Bears Thoughts on the Second Day of the 2018 NFL Draft

A couple thoughts on yesterday’s second round haul:

  • What I liked: The James Daniels pick.

    I’m a “football games are won and lost at the line of scrimmage” guy and I always love to see offensive linemen taken reasonably high because they benefit everyone on the field in so many ways.

    I think the decision to play Daniels at left guard is smart. Daniels had trouble as a center handling big linemen at the point of attack. This is common in centers who have to snap the ball in addition to firing out to handle these mammoths. See Hronis Grasu for a perfect example. Even though Daniels has supposedly gained quite a bit of weight to get up to 305 pounds, I think allowing him to play guard may help solve this problem.

    At the same time it allows Cody Whitehair to stay put at center, where he has been doing extremely well. Hopefully this settles Whitehair and right guard Kyle Long into their spots, stabilizing the offensive line and allowing them to work at a single spot to become the best that they can be in their roles.

  • What I didn’t like: Trading a second round pick in next years draft to pick up wide receiver Anthony Miller.

    Every time the Bears do things like this it feels like robbing Peter to pay Paul. It seems like every year general manager Ryan Pace something to the effect of “It’d be nice to recoup that BLANK round pick that we gave up earlier.” How about staying put and allowing yourself to catch up?

    I suppose if Miller works out, no one will remember what they did to get him. But I get wary when teams seem to be spending their entire draft strictly chasing their immediate needs rather than the best player available. Hard to believe there was a guy so good that you absolutely had to have him and who, at the same time, just so happens is a receiver.

    When I look around the league it just seems to me like the smart organizations are the ones that collect picks, not trade them away.

    Former Bears general manager (and the last decent one they had) Jerry Angelo used to stress that you as a GM you should never fall in love with prospects. PAce comes from a different type of background with the New Orleans Saints. Former Eagles team president Joe Banner explains. Via Don Banks at The Athletic.

    “Banks: The win-now Saints arguably made the boldest, riskiest move of the night in moving from No. 27 to No. 14 to take UTSA pass rusher Marcus Davenport, giving up their 2019 first-round pick to Green Bay in the process. Your assessment of what they gave up and if it’s worth that for a pass rusher who is promising but seen as somewhat of a work in progress?

    “Banner: Historically, the Saints have been kind of over-aggressive and short-term focused and gotten themselves into really deep cap trouble. The last of couple years, they seemed to have learned the better way was to be somewhat aggressive but to balance it in the short term in terms of value in a way they hadn’t been. I looked at this as kind of falling back into their old bad habits. And I happen to like this player, though I’m not sure he’ll be an impact player right away.

    “So again you have to get the right value because you’re trying to build a whole roster, and there’s no player other than maybe a difference-making quarterback that compensates for being weak in other areas. I think they dramatically overpaid. I think they got a good player, but I wonder if he’ll actually be ready to contribute in a major way in the time frame they’re hoping.”

    I think Pace falls in love with these prospects too easily. He did it with Mitch Trubisky and it forced him to trade up in a scenario where it was reportedly unnecessary. He did it with Leonard Floyd before him. Every once in a while, maybe its OK. But every year? If this continues, it’s going to hurt the organization. It’s arguably hurting it already.