The Bears will have one extra pick in this year’s NFL draft. The league announced which teams earned compensatory picks on Thursday, and the Bears were awarded an extra seventh round pick, No. 258 overall. It will be the second-to-last pick in the draft.
Compensatory picks, or comp picks, are awarded at the ends of rounds three through seven. The picks are awarded to teams who lost more impactful players in free agency than they gained in free agency in the previous offseason.
The Bears weren’t expected to be awarded a comp pick, because they had to sign so many free agents to fill out their roster. But the league determined that the losses of players like Allen Robinson, Akiem Hicks, James Daniels, Bilal Nichols, Andy Dalton and Pat O’Donnell narrowly outweighed what the Bears received when they signed players like Justin Jones, Nick Morrow, Lucas Patrick, Byron Pringle, Al-Quadin Muhammad and Equanimeous St. Brown.
The Bears now control nine draft picks:
- Round 1, No. 1 overall
- Round 2, No. 55 overall (from Ravens, Roquan Smith trade)
- Round 3, No. 65 overall
- Round 4, No. 103 overall
- Round 4, No. 133 (from Eagles, Robert Quinn trade)
- Round 5, No. 136
- Round 5, No. 149 (from Ravens, Roquan Smith trade)
- Round 7, No. 218
- Round 7, No. 258
The Bears don’t have their own second round pick since they sent it to Pittsburgh in exchange for Chase Claypool part way through last season. Their sixth round pick belongs to the Dolphins due 2021’s Jakeem Grant trade.
This is Ryan Poles’ first draft with a first round pick. Last year he didn’t have one because the Bears sent the 2022 first rounder to the Giants in the move up to select Justin Fields. Poles’ first selection came at No. 39, where he picked Kyler Gordon.
NFL
The first round of the draft begins on Apr. 27.