Poles revealed that the exercise enabled him to learn “a lot about us as a group” and was done “so that we make good decisions and we have our board set up the right way.”
“The key is sometimes you just want to remove group-think,” Poles said. “If I polled everyone and you had to raise your hand, sometimes you look around. It just removes that, and everyone puts their thoughts and ideas down and it takes that out of it. You see it. I put [the results] on the screen and you could hear the oohs and aahs. It was a real cool exercise.”
(2) With just six picks in the draft, Poles reiterated that he hopes to be able to trade down to acquire additional selections.
“For draft picks, I would like to do some movement and get more picks, but it’s got to be in the right area,” Poles said.
The Bears will only deal down if they feel they can still land a prospect they covet with the pick or picks they acquire.
“The biggest thing is how many players you have at a certain level, so you can move back and get a quality player at that next spot,” Poles said. “And when you get kicked other picks, that’s an additional player. So, where is that pick located at in the draft and can I still get a quality player at that level as well? Also, you can accumulate on the back end and package things up and move them again. So, really it’s just the volume and where the draft is deep at certain positions.”
The Bears have their own picks in Rounds 2, 3, 5 and 6. They obtained additional selections in the second and fifth rounds as part of trades that sent outside linebacker Khalil Mack to the Chargers this year and receiver Anthony Miller to the Texans last year, respectively.
The Bears traded their first- and fourth-round picks to the Giants last April to move up nine spots in the first round to choose quarterback Justin Fields at No. 11. They also sent their seventh-round selection to the Texans in the Miller trade.
(3) When asked about the deepest positions on the second and third days of the draft,…