What's up? Welcome into our first ever Hogan Johns bears mock draft edition, little mini pod here for you in the middle of the week ahead of the NFL combine John Z we made the picks. I don't like the grades that Pat Norton gave us, but I guess we have to talk about it. You kind of got them with that threat to put them in a room with Carm or Braggs. Either way works. Yeah. Well, I have, I have my ways, but let's, let's just jump into this. The full mock draft is available by the way, for CHGO diehards on all CHGO.com and our colleague, Patrick Norton did grade the mock draft evidently uh very well I think you did a great job let's jump into the picks John's we both went with a defensive tackle number 25 overall that's where the Bears sit in the first round but we went with different ones I went with Lee Hunter from Texas Tech and you went with Caleb Banks from Florida so here's the question I have for you were you kind of struck wrestling with like I was wrestling with the idea of who to take it this could be a good spot to be in for the Bears at number 25 if they want to target a defensive tackle yeah it is I mean I kind of wanted to go edge but there's it's kind of a weird spot with the edge rushers the the top guys probably off the board there's some tweeners maybe some guys that don't necessarily exactly fit Dennis Allen's height length requirements. So it seemed like the value was better with the defensive tackles and talking on Kayla banks, banks, who I went with, this is a very interesting prospect. I think next week at the combine, the medicals will be huge for him. Now he had a foot injury late 2024 carried over to 2025, but I love that he came back and played at the end of last season when the coach was fired at Florida and there was really not a ton of reason to come back. He could have set his sights on the draft. That tells me he loves football. Look pretty good at the senior bowl, looked healthy at the senior bowl. So as long as this wasn't some type of chronic foot injury, which is always scary with a 335 pound man, and they feel like he's healed, then I think this is more like a top 10, top 15 player that you could be getting later in the first round. So with Lee Hunter, I'm thinking of the run game first. I understand that you want pass rush, but if I'm looking at free agency, I think the bears can address some of their pass rush concerns, especially with some veteran defensive ends. So Lee Hunter would fit in and be an immediate replacement for Andrew Billings. I think his length is very disruptive. He's listed at the six, three, 320 pounds. Peter Woods is someone I considered also, I don't know if he had thoughts on him. I saw Daniel Jeremiah from the NFL network picked him for the bears in his most recent mock draft. I don't know if that feels late or, or I know boards will vary at this point, but Peter Woods would be another disruptive option with more pass rush skills that I would consider at number 25. Yeah. The boards are kind of all over the place, but there seems to be, this does seem to be sort of a sweet spot for one of these first round talents, a defensive tackle to fall to the bears in the first round. Let's go to the second round. Now pick 57 is where the bears sit in the second round. You went safety. AJ Halsey from LSU. And you went the Northwestern offensive lineman. Yes. Gail Tiernan. Yeah. Well, I don't know if you've noticed, but the, uh, it's like every three or four years, Northwestern sends a really good offensive lineman into the NFL. This is that guy this year, Caleb Tiernan. Now he's not going to be Rashawn Slater, you know, top half of the first round, um, or Peter Skaranski. However, there's still similar arm questions, arm length questions here. Now I think Tiernan's probably a little bit lengthier. Now we'll find out next week when he gets measured at the combine and that'll determine a lot of this different thoughts on Tiernan. I know our guy, Fran Duffy has them more as a first round guy. However, I did reach out to him and I said, Hey, do you think there's a chance he could fall to 57? He said, yeah, actually I think there there a decent chance So Duffy likes him a little bit more of his arm length You think well I don think we know yet But I I I think he just he he might not be part of the issue too is he six seven he's almost too tall to shift inside the guard. If you know, like Skronsky was like, well, if it doesn't work out outside, he's going to be a dominant guard. It's six, seven, especially with Caleb not being the tallest of quarterbacks. I would be a little bit worried about him having to be a guard in the future. So similar to Ozzie Trapillo, taller lineman, offensive tackle. He, I think could fall back in the second round, be available for the bears. Now, big difference here though. Trapillo had the right side experience, struggled at left tackle, whereas Tiernan's got experience on both and has looked good at both spots. So I think as a fallback, the floor is swing tackle. whereas I think with his experience and especially on the left side, John Z, I think he could actually help fill the gap the bears might have next year at left tackle and be a serviceable plug and play starter at left tackle, even as a rookie. So with AJ Halsey, he is, let's get this right. He is Fran Duffy's number 46 overall player and number three safety. To me, it comes down to what type of investments you want to make at this position. As we talked with Matt Bowen earlier this week, there are some good free agent safeties available and safety can be a position you wait on. But I think the Bears might strike fast just by retaining Kevin Byard. So that could be a pretty good contract. And I understand why the Bears would want to do that. So to me, it makes sense not to sign another safety, but to potentially draft one as your next starter. so Halsey he's violent he's downhill he's a good tackler and he's got a lot of ball production in college so I think he could be an immediate starter in a strong safety role I know they're interchangeable in Dennis Allen's defense but I think his skill set and a lot of other safeties would mix and match with Kevin Byard really well especially if you want to target one early in the draft all right on to the third round pick 89 is where the Bears are slotted and you're the way you got this you're going three straight defensive picks yes you know what I'm saying so I went with pick 89 Malachi Lawrence pass rusher from central Florida in round four I went to Cario Davis cornerback from Washington that might be well I was going all the way back to your first round pick okay all right because you went defense deep so if you're going to keep going to the fourth round. You're actually, you're all defense. No, until, until the seventh round, there you go. That doesn't count. It matters. Yeah. I just think like the investments have to be made there after last year. Am I crazy to think that like last year you went Colson, Lovelland, Luther Burden, Ozzie, Chapillo, Shamar Turner, like your first three picks were offensive players. we know where the bears concerns are they're up front defensively yes left tackle stands out to me it's going to stand out just like it stood out to you with your second round selection but maybe there's a free agent tackle that can be added to that mix and you and you run it back with karon amigaji theo benedit like that i might be okay with that the bears pass rush the bears run defense has to get better and i think safety is part of that conversation too absolutely so you go Malachi Lawrence with an edge rusher in the third. I'm going to go with a linebacker, a potential replacement for Tremaine Edmonds, Keyshawn Elliott from Arizona state. Um, he is one of the, I would just say one of these smarter linebackers that you could tell is well studied before games. He reads the run really well, has good instincts, seems well prepared for every single game. And he fires downhill, uh, also had the green dot at Arizona State so he you know he seems like one of these guys that's going to be a defensive leader who's winning uh with instincts and I I think his 40 time next week in Indy will be huge for him to see how high he could actually climb in this draft just based on the speed alone and we know the Bears need to add speed on defense Malachi Lawrence 6'4 247 33 and a half inch arms those were his measurements at the east shrine game I think he close to fitting the physical profile that Dennis Allen wants from his past rushers He had seven sacks two forced fumbles last year So the production is there at central Florida And again the physical profile is something you have to consider when you look at the edge rushers for Dennis Allen's defense. We'll go through the final rounds a little bit quicker. But in round four, I did go offense again here. I just think we can't ignore the fact that Ben Johnson is still the head coach. and I think he's got a ton of influence, if not the most influence at this point. And so there is a guy named Desmond Reed who Fran Duffy, his comp for Desmond Reed, running back out of Pittsburgh, is Tariq Cohen. And I love this. I love adding a piece. Now, he's actually a taller Tariq Cohen. He's undersized, but he's 5'8". But similar type of player, quickness, right? And he's a polished route runner already. So he's the type of guy that you could take running routes out of the backfield. You could also go line them up in the slot, have them run option routes. I think adding a piece like that to Ben Johnson's offense could already open up a lot of things on top of what Colston Loveland's already doing at tight end. You're talking about creating a lot of mismatches and making it really hard to guard the entire field if you're a defense. So I think Desmond Reed just as a running back option, adding to that group just gives them a little bit of a different element, a little bit more of a home run element that they might not have right now. So as I briefly mentioned earlier, I went cornerback in round four to Cario Davis from Washington, also played at Arizona. He is six foot four in 200 pounds. Does that sound like a current Bears cornerback about to end their free agency? Yeah, it sounds like Nishan, right? There you go. Good at man coverage. He's got those long arms. I just think cornerback as much as we argue about safety, when the draft to safety, when the sign of safety, like it requires some investment as well. Wright's going to hit free agency. Tyreek Stevenson is entering the fourth year. The final year of his rookie contract has yet to become a full-time starter. Jalen Johnson is coming off a season where he was never healthy after core muscle surgery. Cornerback require some investment. I just don't think it's going to happen in free agency just because you have a lot of money already committed to Jalen Johnson. So the fifth round, we both go defense here. I've been ignoring edge for too long, but there's a, uh, an edge rusher out of Texas Trey Moore, uh, that I really like now, you know, he, at some point the bears just can't be held too rigid to this idea that any tall, lengthy defensive lineman, that's great, but we're in the fifth round now. I like more just because of the relentless motor that he plays with. And he has a deep bag of pass rush moves to go along with it needs to be better against the run. I think that's one of the reasons why he might be available this later in the draft. But I look at this guy as I'm not saying he's Max Crosby, but he's Max Crosby was similar to me as he fell, I think to the fourth round, right? Where they just overlook some things and didn't pay attention to enough to the fact that he just plays really, really hard all the time and is a polished pass rusher. And that's what I see in Trey Moore out of Texas. I went with Missouri defensive tackle Chris McClellan in round five. He had five sacks and seven tackles for loss in his last year at Missouri. He's listed at six, four, 323 pounds. We'll see what the combine numbers say in general. I think defensive line, whether it's pass rusher, maybe some versatile players, this is going to be a position targeted by the Bears in a variety of different ways. Why? Grady Jarrett and Diode Angbo's contracts. The Bears can get out of them in an affordable way after this season. So if they're not producing, if Grady Jarrett is showing more signs of wear and tear at this point in his career and Diode Angbo struggles to get back from his injury, I think defensive line will be heavily addressed by the bears in some form this off season. All right. Round seven, the bears have two picks right now. If they stick with those two picks, so we'll double up here. The two players I went with here in the seventh round, Jalen Catalan, a safety out of Mizzou who I think is really a fascinating player in this draft because I think his talent alone in most years would get him drafted way way higher than the seventh round But he's already going to be a 25-year-old rookie. He was in college for seven years, and he's got a lengthy injury history. So this is a player, Johnsy, who will probably be off a lot of teams draft boards completely. But here in the seventh round, I like you're, you're maybe not drafting here to get a player. That's going to be in Chicago for a long, long time. But if you can get the length of the rookie contract out of a, of Jalen Catalan, I think there's a player who can play quickly and sort of fill that CJ Garner Johnson type role where he's got the versatility to play in the slot play safety. He's a little bit undersized, but he fires downhill. He can run sideline to sideline. He's just really a fascinating, explosive player. Again, big if can he stay healthy at the next level? He's older, but we're talking about a seventh round pick. I'm willing to take a flyer on cattle on this late in the draft. And then finally, I always like adding offensive line depth as much as I can. I think actually one player we never talked about, like basically all year, Ryan Bates, his contract is expiring. Center depth is actually an underrated need for the bears. So Jager Burton out of Kentucky, he's played center, he's played guard. He's probably projects as a swing, interior swing guy in the NFL at the next level as a backup. And so I'm adding Burton here as my last pick. So my two picks in round seven, again, these will all be finalized once the comp pick selections are finalized and then announced by the NFL. So I went with tight end for Michigan State. Jack Felling as my first pick. And then Penn State offensive tackle, no one Ruchi, just tight end as a position. I think that Ben Johnson will always look at extensively just because of how much he wants to play 12 personnel, 13 personnel. You're not going to find Colson Loveland like players every single year. You may not even find Cole Komet like players every single year. Those are your number one and number two tight ends. They have immense value on this roster, but after them, do you resign Durham Smythe? Do you keep Steven Carlson? I think tight end will be a position that will be addressed in some capacity this off season. Maybe it comes late in the draft where you take a swing on a player you could develop and fit in to your system because of his physical traits. Nolan Rucci, he is a massive offensive tackle. He is listed at six foot eight. you're just taking swings on development at this point offensive line requires continuous investment find those players fit them in maybe you hit a home run with someone well those are the picks you tell us how we did i'm sure you hate them and you love them depending who you are norton gave you an a minus i gotta be i will threaten him before mock draft 2.0. He's a generous grader there. People probably listening to this are like, F! You guys get F's. Safety in the second round. Yes, the safety in the second round. Dennis Allen has a track record of taking safeties early. There you go. Check out the full mock draft. All CSGO.com is available for diehards. Includes some highlights in there, some clips to go with the players and Fran Duffy's big board. His entire draft database is available with all of our die card heart content. I'm telling you that alone pays for itself. You can get in right now with code Johns, J a H and S $36 for your first year as a CSO diehard. You also get a free shirt tire at, I'm telling you Fran Duffy's draft guide is so in depth worth it. I can tell you it helped us a lot as we just did this mock draft even better. Fran's going to join us on Thursday's episode of Hogan Johns. we'll have him grade our mock drafts too. So maybe, maybe he'll give you a better grade than Pat did. And I don't know, since he's our draft expert, it might, it might mean a little bit more. I don't know. Throw Pat on the bus. You're definitely not getting, getting a better grade than me next time. Yeah, that's probably true. All right. That's all available for you. All CHCO.com and Fran Duffy is going to join us to go even more in depth on Thursday's episode of Hogan Johns. We'll talk to you then. See ya.
