Ryan Poles Drops Major Hint On His Bears Draft Plans

I've held to a key belief in my time covering the NFL. One can usually tell whether a GM is going to be good or not based on their first draft pick. Jim Finks took Walter Payton. Jerry Angelo took Marc Colombo. Phil Emery took Shea McClellin and Ryan Pace took Kevin White. So the Chicago Bears haven't done too well on those first swings in a long time. Ryan Poles is getting ready to step up to the plate. The difference this time though is he won't have a 1st round pick at his disposal. Thanks to Pace's unending aggressiveness that led to Justin Fields and Teven Jenkins in last year's draft, his replacement now has no 1st and just five picks total to work with. He was asked about this challenge during an appearance on Carmen & Jurko for ESPN 1000. Poles stated there are ways they might be able to secure more picks if the opportunities present themselves. Aside from that, he will be focused on finding the best possible value with each pick and also place major emphasis on undrafted free agency.

He also made one other statement that hinted at just how different he is from Pace.

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"I think at the end of the day, you want as many draft picks as possible."

There isn't really much room for conjecture there. Ryan Poles spelled it out in no uncertain terms. He intends for this football team to be built through the draft moving forward. While he won't be averse to moving up in certain situations, it sounds like his goal will be to flood the roster with as much young talent as possible. The idea is that Matt Eberflus and his coaching staff can properly develop them into the players they're capable of being. This shouldn't be a huge surprise. Poles came up in the NFL as a college scout, then a college scouting director. His philosophies are centered around great teams being built via the draft. Such wasn't the case with Pace who came up as a pro scout. He didn't value draft picks like gold ingots the way other GMs did. They were just a means to acquiring a select few superstar-caliber talents each year that he could build around. That approach ended up hurting him as it left the roster old and lacking depth. Poles doesn't plan on falling into the same trap.