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Simply the book is a non story.

1) I watched 5 CC interviews and never does she say King told her they were takng Banks if he was there. Im on her X account and cant find that statement. Point being every interview I have seen, its always her opinion they were trading up for Jeanty (to expensive)or going to take Campbell or Banks. The interview with King only said they were interested in 3 other top 10 draft picks. I have no problem with her opinion many people made those statements but there was never an insider saying they were doing that. That doesnt make her a liar. Every interview she gave before the draft was talk about RBs, LT and DT. Every interview she has stated this is a BJ driven draft. 2) Of course it matters who's there. Last year Poles was willing to trade a few spots to get Odunze and Cunningham told him to be patient. So if they want someone they would trade at least a few spots to get them. Any team would want Jeanty so the thought they might traded for him was always in play. but with with Banks at 9, nothing. I think they targeted Loveland. Another indicator was BJ played a Colston highlight film before the first round to the rest of the war room. I think they had intentions of always trading one of the 2 2nd rounds picks because of several positions to address. So they may have wanted Henderson but didnt trade a few spots to get him. They seen Bruden available and decided he was worth keeping on that pick and took what they could get with 41 to still add a OT and DL, both they deemed needs. They had to know chances are Ersery not being there at 56, he went at 48. Between 41 and 56 4 edge players, 2 DT, and 2 LTs went off the board. I think when they traded back they had both Ozzy and Shemar on their radar and got who they wanted. Just as easy to say they got who they targeted instead they misjudged the board. C Cant say about any of the other picks but I think they got 3 of what they planned to get with the first 4 picks. Burden was the outlier, being available they went to plan B or even C with getting a RB, they passed on Henderson with what would have been an easy trade if they wanted him. They liked Bruden better. In round 4 , Scattabo went at 105 and they easily could have moved up to get him but instead moved back because they got a couple players available they wanted. In the 7th round I think they maybe liked either Brashard Smith or Damien Martinez but went before their pick. Monangai was available and that's who they ended up with. We have no way of knowing of how they ranked their RBs , Kyle may have been 4th or 5th on their list. If we go by attention they paid before the draft. 1) Jeanty ( cost to great) 2) Henderson 3) Scattabo 4) Brashard Smith Everyone has an opinion on how the draft should have went, I think they pretty well got the players they wanted. Kyle Monangai will prove valueable. We wont know what is right or wrong for a couple of years.

Most of Daniels advanced stats (EPA, QBR, even PFF) were artificially inflated because of his scrambles. He is still a good QB, but we all saw what that fluff looked like with Fields and once they pinned him in and took away his first read, he really fell off a cliff.

He really stressed the defenses with the threat of running, and he did make good decisions, but rushing+sacks near 200 times is unsustainable. Daniels had 148 rushing attempts and was sacked 47 times, for 195 potential hits. Lamar Jackson had 139 rushing attempts + 23 sacks = 162 Josh Allen had 102 rushing attempts + 14 sacks = 116 Caleb had twice as many sacks and was still basically 25% lower: 81+68 = 149 If Caleb cuts his sacks in half he would be near Josh Allen's range which seems like the sweet spot for QBs that extend plays. There are 2x QBs in NFL history to have over 40 sacks and 130 rushing attempts in a season, 2022 Justin Fields (55+160=210) and 2024 Jayden Daniels (47+148=195). Daniels had 4+35 more in the playoffs, so 234 over 20 games is pretty wild. That will catch up to him.

He did, but it was usually a good decision. There are many instances of him going through progressions and being successful.

I will have to find the stat, but I know Daniels was in the top 10 for throwing to his first read and he was #1 in scrambling under pressure. So those sort of lend themselves to the fact that he would throw to his first read or run majority of the time. Not always, but he did one of those two things a lot.

I don't agree. And honestly, I don't believe you are seeing what he's doing. Daniels head is very calm in the pocket and that's what you want. He scans with his eyes then flips his hips and throws. Not staring at his primary. Defenders are too smart for this and they didn't have Randy Moss to offset that. I know you won't agree with this assessment, but it's simply my opinion. Daniels did some fantastic things last year and I don't see a letdown this year.

I think Kingsbury is a real offensive genius. I also understand him to be difficult to be around. I'm happy with Ben Johnson as our coach, but I think Kingsbury is his equal in Xs and Os, but BJ is the far better head coach.

It is a great question, he did pretty well with Kyler, who peaked in years 2 and 3 in that offense, then the wheels came off in Year 4.

still, it seemed like the primary receiver was open most of the time. I gotta give credit to Kingsbury for that. And I didnt do any kind of film analysis or anything, but Id love to know how he gets his first read open so much. But we agree that its basically a one read and run offense for Daniels, and that cant be sustainable?

I agree on Fields. I think it has to do with just taking what the defense gave them. I know he averaged fewer intended air yards than Caleb did per throw, so he had a lot of short passes.

When I say passer, in this case, I just mean the physical act of throwing the ball, not including decision making. And I personally have always thought that Fields has an incredible arm. He has a killer deep ball, very accurate. I think Fields' body with Bagent's brain would make an incredible QB, for example. As for your description of Kingsbury's scheme, I totally agree. If you watch film of Daniels, he locks on to his primary receiver before the snap, and its yes, or run. You almost never see his head turn. A couple plays have what looks like a scripted look off, but i dont see Daniels making multiple reads. Ive only seen him do that a handful of times, overwhelmingly, it is as you described, and I agree the NFL will catch up to it. But how does Kingsbury get his primary receiver so wide open on so many plays? That's the part thats astounding to me!

Yeah, but the media is eating them up. Daniels in MVP talks and the Commanders are magically a top 5 team in the NFL. They had a cream puff schedule and then had the easiest path in the playoffs. I think Daniels is a better passer than Fields, but the frame scares the hell out of me. He is one hit away from being out for the year. I read something about what Kingsbury did, and it was essentially one read, checkdown, then scramble. Pre-snap determines first read, hike the ball, first read yes or no, checkdown yes or no, then scramble. This allowed Daniels to get the ball out of his hands but it also didn't really have him doing too much processing. That can only get you so far.

that is SO fair. Im trying to bend over sideways to not be negative, so maybe I went too far positive LOL maybe I could spin it like this? Poles got the two best candidates out there for these jobs. So he succeeded. Now whether they work out, is another thing? But yeah. Im not sold on Poles. I'd really like to know whether he was allowed to fire Flus last year or not. If he was, then he is definitely suspect. But maybe he wasnt, and I'll probably never know. Let's see how Dalman and Jackson look on the OL. We are assuming those holes are plugged now, but I thought Nate Davis' tape was awesome too. Youre right - lets wait and see. Like you said - looks good on paper, cant wait to see it on grass.

That's a big reach of a statement. Neither are proven at their profession as of yet. Does it look good on paper? Hell yeah! Does it look good on the field? Haven't seen it yet. I very much agree we got it right, but I'm not betting a nickel on it until I see it happen. Been burnt too many times...

OK youre missing two very important details. 1) It was said AFTER the draft, not before. CC says she spoke to the dir of player personnel after the draft, and he said Loveland wasnt necessarily their first choice, that if Banks had fallen, for example, they would have taken him. I believe CC is not a liar. I feel like it may even have been partly on video, so you could see hm say it - Jeff something. 2) It matters who was available when, because we did trade down multiple times. *IF* we traded down thinking we would get a certain targeted HB at a lower pick, one who was still available on the board BEFORE the trade down, and we could have just picked them then, but instead if we traded down and then someone got in front of us and took the HB, then that means we read the situation poorly, and missed out on HBs we were targeting more than Monangai. If it happened multiple times, then it is fair to criticize the draft process as having misread the board, and missed out on players we mistakenly thought would be available later, got greedy, and missed the HB that was targeted. And even if that did happen, I'm not unhappy value-wise with the players we DID pick either, but if you're going to be evaluating the team, you gotta look into the places where they failed too. Is it fireable? No it's not. But that doesnt mean it isnt important. It's important in the continued evaluation of Poles who has done some amazing things, some good things, gotten lucky some, made some very questionable moves, and a few flat out bad decisions too. For me, right now, Poles is getting a B. Maybe a B+, and most of that is due to Caleb and Johnson, two massive pieces we got VERY right. But Caleb was luck as much as anything, and Johnson picked the Bears because of Caleb. So Poles could easily have lost both of them, if the Texans don't score a last minute touchdown in the last game of the season that didnt matter to them. For me, that all adds up to: Poles is worth keeping an eye on. I'm not totally sold on him or Warren. Not the way I am about the coaching staff, for example.

I read the remarks after the draft, can you show me the video where she states it before the draft? I have seen interviews where Poles talks about all three of those players, of course he liked them, but other than the first pick in the draft no GM is going to broadcast who they are taking. Actually it doesnt matter because they were not available and they didnt move up to take any of them or even talked about that.

CC reported that Bears employees, including director of player personnel said they wanted players that were gone before they picked, and specifically Jeanty, Banks and Campbell, and Henderickson later. She named her source, and also exactly when he said it (immediately after the draft) So either you think she is lying, or youre just trying to ignore these facts because they dont fit your "everything is perfect" narrative. Now even if the Bears did get out maneuvered on the board, it doesnt mean the draft was a failure. Poles may have miscalculated who would be there at times, but we still stayed true to our board and got value. So this isnt me saying he was awful either. But reality is messy, and is almost never "they got it exactly how they wanted it, its perfect"

Since none of them were available, we will never know. After they made the draft pick, the next day BJ said he showed a highlight video before the draft to show a little insight in where they were going with the pick to the war room. At 9.45 . It was Loveland. Through out the draft they seemed like they guess who people were taking and were pretty spot on, so they knew none of those other picks would be there. CC has no inside information other than they liked those players. Im sure they liked Carter and Hunter to but knew they wouldnt be there.

Jayden Daniels isnt that great. He is a lot like Justin Fields - amazing arm, great with his feet, but not ready to read a fully dimensional offense. Kliff Kingsbury has gotten the most out of him - really amazing results. Let's see if it continues this year. It's hard to make a QB look good consistently if they cant read a defense, eventually the NFL will catch up to what you're doing schematically, and force Daniels to play the position, and then i believe he will be exposed..

Ok, so I watched the episode. Lots of great highlight film on players. I was especially happy to see Turner's film. I think he was a steal. He should help us a lot. I do think the beginning where they say "Let's start with Loveland" was a little bit suspect. It's not clear that they started with him out of the gate, or if they were doing tight ends there, or what. We have heard from Courtney Cronin that the Bears would have taken Jeanty, Campbell or Banks over Loveland if any of them had been there, so I dunno if the film really says anything - it was edited tightly to the beginning of those words, and there is nothing from the draft before the pick. Still and all, the Bears were obviously very high on Loveland, and pleased that he was available for them. He's gonna be a great player for us, I believe. But I don't know that this film really does anything to dispel the idea that Poles miscalculated on HB availability through several trade downs. That's not to say that the players they did get were bad - they arent. It looks like a solid crop of rookies that can help us, including the HB we eventually did get, Monangai who looks great. I just don't think everything went perfectly according to plan on draft day either? Or at least, this film isn't proof that it did.

You do notice, none of them were juggernaut defenses either.

Burden has a ton of talent, and with the right guidance I hope he turns into a real weapon - he has it in him! But the reason he slipped to the second round is that he shows much sharper cuts when he's running with the ball than he does when he's running his routes, and he is a bit of a head case. Now to be fair, most stud WRs have giant egos and are head cases, so it's hopefully not a fatal flaw, but if he is coachable, he does have a ceiling to become a top WR in the NFL.

That's my kind of hype video. I really enjoyed the dialogue and forethought of how the draft would shake out. It shows a knowledgeable and disciplined plan. I feel that they hit on Loveland, Trapilo, Stewart, Hyppolite, Newman and Monongai. Burden and Frazier have something to prove, before I get high on them.