Everybody knows by now that Ryan Poles is not somebody prone to staying put on the draft board. The Chicago Bears GM isn’t afraid to wheel and deal. Since he took over in January of 2022, the man has now conducted ten trades. For context, Ryan Pace didn’t reach that mark until his third year running the team. What’s crazier is the draft hasn’t even started yet for Poles. Almost half the moves he’s made to this point happened during the draft last year. It’s hardly a stretch to think he might be planning more.
In fact, the Bears have been surrounded by trade smoke for weeks, even after sending the #1 overall pick to Carolina for that massive package, including a future 1st, two 2nds, and wide receiver D.J. Moore. There are rumblings that Poles may try to move down again, hoping to stockpile more picks while finding the best value on the board. It’s hard to discern what his exact strategy may be. Brad Biggs of the Chicago Tribune brought up an interesting one in his latest column.
“The other possibility — and this involves a lot of moving parts — is moving down deeper into Round 1 and getting enough draft capital to combine with Day 2 picks to then trade back into Round 1. In that scenario, the Bears could have two picks in the back half of the first round. That’s a dice roll, for sure, because you don’t know what you’re going to get.”
This scenario is far from uncommon for the Chicago Bears.
There is a logical reasoning behind moving back into the 1st round. Not only does it improve your odds of landing a good player, but it also allows you to take advantage of the rookie wage scale. Any player taken in the 1st round has the 5th-year option attached to their contract. That guarantees a team an extra year of affordable control before having to pay big money. Since 2010, it has happened a total of 16 times. Some of the players acquired in those trades were Lamar Jackson, Montez Sweat, Cordarrelle Patterson, Harrison Smith, and Mark Ingram.
There is definite value in such a move if you target the right player. Presuming the Chicago Bears move down from #9, they’d have more than enough ammunition to move up from the 2nd round back into the 1st. They already have ten picks going into the draft. If they add one or two more, Poles would have all the flexibility necessary to go get a player he covets. It comes down to whether such a player is available in that late 1st range and whether one of the teams picking in that area is willing to move down.
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