I had to call a conference of my cobloggers. We were really hoping Loadholt or Britt might be around. Iglesias and Wood are both reaches, but there really weren’t many other decent options. I did take a look at Patrick Chung.

In the end I just went with the best place I thought I could add depth and pick up a potential starter down the road.

If the draft falls like is has here, I’d really expect the Bears to try and trade down. Maybe grab an extra pick to help makeup a little bit for the Cutler deal.

As a Bears fan, I’m not thrilled with this pick. (But to be fair, I’m also not at the point where I’m suggesting we pick up torches & pitchforks and burn your house down.) Seems to me that with only one pick in the first three rounds (well…unless you consider our 3rd round comp. pick a “real” third rounder, which I don’t—more of a high 4th rounder), and with as many needs as we have on the team, I have a hard time with a luxury pick of a guy who we know isn’t even going to be a starter. Kreutz is getting old but is still very much a starting-caliber C. While I agree the Bears are going to need a center for the future, I just can’t see taking one at this point when we have positions that we need for the present that are currently unfilled.

If I were in your shoes, (or rather, in the Bears’ shoes) at this spot in the draft with the picks the way they have gone down to this point, I would have taken the best safety on our board. Likely that would be Patrick Chung from Oregon, or perhaps it would be Rashad Johnson (Alabama) or Louis Delmas (W. Mich). Any of the three (IMO) are worthy of a mid-2nd round pick.

The only thing I really agree with you about is that there is no need to “reach” here for a WR. We might get lucky and snag a guy with a lot of potential deeper in the draft, or perhaps we can sign a veteran between now and the beginning of the season. I think it’s a lot harder finding quality safeties on the FA market than it is finding quality (or at least passable) WR’s.

Last year the Bears were 30th in the league in pass defense. Indications right now look like that’s going to get worse, not better, if we stick with the players we currently have.

The only player in that entire list of safeties that seem to have any potential to me is Kevin Payne. As for the others? I’ve seen nothing from Steltz that leads me to believe he is a starting-caliber safety in the NFL. And please don’t tell me Bullocks is going to be the starter… the Saints had the worst pass defense in the entire NFL last year, and he was so bad he got BENCHED by them! (Why? Because he couldn’t cover anybody…)

If we were to draft Chung, I could definitely see him starting at SS and Payne moving over and starting at FS. (Payne is a real ballhawk; if he had 4 picks last year from the SS position I’d love to see what he could do at the FS position). Or you could keep Payne at SS and draft either Delmas or Johnson; either of those I am quite sure would easily beat out Steltz or Bullocks to be the starter at FS. Because right now I think we have nothing at that position. (Perhaps I’m wrong…I hope I’m wrong… but that’s how I see it.)

Is much more of a need, but this pick would certainly make a lot of sense since Kreutz is getting long in the tooth. Wood may be able to beat out Garza during training camp, and suddenly the Bears biggest weakness before FA (O-line) is huge strength.