Bears Draft 2025: The Case for Offensive Line at 10

This is the first article in a four-part miniseries about what the Chicago Bears should do with the 10th pick of the draft. We will examine four different position groups and explain why drafting that position is the right move for the Bears.

We start with the offensive line.

Of course, the Chicago Bears need to draft an offensive lineman, specifically a left tackle. The Bears have done a great job putting some quick fixes on the interior of the offensive line with Drew Dalman, Joe Thuney, and Jonah Jackson, and of course, they have Darnell Wright on the right side as well.

When you look at the line, you look at those four individuals and know that Braxton Jones is a solid starter at left tackle, and you would say to yourself, that’s a solid line for 2025, the Bears need to focus their attention elsewhere at 10.

Right? Wrong.

You need to zoom out.

First of all, let’s look at Ben Johnson. In what should be a delight for all Bears fans, Johnson loves blocking. Beyond that, he demands blocking. Everyone on that offense, if the ball isn’t in their hands and they aren’t running a route, should be putting a body on a defender.

It’s a basic rule of football, you know, hit the other guy, but it’s one that a lot of teams don’t focus on. It’s like basketball teams that don’t practice free throws. It’s ridiculous.

If the Bears are going to focus on becoming an elite blocking team, and I believe they are going to do just that, having a solid five up front on the line isn’t enough; you need to create a unit that’s deep and constantly has young talent developing behind the starters.

Beyond just what you need on the field, you have to look at roster construction as well. We all agree Darnell Wright needs an extension, right? At a minimum, Wright is going to need 4/$100 from the Bears for an extension. When you combine that with the free agents they just signed across the interior, they need offensive linemen on rookie contracts.

When you look at line construction across the league, most teams have at least two players on rookie deals starting on their lines, some teams have more than that. You’ll find some teams push 4 starting linemen with big salaries. You’ll never find five.

Braxton Jones is a free agent at the end of this year. The Bears are in no position to re-sign him. I think they’ve made it pretty clear in their actions that they don’t plan to do this anyway, but with guys like Dan Moore getting north of $20 million per season, there’s no reason to think Jones can’t get that as well.

In a couple of years, that would mean the Bears would have a line that would cost them roughly $20 million, $16 million, $14 million, $17 million, and $25 million. That’s a starting five making around $19 million per spot. You simply can’t afford that.

If the Bears don’t make any effort to find a young left tackle this year, they are going to be in a position where they are going to have to find a cheap Jones replacement (someone making $7 or $8 million a year and that’s dangerous) or go with Kiran Amegadjie who you just can’t rely on at this point in his career to be your LT1 in 2026.

With Johnson’s focus on offensive line and blocking, do we really think he’s just going to come into a situation and know that he’s going to have a massive problem at left tackle in 2026 with limited resources to fix the issue? Of course not.

Johnson knows the Bears need an LT, and they need one this year. The problem could be, can they get one at 10?

Will Campbell would be the ideal guy, but will he slide that far? There’s plenty of buzz that he would be the Patriots’ selection at four, but I would say, if the Patriots decide to go another direction, there’s a decent chance he could slide all the way to 10.

I think if Campbell is selected, Armand Membou would be less likely to slide, it seems that more teams are higher on Membou overall than Campbell. If Membou does make it to 10, the Bears have to decide if he fits their situation.

Membou has pretty much exclusively played right tackle his whole career. Some guys can make that switch, other guys can’t. If the Bears draft Membou, either he or Wright will have to switch to the left side, and there’s no guarantee that it will work. Take Charles Leno, for example, Leno was a horrendous right tackle but was a Braxton Jones-level left tackle.

The bigger issue is that there’s a decent chance that both those players are off the board. What do the Bears do then? Could they reach for Josh Simmons? A player with some injury concerns who has some (largely unsubstantiated) rumors about his football character? Would they try Kelvin Banks even though many think he needs to be a guard at the next level? Do they roll the dice that a guy like Josh Conerly makes it to them in round 2 (highly doubtful)?

The Bears are in a difficult spot with the 10th pick. They will be sweating seeing how the board breaks in the top nine, but make no mistake about it, if there’s a tackle there at 10, the Bears should and will pounce.