The Ryan Pace 2017 draft approach was, to put it mildly, unique. Three of the five picks he made came out of smaller programs including Adam Shaheen (Ashland), Tarik Cohen (North Carolina A&T) and Jordan Morgan (Kutztown). A daring approach in what many considered to be a critical draft. Of course it’s clear now that Pace had always planned this to be the time that he hopefully found Chicago their future franchise quarterback.
In hindsight, of course he’d think that. Jay Cutler had two years to show him something. It didn’t work. The Bears held the third overall pick in the draft. If ever there was a time to take a quarterback, this was it. From his perspective though, it wasn’t a question of whether to take one. It was who should he go after?
Ryan Pace 2017 draft plan involved deceiving from both inside and out
According to the Chicago Tribune, he had one name in mind very early in the process. However, Pace has established himself as a team player. So he did something a little unorthodox. Rather than inform his front office and coaching staff of his love for North Carolina’s Mitch Trubisky, he kept the details to himself.
Why? A good reason in fact.
Subscribe to the BFR podcast and ride shotgun with Dave and Ficky as they break down Bears football like nobody else.
“To be clear, the attraction to Trubisky as the potential savior to tug the franchise out of the quicksand of NFL mediocrity had started long before mid-March. For months, Pace had been convinced that Trubisky was the top quarterback in the draft. But for the longest time, he kept his evaluation to himself, not wanting to influence the assessments of his subordinates. Then, as the reports came trickling in — from area scout Chris Prescott, from national scout Ryan Kessenich, from college scouting director Mark Sadowski, from Lucas, from Loggains — the consensus energized Pace.”
Pace wanted to make sure that the people he trusted reached the same conclusion as him before making the decision. It would’ve been easy to use his managerial powers to override everybody. Instead he recognized that his eye for talent, while respectable, can’t be foolproof. If the majority of his colleagues favored say Deshaun Watson or Patrick Mahomes instead, likely it would’ve compelled him to reevaluate.
Instead every man he trusted most came away with the same exact conclusion. Trubisky was the guy. Thus Pace had the conviction put in his head from that point forward. No matter what, he’d make sure the young quarterback would be a Chicago Bear by the end of business hours on April 28th, 2017. It took some wheeling and dealing, but he got it done. Trubisky will wear navy blue and orange. Hopefully for the next decade and beyond.
So hyped to be wearing my new Uni! Check out my new card as an official member of the @ChicagoBears #WhoDoYouCollect https://t.co/1gUQZd3mEN pic.twitter.com/t7dHn11sB3
— Mitchell Trubisky (@Mtrubisky10) May 20, 2017
Pace knows much of that depends on how he does in the months and years to come. How he’s able to build around the young passer. That was the major failure of his predecessors Jerry Angelo and Phil Emery. They didn’t build a good enough roster around Cutler. Have the Bears learned that lesson well? An answer will be found soon enough.
