:10
[SPEAKER_00]: It really actually wouldn't be that shocking.
32:12
[SPEAKER_00]: Obviously they don't want to there.
32:14
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, we don't know what Jalen Johnson is going to be this year, but obviously the bears have to see what they have with Jalen before they make any decisions there, but they let Nesha on right leave.
32:22
[SPEAKER_00]: They apparently hate Tyrex Stevenson because when
32:25
[SPEAKER_00]: and he gets opportunities to play, he's not playing, and they go other directions.
32:29
[SPEAKER_00]: So obviously Gordon is best inside there.
32:32
[SPEAKER_00]: I do not think the Bears would think to bounce him outside.
32:36
[SPEAKER_00]: So the Bears have another outside corner position.
32:39
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I don't know, maybe Tyrex Stevenson starts this year, but that seems to be another position where the Bears need some immediate help is outside corner, because Tyrex Stevenson does not seem to be on the same page with his coaching staff, which based on his,
32:53
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, the previous coaching staff that shouldn't be too shocking, but cornerback, you know, late round one or obviously on day two is that something that you could see the bears do and are there a couple guys that that that that you would like to see in Dennis Allen's defense.
33:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, and yes, I am not at all surprised that you bring it up because my personal philosophy about roster building is your one spraying ankle away from and the bears are one spraying ankle away from meaningful snaps at outside corner in a lead full of killers at wider
33:33
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you feel super secure about that, you're very different than I am.
33:37
[SPEAKER_02]: So I could see again, corner being a place where they look at the board, they look at how it's fallen.
33:43
[SPEAKER_02]: And you've got some wildcards in there.
33:46
[SPEAKER_02]: You've got Zafraiser who didn't play last year.
33:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I like him.
33:49
[SPEAKER_02]: Do I think he's gonna come in and play starting reps at outside corner after a year off?
33:53
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not counting on that.
33:55
[SPEAKER_02]: So Tyrex, even since I really had high hopes for under Dennis Allen, I think he has a lot of physical skills.
34:00
[SPEAKER_02]: And obviously, he didn't match up that like you said, that's not something that's blossomed.
34:05
[SPEAKER_02]: So again, when you're looking at now, one, one spring ankle away.
34:09
[SPEAKER_02]: And when you're looking at next year, because again, those contracts start to age out.
34:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Who do you have any uncorner pipeline as a as a dependable outside corner?
34:16
[SPEAKER_02]: And the answer is,
34:18
[SPEAKER_02]: So there are a lot of good corners in this draft that are going to be available in that range and I would not be surprised and or upset
34:29
[SPEAKER_02]: If the bears took Colton hood out of Tennessee with their first round pick or and this is going to surprise me people Chris Johnson not a San Diego state.
34:38
[SPEAKER_02]: I think Chris Johnson might be the smoothest corner in this draft to see the best no he's probably the in my mind he's the probably fourth best corner in this draft but he is a very good polish corner with good size great technique can play press can play off.
34:54
[SPEAKER_02]: very smooth, doesn't panic.
34:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Colton hood a little bit smaller, but doesn't play small.
34:59
[SPEAKER_02]: I was actually surprised that he wasn't over six foot after I watched his tape.
35:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I looked at the measurements after the tape, typically the way I do it.
35:06
[SPEAKER_02]: And he is a great pressman corner and Dennis Allen loves those guys.
35:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Throughout his history, he loves having a gown.
35:13
[SPEAKER_02]: One side that he can say, go press the live and hell out of that guy and we're gonna run the defense around you.
35:19
[SPEAKER_02]: It's almost like a defensive back version of pin and pull.
35:22
[SPEAKER_02]: Like you locked down this side and we'll rotate around you.
35:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Colton Hood could do that right now.
35:28
[SPEAKER_02]: And so if either of those guys are there, they both probably will be.
35:32
[SPEAKER_02]: Hood might be off the board at that point, but I don't think so, Johnson.
35:36
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
35:36
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm hearing a lot of things about Johnson going in the first round because apparently NFL coaches love him as well.
35:42
[SPEAKER_02]: But if either of those guys are there and it didn't fall your way at edge.
35:46
[SPEAKER_02]: It didn't fall your way at left tacklers.
35:48
[SPEAKER_02]: A big run on those.
35:49
[SPEAKER_02]: It didn't fall your way at safety.
35:51
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe all three are off the border.
35:53
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe you don't like one of those three.
35:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Maybe you met with them and you've got concerns about them.
35:56
[SPEAKER_02]: You're sitting there and you're saying what are we going to do at 25?
35:59
[SPEAKER_02]: How do we get a good player?
36:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Like cornerbacks, especially outside
36:04
[SPEAKER_02]: you typically have to invest high draft capital to get them.
36:06
[SPEAKER_02]: You might get lucky and invest middle draft capital and have somebody blossom.
36:11
[SPEAKER_02]: But once they're good, you have to pay them huge dollars.
36:14
[SPEAKER_02]: So if you can get a starting outside corner, and I think both of those guys fit that description, that they won saying, I got a good football player at a position a need for my football team and sleep like a baby.
36:28
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
36:28
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's move over to day two.
36:29
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just going to just say this when we are talking day two prospects, E. J.
36:34
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's lump in if you have some guys that might be there in the fourth round as well.
36:38
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're talking about, let's do second, third, fourth round.
36:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's kind of do those together because and let's start at safety.
36:45
[SPEAKER_00]: And we did that in the first round.
36:46
[SPEAKER_00]: We talked about the big three.
36:48
[SPEAKER_00]: If the bears all the big three are gone or they go a different direction,
36:53
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very clear that a safety needs to be taken.
36:57
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no arguing that.
36:58
[SPEAKER_00]: There's going to be a safety taken probably by round two, but maybe round three, it seems to be it's going to be one of those top three or four picks.
37:07
[SPEAKER_00]: So if they don't do safety in round one, who are some other safety's that would intrigue you for Dennis Allen's defense?
37:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I think you're right, the bears are unlikely to get out of this one bill without a safety and if they do, I think I'm going to be disappointed because like you said, I don't see that player on the roster right now.
37:24
[SPEAKER_02]: So for round two, I'm looking at two guys that a lot of guys label his corners, but I actually think they're going to be better as safe ease and in terms of their alignment in college, they were
37:41
[SPEAKER_02]: He's kind of like Caleb down's light.
37:43
[SPEAKER_02]: He is an agent of chaos around the line of scrimmage.
37:46
[SPEAKER_02]: He's tremendous against the run, taking on tight ends and the run fit.
37:49
[SPEAKER_02]: But he's also got really good coverage skills.
37:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Better if he's facing the quarterback not so good if he's turning his back and running.
37:55
[SPEAKER_02]: But very good, you know, cornerback level coverage skills that I think would translate to safety very, very quickly, especially because of his stature and physical nature.
38:04
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's one.
38:05
[SPEAKER_02]: The other one is trading stokes from Arizona State, Genesis Smith's partner out there.
38:10
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, not the youngest player, he's 26, everybody's going to say he's overaged.
38:13
[SPEAKER_02]: I get it, knee injury in his past couple of years ago, but he's played very well and the explosion is back very evidently on tape, tremendous player in coverage, more of a deep third-type player.
38:25
[SPEAKER_02]: Again, I'm projecting him to safety.
38:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Both of those guys would be targets in round two for 57 or 60.
38:31
[SPEAKER_02]: And then in round three, it starts to thin out, pretty darn quickly.
38:38
[SPEAKER_02]: is the keywheatly, the safety from Penn State, very tall, very lanky, six, three-ish, good speed, more in a straight line, but it is a very good coverage player as well, and heavy against the run when he gets forward again, a little bit more linear, a little bit less sort of changes direction, but a very, very good player that I would not be unhappy with.
38:59
[SPEAKER_02]: And hey, look, the bears have had success with Penn State's A.D., so.
39:02
[SPEAKER_00]: They have, in fact, that is true.
39:05
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let's look at defensive line here.
39:07
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's start in the edge room.
39:09
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, let's take a look at this.
39:12
[SPEAKER_00]: I think defensive line is interesting.
39:13
[SPEAKER_00]: I think everyone's assuming the best.
39:15
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll definitely take a tack all early.
39:16
[SPEAKER_00]: They'll definitely take an edge early.
39:18
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not 100% certain on that.
39:22
[SPEAKER_00]: been scratching my head a lot about how they've been scratching my mind.
39:25
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm not I'm not banking on anything for certain happening.
39:29
[SPEAKER_00]: But if they do take let's just focus on edge to start then we'll do interior defensive line.
39:33
[SPEAKER_00]: If they do take an edge on day two again, who are the intriguing guys there for EJ Snyder?
39:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's weird at 57 and 60 again, depending on what you believe about how this edge class is gonna go off the board.
39:46
[SPEAKER_02]: There's some people saying it's gonna fly off the board.
39:48
[SPEAKER_02]: There's other people saying, no, it's not gonna go that fast and a lot of people that you think are gonna be gone or still gonna be there.
39:53
[SPEAKER_02]: So that makes it very difficult to project.
39:57
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a stable draft to look at and say, well, I feel pretty good that at 57, these three guys are gonna be there.
40:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's gonna be a lot more dealers choice and that makes it very, very difficult to project.
40:08
[SPEAKER_02]: As it sits currently, and I'm using consensus boards because generally they're fairly accurate, not perfectly accurate by far.
40:16
[SPEAKER_02]: Derek Moore, the edge for Michigan.
40:19
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, I'm not typically a Michigan edge fan, and that's not helmet scouting like Michigan has a type at edge.
40:24
[SPEAKER_02]: every's going to point out she said, and he was tremendous.
40:27
[SPEAKER_02]: I liked him.
40:27
[SPEAKER_02]: I had a good report on him.
40:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Derek Moore's a guy that kind of snuck up on me in the process.
40:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't watch him till a bit later, so I had a lot of edge scouting under my belt by the time I got to him.
40:36
[SPEAKER_02]: A lot of people to compare him to you.
40:39
[SPEAKER_02]: his stats aren't necessarily going to believe it was physical profiles very nice and there are flashes there he is probably going to be available that range and I think he both is going to fit the sort of Dennis Allen profile which is something I struggle with because Dennis Allen has this profile at edge that he likes I get it.
40:56
[SPEAKER_02]: hasn't been super successful, so I'm like why do we have to stick with that?
41:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Are we not learning?
41:02
[SPEAKER_02]: But you know, there is the factor that those are typically the guys you're going to see.
41:05
[SPEAKER_02]: You're not going to see a 230-pound edge.
41:08
[SPEAKER_02]: That is a fireball or off the edge drafted and playing for Dennis Allen.
41:11
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not likely.
41:12
[SPEAKER_02]: anything other than a DPR rule.
41:14
[SPEAKER_02]: So if you're taking a guy up high, round one, round two, he's going to be in every down edge and he's going to have to have some more size.
41:20
[SPEAKER_02]: More has that he has very long arms, he has pretty good strength and there are rushes where you see the potential for more and you go, oh, like if that gets polished up, that's a good player.
41:31
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's kind of the one I have my eye on in that area and then if we get down to round three,
41:37
[SPEAKER_02]: K-Round Crawford, the edge out of Auburn, the other edge out of Auburn, you know, Celtic Fox running mate down there.
41:45
[SPEAKER_02]: And he is a solid guy.
41:48
[SPEAKER_02]: He reminds me in the way that he plays a little bit of booker.
41:50
[SPEAKER_02]: He's not the same physically, but in terms of results and being a very solid number two.
41:56
[SPEAKER_02]: So on bootleg, we always talk about edge rushers in Batman, Robin, or Alfred.
42:00
[SPEAKER_02]: You need a Batman.
42:01
[SPEAKER_02]: You need a couple of good robins and you even need an Alfred.
42:04
[SPEAKER_02]: That might be your DPR, that might be your specialist.
42:06
[SPEAKER_02]: But Batman are alpha-rushers, right?
42:10
[SPEAKER_02]: The top guys you're going to take in the first 15 picks that are able to command double teams and everybody has to game plan against them.
42:16
[SPEAKER_02]: They're rare.
42:17
[SPEAKER_02]: Very few teams in the league have two.
42:20
[SPEAKER_02]: Houston's one of the teams that has two, very few teams have that.
42:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Some teams don't even have one good Batman.
42:26
[SPEAKER_02]: They have a bunch of robins.
42:27
[SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, I think Cameron Crawford is right now an Alfred that could become a low end Robin for that analogy.
42:35
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, and let's move over to the interior defensive line here because obviously it's a position that bears could attack here.
42:42
[SPEAKER_00]: Who are some guys there and then in terms of potential?
42:47
[SPEAKER_00]: Who is like you talked about trying to find those past rushing defensive tackles and obviously harder to do?
42:56
[SPEAKER_00]: Potential for like one of those because it does happen those defensive tackles taken on day two that blossom into major impact, you know, monsters on the interior is there a guy in this draft who he may have boomer bus going, but there is a chance for that boom on a day two pick.
43:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's a great question.
43:15
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it should be the bear's target because interior pressure is one of the things that screws up offences the fastest.
43:22
[SPEAKER_02]: It's the shortest line between A and B, right?
43:24
[SPEAKER_02]: The pressure comes the most quickly and disrupts the plays.
43:27
[SPEAKER_02]: So on day two, 57 and 60, and I know some people will say it's a little bit early, but again, there is a limited supply of these players in this draft.
43:36
[SPEAKER_02]: Real,
43:37
[SPEAKER_02]: playmaking what we would call three tech penetrating defensive tackles.
43:40
[SPEAKER_02]: There's only three or four spread throughout this draft and the one at the top is Grayson Haltman the DT out of Oklahoma.
43:47
[SPEAKER_02]: A lot of people will say, oh, he's he's not a deal.
43:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Be on the board at 60 or 70.
43:51
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you don't have a pick at 60 or 70.
43:53
[SPEAKER_02]: You got 57 and 60 and then you drop all the way down.
43:57
[SPEAKER_02]: He's going to be gone.
43:58
[SPEAKER_02]: So if you want to take him, you're probably going to have to take him with one of those spots.
44:02
[SPEAKER_02]: might it be a small overdraft?
44:03
[SPEAKER_02]: It might, but not if you think he's going to blossom into that player and you do see those flashes on tape.
44:10
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, if you get farther down, but not that much farther, Caleb Proctor, Southeastern Louisiana is a physical specimen and a guy that in the beginning of this process was down in the 170s, the 180s, he moved up to the 140s, the 150s, a couple of weeks ago,
44:32
[SPEAKER_02]: by the end of day three, that's pick 100.
44:35
[SPEAKER_02]: I am gonna cash those bets with ease.
44:37
[SPEAKER_02]: I am not gonna sweat it.
44:39
[SPEAKER_02]: The league is wild about Caleb Proctor for a lot of reasons.
44:44
[SPEAKER_02]: One is his ability to penetrate quickly.
44:46
[SPEAKER_02]: He is really strong pound for pound.
44:49
[SPEAKER_02]: It's only about 280, but he's six threes.
44:50
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got good leverage.
44:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And this is, honestly, if you want the how he Rosman mid-round dart throw of and physically gifted defensive tackle,
45:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Caleb Proctor is that guy.
45:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he's going to go well within the top hundred picks and way before a lot of people sort of recognize his name, but he's the other guy that could create pressure, sort of in the top 100 in that category of a real slashing penetrating three-ten.
45:15
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
45:16
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me ask you about another position here for day two.
45:18
[SPEAKER_00]: I got a couple more positions for day two, but another position for day two that I think a lot of bears fans are pretty common.
45:23
[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't have to happen this year, but I do think there's a good chance it does happen this year.
45:30
[SPEAKER_00]: early enough where you can be confident that the center can step in and start in 2027.
45:36
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think they would spend like a round two pick on a guy that's not going to start immediately, but round three and round four certainly I think a center could certainly be in the cards there for Ryan Polls.
45:46
[SPEAKER_00]: Are there some centers you would like in a Ben Johnson offense?
45:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, there are quite a few, and everybody's made the connection to Logan Jones, the Iowa Center, good outside zone center.
45:58
[SPEAKER_02]: And a guy that has, again, climbed throughout this process the beginning, he was like, oh, he's physically limited.
46:02
[SPEAKER_02]: He's not as big.
46:04
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, he'll be available in the fifth round.
46:07
[SPEAKER_02]: He'll be available in the fourth round.
46:08
[SPEAKER_02]: Logan Jones has made that very steady climb because people have gone back to the tape and gone.
46:15
[SPEAKER_02]: Hmm.
46:15
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, yeah, my favorite quote on Logan Jones, I think he came from an AMC scout said, this guy plays like he's already got two kids in a mortgage.
46:24
[SPEAKER_02]: And I want that for my center.
46:25
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm sorry, that sounds fantastic.
46:27
[SPEAKER_02]: But right now on the consensus board, he is just inside the top under it again.
46:31
[SPEAKER_02]: He was down in the 150s, 160s when this started, he's climbed up to 96.
46:35
[SPEAKER_02]: The other guy that I really like, again, I believe
46:38
[SPEAKER_02]: That you're on the right page that round two just where center value lines up.
46:43
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't think they're probably going to take one but round round three it starts to get there and Sam Heck from Kansas State is a very solid player with a lot of experience in the system physically.
46:54
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he's really good as well.
46:56
[SPEAKER_02]: He would be the you know, I think.
46:58
[SPEAKER_02]: Heck would be a sort of match lock and key fit for that third-round pick in terms of value.
47:04
[SPEAKER_02]: Logan Jones might be a little bit of a reach, but not that much.
47:07
[SPEAKER_02]: And then if you get farther on down, I think Jake slotters the next guy they're probably looking at the Florida Center.
47:13
[SPEAKER_02]: Not a guy physically blows you away.
47:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Having stood right next to him with the combine and watching move.
47:18
[SPEAKER_02]: Not a guy that I was overly impressed with physically.
47:20
[SPEAKER_02]: And I went back to the tape and I was like, man.
47:22
[SPEAKER_02]: he just wins, he just wins, wins, he can reach a three-tech, which is a very difficult thing to do as a center, he does it reliably.
47:30
[SPEAKER_02]: He's just, he just performs.
47:32
[SPEAKER_02]: He's one of those offensive linemen that is, you know, not necessarily body beautiful, but on tape, he does what you need him to do especially in his own scheme.
47:39
[SPEAKER_02]: So those are three guys I think they might target HECKed Jones and Slotter.
47:44
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, and I want to ask you about wide receiver as well because that is another position.
47:49
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, do they need a wide receiver right now?
47:51
[SPEAKER_00]: No, you know, John A Walker is their fourth wide receiver.
47:54
[SPEAKER_00]: I know Barris fans want him to get, you know, 75% of the snaps this year.
47:58
[SPEAKER_00]: But, you know,
47:59
[SPEAKER_00]: They did sign Raymond.
48:01
[SPEAKER_00]: I do think they like Walker.
48:02
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's not it's not a position of need and tight end obviously Cole commits it and there is as the second tight end they don't really have a third tight and obviously that's probably more of a blocking type guy maybe just grab one and round seven that you you're intrigued by but if someone sitting there like Luther burden was sitting there last year.
48:21
[SPEAKER_00]: It certainly wouldn't be a shock or if Ben Johnson's like, I want this guy in my offense, this is happening because if Ben Johnson wants something Ben Johnson's getting something so are there day two early day three wide receivers that you think could intrigue the bears.
48:36
[SPEAKER_02]: several.
48:37
[SPEAKER_02]: And for different reasons, again, guys with different profiles and it is a flavor straff and I don't think it's fair for positions like corner or wide receiver to say, oh, this is just wide receiver number 10.
48:48
[SPEAKER_02]: What does he do?
48:48
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he slot dependent?
48:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he outside?
48:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he more versatile?
48:51
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he a one?
48:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Is he a two?
48:53
[SPEAKER_02]: You really have to dig into that.
48:54
[SPEAKER_02]: And there are a couple of players that I
48:56
[SPEAKER_02]: I think would be spendjoz and cat nip to your point that if they get there, he's going to go no way.
49:02
[SPEAKER_02]: This is the best player on the board for me and I know exactly what I'm going to do with him.
49:07
[SPEAKER_02]: One of those is Skyler Bell, the wider Siever out of UConn.
49:10
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he is one of the best offensive players in this draft and that's on the entire side of offense that includes Lyman.
49:17
[SPEAKER_02]: quarterback's wife or she was running back to anything.
49:19
[SPEAKER_02]: Skyler Bell is fantastic and I think he would be catnip for Ben because he is role versatile.
49:26
[SPEAKER_02]: He is incredibly sure Hannity's got like 10 inch hands.
49:29
[SPEAKER_02]: He stayed at UConn to develop that program because he said he got
49:34
[SPEAKER_02]: much bigger NIL offers to leave and said, no, I came here to build this thing and if I play well enough, they will find me and sure enough they have found him and he is a very, very good player.
49:46
[SPEAKER_02]: I love his advanced metrics.
49:47
[SPEAKER_02]: I love his tape.
49:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I love his build.
49:48
[SPEAKER_02]: I love the way he goes about his business.
49:51
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think Ben would be, you know, I think Ben would just stand up and say it's over.
49:55
[SPEAKER_02]: That's our guy.
49:55
[SPEAKER_02]: He's more valuable than anybody else on the board.
49:57
[SPEAKER_02]: He's there.
49:59
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, let me ask you a couple more philosophical things here before we get into seventh round picks that that that could be intriguing for the bears and that is trading in this draft because last year we heard that it was going to be the most active Thursday night trade of, you know, night of all the time.
50:19
[SPEAKER_00]: And basically, once the bear still calls and lovelin everyone's phone stop ringing is the way everyone says it basically played out last year that lovelin was apparently the guy.
50:27
[SPEAKER_00]: people were interested in trying to come up and get, whether that's 100% true or not, I'm not sure, but regardless, the trades weren't there early.
50:33
[SPEAKER_00]: So I mean, obviously round one, if someone calls, you know, if Ty Simpson, if someone loves Ty Simpson and calls the bears, and the bears want to trade down, you know, maybe that happens.
50:42
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if there's going to be opportunities there, but I've heard again some things that people may be
50:48
[SPEAKER_00]: intrigued in terms of having a lot of movement and day two and day three of the draft, like you said, it's a flavors draft and people may want to just come up to get their guy because they don't like three or four guys, whatever it might be.
51:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Is this a draft where you think there should be potential for the bears to trade down because we talked to, you know, what we're going to talk about it right here, the fact that the bears obviously they've got a heavy day to
51:17
[SPEAKER_00]: Then they're not picking until the lottery picks in round seven.
51:20
[SPEAKER_00]: They don't really have anything in that fifth, sixth round, where there could be some interesting prospects.
51:25
[SPEAKER_00]: So, is trade down a viable possibility?
51:28
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you never know until we get there.
51:30
[SPEAKER_00]: But do you think it's a draft where people are going to be moving a lot?
51:34
[SPEAKER_02]: Uh, I think movement's going to go three particular ways in this draft and and whenever you say somebody wants to trade down, somebody's got to want to trade up like that's the balance.
51:43
[SPEAKER_02]: Lots of people, uh, again, I've been doing more sort of background work on, on players and you end up hearing things about the draft as well as a whole when you're doing that kind of specific work on players.
51:55
[SPEAKER_02]: And one of the things I've heard over and over again is, yeah, everybody wants to trade down.
51:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Like everybody wants to trade down in this draft because
52:02
[SPEAKER_02]: The valuations they have are very close, very consistent from I would say top two thirds of round one all the way down to like round three or four and that means hey if I trade back I can still get a player I like very much so and I'm going to get something for it so a lot of people want to trade down some people would have to want to trade up and there are teams like the jets that have more picks this year than they can probably roster
52:29
[SPEAKER_02]: they're going to look for two things they're going to look for value and trading up like hey I'll trade up but I'll give you a little bit less because you know look you need the trade and I don't so they're going to try and take advantage of that and pay a little bit less than they would in a typical year.
52:45
[SPEAKER_02]: or teams like that, or teams that just don't like players their pick are going to try and pay them forward into 2027, because the 2027 class, and I'm not just talking about quarterbacks, in general, scouts have been looking at the 2027 class for three years.
53:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, for years.
53:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Look back at all the freshmen that came in and they went, okay, when's the first year they're eligible?
53:06
[SPEAKER_02]: Jeremiah Smiths of the world.
53:07
[SPEAKER_02]: right, and there are many others.
53:09
[SPEAKER_02]: The edge class looks good.
53:10
[SPEAKER_02]: The wide receiver class looks bunanas.
53:12
[SPEAKER_02]: The quarterback class looks great.
53:14
[SPEAKER_02]: One of the reasons we didn't really talk about Ty Simpson at the top, but one of the reasons I think Ty Simpson chose to come out this year is, yeah, he's the second best quarterback in his draft.
53:23
[SPEAKER_02]: If you waited until next year,
53:25
[SPEAKER_02]: even if he had a good year, which is not guaranteed.
53:27
[SPEAKER_02]: He could regress.
53:28
[SPEAKER_02]: He could get hurt like whatever else.
53:30
[SPEAKER_02]: You could lose his carving job.
53:32
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, even if he had a good year, he might be quarterback seven or eight and just in terms of the number of quarterbacks that typically would pick, even in a heavy first round, that's five or six.
53:43
[SPEAKER_02]: You'd be a second round quarterback in that year.
53:45
[SPEAKER_02]: Or maybe a third, depending on how it went.
53:48
[SPEAKER_02]: So he and his team probably looked at that and went, dude, if I go right now, there's this huge gap.
53:53
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to fill that for somebody.
53:55
[SPEAKER_02]: Might be the end around one.
53:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Might be round two, whatever.
53:57
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm the next guy off the board when somebody needs a quarterback.
54:00
[SPEAKER_02]: If I wait till next year, A, my outcome is uncertain and B.
54:04
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not like I'm tickling the back end of the top 10 as opposed to number two so I think that was a very conscious choice a lot of teams are going to look to kick picks to next year because they're thought of as very valuable that is thought of as a talent rich class so I think there's going to be a lot of calls I'm not sure how many of those trades are actually going to get consummated to your point the bears could really use it there's 250 picks 250 plus picks in this draft they have a 110 pick gap
54:33
[SPEAKER_02]: from round four at one twenty nine their next pick is round seven to thirty nine the bear bears fans are going to get bored on day three they're getting one pick and then it's going to go a hundred and ten picks before they do anything and like you said that's the tail end is two thirty nine and two forty one that's you know fifteen picks before the end of the draft like it basically you get that shot for one twenty nine and then but as well you know go play some golf because unless they trade back up they're not doing anything for the next basically three rounds
55:01
[SPEAKER_00]: And to your point, with the 2027 draft, the way people are looking at it, an Austin Booker type trade, right, where you get a current fifth round pick, but you've got to trade that 2027 four, not just for the bears, but for NFL teams in general.
55:18
[SPEAKER_00]: Those type of picks, you're going to have to really love one of these players to give up 2027 picks to go move up to get a 2026 guy.
55:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, no, I would agree.
55:28
[SPEAKER_02]: And again, that pick on ground four is kind of most interesting to me because there is a reset, right?
55:35
[SPEAKER_02]: There's day one, we get a reset.
55:37
[SPEAKER_02]: There's day two, rounds two and three, there's a reset.
55:40
[SPEAKER_02]: Everybody looks at the board after all the flurry and the shuffle and all the calls and goes, who's left?
55:45
[SPEAKER_02]: What did we get in the first two days?
55:47
[SPEAKER_02]: What do we need to kind of polish off?
55:48
[SPEAKER_02]: And everybody kind of gets some strategy, right?
55:52
[SPEAKER_02]: They make calls all night, hey, if we wanted to do this, we wanted to do that.
55:55
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's going to be some real opportunity there and it depends again what they've done with those first three picks above that, but that round four target.
56:02
[SPEAKER_02]: Man, like, I think it's a sweet spot for inside linebacker.
56:06
[SPEAKER_02]: In this class, like, the bears could use one of those Bryce Betcher or Caleb Alarm's or Oregon or TCU.
56:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Both really good players.
56:13
[SPEAKER_02]: There's some defensive tackles again.
56:14
[SPEAKER_02]: If you didn't get one up high, you can get some good, run stuffing defensive tackles down there.
56:18
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, that pick to me is fascinating.
56:20
[SPEAKER_02]: And it better be because I'm gonna have to sort of just save for it for 110 picks, but no matter what they do with it.
56:26
[SPEAKER_02]: But there's some really interesting players there.
56:28
[SPEAKER_02]: And then it really gets down to, like you said,
56:32
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, and so when we look at the bears day one day two picks with the four picks they have we'll put the fourth round pick aside here for now.
56:41
[SPEAKER_00]: Most teams when they draft they they tend to draft fairly balanced where if they've got four picks a lot and it's not perfect but a lot of times you'll end up with two offensive two defense of players and it most teams do end up doing that the bears certainly end up doing that most of the time when you look through their history not always like obviously last year we're taking or two years ago with Caleb and the doings they up top but.
57:02
[SPEAKER_00]: The bears this year when you look at this roster and you look at rookie contracts right now in terms of what bears players on rookie contracts are intriguing doesn't have to be awesome players right at Caleb Williams doesn't have to be that level, but you know obviously on offensive got lovelin you've got burden you've got role you've got Caleb you Kyle manongai like you you've got interesting players on rookie contracts on the offensive side of the ball on the defensive side of the ball.
57:30
[SPEAKER_00]: You have guys, if they're intriguing, they haven't played, you know, Fraser hasn't played, people I barely played, Turner got hurt.
57:38
[SPEAKER_00]: There's not a lot of intriguing rookie contract guys, Dexter's in his last year.
57:43
[SPEAKER_00]: So when we look at the bears on defense with these first four picks, what it's done you if the bears took four defensive players with their first four picks.
57:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Not at all.
57:55
[SPEAKER_02]: The only thing I would wonder is if they chained Ben up and put him in the closet for the day.
58:00
[SPEAKER_00]: Like I feel like it's gonna be three out of four.
58:02
[SPEAKER_00]: Like that's what I feel like.
58:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I think that's probably just going to be the way the board falls and where that offensive player might come in again, could it be in round one, it could I don't think it's going to happen, but who knows who falls, right, this is going to be a weird draft for valuation and that means not only are players going to get picked higher, but for every player that, you know, gets picked 20 spots before everybody predicted because some team loved him.
58:27
[SPEAKER_02]: another player gets kicked down the board.
58:29
[SPEAKER_02]: And if the bears find themselves in round one, two or three, with that opportunity where they really thought this guy was going to be gone 40 picks ago and they love him to death and Ben slams the table and says, I know exactly what I'm going to do with that guy.
58:44
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
58:44
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I could, it's crazy, but I could see it around one.
58:47
[SPEAKER_02]: I think Canyon City is going to be off the board.
58:50
[SPEAKER_02]: They already have Colston level.
58:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Right.
58:52
[SPEAKER_02]: Do you think Ben's not looking at Canyon City and going, dude, he's basically a power slot.
58:59
[SPEAKER_02]: I could do anything I want to.
59:00
[SPEAKER_02]: He's a really good blocker.
59:02
[SPEAKER_02]: He's underrated blocker.
59:03
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, lovelin was last year.
59:04
[SPEAKER_02]: Do you think if he's to each there at 25, that Ben's not going to be like, look, I know what we need defense, but come on.
59:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Like,
59:12
[SPEAKER_02]: I would not be surprised by a defensively draft.
59:14
[SPEAKER_02]: I've been leaning on that since fall saying, I would not be surprised if the entire draft was defense.
59:19
[SPEAKER_02]: They kind of needed if you look at the balance.
59:21
[SPEAKER_02]: You talked about contracts about youthful talent, about just overall how the team played out on the field last year.
59:27
[SPEAKER_02]: They were short defensive firepower, like very short defensive firepower.
59:31
[SPEAKER_02]: So I wouldn't be at all surprised.
59:33
[SPEAKER_02]: Who was four out of four, right?
59:34
[SPEAKER_02]: The board lines up that way as long as they don't force it.
59:37
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't care.
59:38
[SPEAKER_02]: If they go in saying we can't pick offensive players,
59:42
[SPEAKER_02]: that's a problem for me.
59:43
[SPEAKER_02]: But if they go and saying, look, we all know that we have, you know, six, seven picks here that 90% of them should be on D, like outside of crazy good talent falling down the board on off.
59:55
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
59:55
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's look at those seventh round picks.
59:57
[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, bears don't have fifth six round picks.
59:59
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're not going to worry project trade and a fifth or six round pick appearing on the bears doorstep here.
1:00:05
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's look at those seventh round picks.
1:00:07
[SPEAKER_00]: Obviously when we're talking seventh round picks, we're talking pure BPA who are some intriguing EJ Snyder guys there.
1:00:12
[SPEAKER_00]: But I do want you to give me a running back or two if you have one because when you look at the bears running back room, there is an RB3 hole potentially right now where they could potentially put another rookie
1:00:22
[SPEAKER_02]: I fully agree with that.
1:00:23
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a super strong running back class pains my heart, you know, I love scouting running backs, but there are good players in this draft again as long as you manage expectations for what they are.
1:00:33
[SPEAKER_02]: It's kind of like quarterback.
1:00:34
[SPEAKER_02]: If you need a starting running back in this draft, you better get them in the top three or four.
1:00:38
[SPEAKER_02]: And after that, you're taking Darth Rose, I don't really care where they are, but there are good players sprinkled throughout the draft, but there's also kind of like the bears draft, a big gulf where those maybe four players are going to go in the top, maybe three rounds and then everybody just could kind of lay off for a couple of rounds until the late rounds and go ahead and get a guy down there.
1:00:56
[SPEAKER_02]: So, let's run through offense, I'll do it rapid fire again.
1:01:00
[SPEAKER_02]: I think one of the misnomers about this draft, everybody keeps saying it's a bad draft.
1:01:03
[SPEAKER_02]: And I don't think it's a bad draft.
1:01:05
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's a different draft.
1:01:07
[SPEAKER_02]: I think it's definitely not a hot premium position draft, but there are a lot of good football players and some of them are going to be down the board.
1:01:13
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're talking about that even talent level.
1:01:14
[SPEAKER_02]: It means the talent level stretches farther in.
1:01:17
[SPEAKER_02]: And if you see a bright light in 7th round and you get them, that's picking up dollars that are the teams drop.
1:01:23
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll just run through name and position pretty quickly for offense.
1:01:27
[SPEAKER_02]: Dayquan right, the tight end from Old Miss currently ranked at 247.
1:01:30
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he would be a really fun pass receiving option for the bears.
1:01:34
[SPEAKER_02]: The running back you asked about.
1:01:35
[SPEAKER_02]: No winnington running back for Oregon had a turf toe thing last year.
1:01:39
[SPEAKER_02]: Looked heel was good at the pro-day.
1:01:41
[SPEAKER_02]: I was there currently ranked 271, which would be undrafted.
1:01:45
[SPEAKER_02]: I could absolutely see Ben saying I want to add his skill set to our room.
1:01:49
[SPEAKER_02]: CJ Daniels, the wide receiver from Miami ranked 2019 right now.
1:01:53
[SPEAKER_02]: So a little before the bears draft pick.
1:01:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, I think I'll probably go earlier than that, but I like him a lot.
1:01:59
[SPEAKER_02]: Eric McAllister, wide receiver from TCU to 24.
1:02:01
[SPEAKER_02]: So right in the range.
1:02:03
[SPEAKER_02]: And Tyron Montgomery, they got to have the big senior bowl from John Carroll ranked at 235.
1:02:08
[SPEAKER_02]: Good player with some development potential.
1:02:09
[SPEAKER_02]: Obviously, as a seventh round, it doesn't need to start right away.
1:02:12
[SPEAKER_02]: Couple of tackle prospects.
1:02:14
[SPEAKER_02]: And this is fun because the bears have had success in this area, right?
1:02:19
[SPEAKER_02]: And the guy that might be starting this year at left tackle was a late round pick as well.
1:02:25
[SPEAKER_02]: So, Carver Willis, offensive tackle Washington has a couple of flaws.
1:02:29
[SPEAKER_02]: Hadnendry came back.
1:02:32
[SPEAKER_02]: I sat with a current player in CFP.
1:02:35
[SPEAKER_02]: He is a current offensive lineman in CFB.
1:02:38
[SPEAKER_02]: He has been at five different stops, thanks to NIL.
1:02:40
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's worked in a bunch of different systems and coach and I said, man, can you watch this guy and then I'll watch this guy and then we'll come together and say what we saw on tape and you can tell me what I'm missing.
1:02:50
[SPEAKER_02]: you know, I don't presume that I'm going to tell him anything that he's missing because he does this for a living.
1:02:56
[SPEAKER_02]: Um, and I think there are a couple flaws with Carver Willis that are fixable and there's a lot of great quality there in terms of course strength is ability to bow up whatever.
1:03:06
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's currently ranked at 2208.
1:03:07
[SPEAKER_02]: I think that is painfully low.
1:03:10
[SPEAKER_02]: And the other guy is Lily Fawamoay, the Wake Forrest tackle.
1:03:16
[SPEAKER_02]: That's, uh, Pavia's left tackle.
1:03:18
[SPEAKER_02]: He's
1:03:18
[SPEAKER_02]: down at 248 or 240.
1:03:21
[SPEAKER_02]: And I've seen some good stuff from him too.
1:03:23
[SPEAKER_02]: So there's a total possibility that bears go the way they have in the past with left tackle and throw a dart and say maybe we'll get a guy.
1:03:30
[SPEAKER_02]: And then there's a whole bunch of guys on defense that we talked about, Jordan Vanneburg, the defensive tackle from Georgia Tech.
1:03:37
[SPEAKER_02]: wild athlete, 10 RAS score has no idea what he's doing right.
1:03:42
[SPEAKER_02]: Bow in the China shop, blows people up anyways.
1:03:45
[SPEAKER_02]: This is going to kill you.
1:03:47
[SPEAKER_02]: His average depth of tackle against the run, negative 0.11 yards.
1:03:52
[SPEAKER_02]: His average tackle was a TFL.
1:03:55
[SPEAKER_02]: That's unheard of.
1:03:57
[SPEAKER_02]: Like one yard is, wow, three yards is fine.
1:04:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Negative point one, never seen it.
1:04:03
[SPEAKER_02]: Skylar Gill Howard, who is the smaller tackle that played next to Leehunter at Texas Tech.
1:04:07
[SPEAKER_02]: He's the penetrating type.
1:04:09
[SPEAKER_02]: He's going to be available down there.
1:04:11
[SPEAKER_02]: Devon Marshall, cornerback, NC State.
1:04:15
[SPEAKER_02]: He's been kind of all over the board.
1:04:16
[SPEAKER_02]: He was higher at one point.
1:04:17
[SPEAKER_02]: He's dropped down.
1:04:18
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if that's just people getting to other folks.
1:04:21
[SPEAKER_02]: I think he would be a good option.
1:04:22
[SPEAKER_02]: He can play outside.
1:04:24
[SPEAKER_02]: Bishop Fitzgerald the other safety from USC everybody's talking about Camari Ramsey actually kind of like Bishop Fitzgerald better he's down at two 10 so again it would be a bit of a stretch Cole was new ski this sort of he's listed as a safety for Texas tech, but I'm going to call him a dimebacker.
1:04:39
[SPEAKER_02]: He plays that big role.
1:04:40
[SPEAKER_02]: He could do a few things that Nicky Minori could do in your system if you wanted to move that way
1:04:54
[SPEAKER_02]: Must be something I don't know there because this tape is way better than 289, but those are all guys that you could spend those last two picks that everybody says every yours or worthless and from picks nothing ever comes out in seven throughout.
1:05:07
[SPEAKER_02]: If you're a bear's fan, you can't say that you're left ankle for you know a better part of last decade came from seven throughout so.
1:05:13
[SPEAKER_02]: things do come out of the seventh round.
1:05:15
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not, you can't count on it.
1:05:17
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a good team building strategy, but those are not wasted picks.
1:05:20
[SPEAKER_02]: That's contract controls for very talented top 250 in the country football players.
1:05:26
[SPEAKER_00]: No, is there a kicker?
1:05:27
[SPEAKER_00]: The Ryan Polts can take in round four.
1:05:30
[SPEAKER_02]: I, okay, just like if you said at the top that you don't, you haven't watched any players, I don't scout special teams, I was kidding, I'm making a storyteller joke, I don't, I don't do it.
1:05:43
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, last thing for EJ before we wrap up here, just basically, is there anything.
1:05:49
[SPEAKER_00]: we missed something that you think bears fans should be thinking about whether it's a player, a position group, anything intriguing in any of the particular rounds, anything we might have missed here that we should get on the board here before we wrap up.
1:06:01
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, injuries is just going to be huge.
1:06:04
[SPEAKER_02]: I typically have not done a ton of work.
1:06:06
[SPEAKER_02]: I've just taken what other people have generated in terms of injury data because it's
1:06:11
[SPEAKER_02]: It's very hard to get.
1:06:12
[SPEAKER_02]: It's very inconsistent.
1:06:13
[SPEAKER_02]: I made a lot of calls this year.
1:06:14
[SPEAKER_02]: I spent significant time reaching out to three groups.
1:06:19
[SPEAKER_02]: People who work for teams, people that are in the agency realm agents basically, and then other and other is a media analyst, podcasters, local broadcasters, whatever else.
1:06:31
[SPEAKER_02]: And basically built two sheets.
1:06:33
[SPEAKER_02]: An off-field issue sheet, and an injury sheet.
1:06:36
[SPEAKER_02]: And
1:06:36
[SPEAKER_02]: There are a lot of really, really talented players of high in this draft that have some really scary injuries, particularly a defensive tackle.
1:06:44
[SPEAKER_02]: Like Caleb Banks, great, great player.
1:06:46
[SPEAKER_02]: One of the top defensive tackles in this draft, top three easily.
1:06:49
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a foot injuries, 330 plus pounds.
1:06:52
[SPEAKER_02]: People are very worried about that.
1:06:53
[SPEAKER_02]: I would not be surprised if he was offboards around the NFL, because people just are like too scary.
1:07:00
[SPEAKER_02]: Xavier Harris, another huge defensive tackle,
1:07:06
[SPEAKER_02]: Foot injury like people just kind of blanch at that there are past wrestlers high value past wrestlers that have at you know an injury that is What I will say, you know key to performance So it's all about where we're gonna see some names and we always do
1:07:24
[SPEAKER_02]: drop down and key spots and they're going to have been very, very highly ranked throughout the entire process and, you know, it happens every year.
1:07:33
[SPEAKER_02]: You're going to look up on the dawn of day three and go, okay, around four doing, what is this guy doing on the board?
1:07:37
[SPEAKER_02]: He was a top, you know, consensus top 50 pick, probably an injury thing at that point might be all field, but, you know, in this draft, there are a lot of what I'm going to call key injuries that are just dings against players that are otherwise great.
1:07:50
[SPEAKER_02]: Have great tape, great pedigree, all that.
1:07:52
[SPEAKER_02]: All right.
1:07:52
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, there he is.
1:07:53
[SPEAKER_00]: E. J. Snyder, of course, bootleg football with Brett Coleman, Barrier, a podcast.
1:07:58
[SPEAKER_00]: E. J.
1:07:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you in Brett?
1:07:59
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you guys doing anything special on Thursday, night Friday night of the draft, any live streams that you can promote here for the listeners?
1:08:06
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, absolutely.
1:08:07
[SPEAKER_02]: We are speaking of continuing traditions.
1:08:10
[SPEAKER_02]: We have drafts must even Wednesday, which is a couple hour later, a 90 minute live stream on Wednesday, just to get everybody's kind of jitters out and then as always, we will be live streaming every single pick of the NFL draft day one day to
1:08:22
[SPEAKER_02]: Day three, as we have done for the past six years now, which is kind of crazy, but we will be live for every single pick of the NFL draft over on the bootleg channel on YouTube.
1:08:33
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, other stuff, last blue chip committee, comes out this week with the guys from NFL SE, Trevor and Connor.
1:08:40
[SPEAKER_02]: I have either one or two, no, I have two recordings every day this week, whether it's radio podcast, whatever.
1:08:48
[SPEAKER_02]: So we are, you said at the top.
1:08:50
[SPEAKER_02]: We are in the thick of it.
1:08:51
[SPEAKER_02]: It is the stretcher on and it's one of the best times a year.
1:08:54
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
1:08:55
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, there he is.
1:08:55
[SPEAKER_00]: EJ cider.
1:08:56
[SPEAKER_00]: EJ thanks for so much time.
1:08:58
[SPEAKER_00]: I always enjoy this every year.
1:08:59
[SPEAKER_00]: And we will set our watches and do it again in 12 months.
1:09:03
[SPEAKER_02]: I can't take enough, uh, you were one of the very first people to reach out to me to do this kind of thing.
1:09:08
[SPEAKER_02]: And I look forward to it every year.
1:09:10
[SPEAKER_02]: I know you reach out, sort of, typically, okay, if you have time, I'm like, I will make time, though.
1:09:14
[SPEAKER_02]: Always appreciate it.
1:09:16
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, there he is, EJ Snyder.
1:09:18
[SPEAKER_00]: That's going to do it for Bear's banter.
1:09:20
[SPEAKER_00]: We will be back with one more draft podcast before the draft.
1:09:23
[SPEAKER_00]: So make sure you look out for that one.
1:09:25
[SPEAKER_00]: Bear it out, everybody.
1:09:26
[SPEAKER_00]: Talk to you soon.
1:09:28
[UNKNOWN]: Adios.