Top 5 Chicago Bears Draft Needs

Apr 25, 2013; New York, NY, USA; General view of Radio City Music Hall during the 2013 NFL Draft. Mandatory Credit: Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports

It’s Draft Week!!!  Months of preparation and speculation will come to a head when representatives from each NFL club hand the commissioner a card with player’s name on it.  Lives will be changed.  Lifelong dreams will be fulfilled.  Team’s fortunes will change.

For the Chicago Bears, it’s first year GM Ryan Pace at the helm of a draft room for the first time.  That adds a little mystery and uncertainty to the Bears draft selections.  With no “book” on Pace, we’re left to wonder about Pace’s draft style.  We know that Phil Emery’s draft style was to zig when everyone thought he should zag.  Phil liked to show that he was the smartest guy in the room.  His picks were boom or bust.

Jerry Angelo, on the other hand, had a different draft style.  He often talked about players’ floors and ceilings when he talked about them.  He preferred to take a guy with a higher floor than a guy with a higher ceiling.  Too bad most of his picks are working construction somewhere because the floor dropped out from under Jerry when too many of his recent picks were misses.

To go along with Ryan Pace, the Bears have new head coach John Fox.  It’s the first time the Bears have hired a coach with previous NFL head coaching experience since the days of George Halas.  Fox has a bit of a track record in the draft, taking Julius Peppers and Von Miller in his first seasons with the Carolina Panthers and Denver Broncos respectively.  Could that tip the Bears’ hand for a Round 1 selection on the defensive side of the ball?  Since the Bears traded away Brandon Marshall, do they go get a dynamic playmaker in the Top 10?   Let’s look at the Top 5 Chicago Bears draft needs.