This upcoming draft season is shaping up to be much less exciting for the Chicago Bears.
Ryan Pace only has five draft picks to work with, and he isn’t scheduled to be on the clock until the 87th overall pick, toward the end of the third round.
Still, the Bears general manager says the lack of draft picks doesn’t change how they go through the process, including the NFL combine starting this week.
“Honestly it doesn’t change because you don’t know how things are going to work out,” Pace told ChicagoBears.com. “As we’ve shown before we could move around in the draft; there’s always that possibility. So I don’t think you treat the combine any different than any year.”
In theory, Pace and his staff wouldn’t have to focus on as wide of a range of prospects given where he’s set to pick in the draft, but he says their evaluation process goes beyond the last weekend in April.
“At the combine we’re not just gathering information for this draft,” Pace said. “We’re gathering information for future years, too, for when these guys are free agents or whatnot. There’s just a lot of collecting of data going on.”
Pace and head coach Matt Nagy are scheduled to hold press conferences from the combine on Wednesday.
