{"id":630142,"date":"2026-04-25T14:43:21","date_gmt":"2026-04-25T14:43:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/630142\/"},"modified":"2026-04-25T14:43:21","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T14:43:21","slug":"bears-earned-elite-grade-for-dillon-thieneman-selection-in-nfl-draft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/630142\/","title":{"rendered":"Bears earned &#8216;elite&#8217; grade for Dillon Thieneman selection in NFL draft"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>After the first round of the 2026 NFL Draft, several experts and media networks were quick to hand out grades on how they felt teams drafted on Thursday night, including the <a href=\"https:\/\/bearswire.usatoday.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Chicago Bears;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Chicago Bears&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Chicago Bears<\/a>. While several teams moved around the board and traded to get into a spot that helped them land their desired player, Chicago waited for the board to fall to them and were able to come away with safety Dillon Thieneman at No. 25 overall.<\/p>\n<p>The selection of Thieneman addressed a huge need for Chicago&#8217;s defense, pairing the new rookie alongside free-agent signing <a class=\"link \" href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/nfl\/players\/34065\/\" data-i13n=\"sec:content-canvas;subsec:anchor_text;elm:context_link\" data-ylk=\"slk:Coby Bryant;sec:content-canvas;subsec:anchor_text;elm:context_link;itc:0\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Coby Bryant&quot;,&quot;ySubModuleName&quot;:&quot;anchor_text&quot;,&quot;yHasCommerce&quot;:false}\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Coby Bryant<\/a>, completely remaking the safety position under defensive coordinator Dennis Allen.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Filling a big void on their roster with one of the most talented players at the position, the <a href=\"https:\/\/sportsdata.usatoday.com\/football\/nfl\/teams\/chicago-bears\/326\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Bears;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Bears&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Bears<\/a> were praised by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pff.com\/news\/draft-best-picks-of-round-1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Pro Football Focus;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Pro Football Focus&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Pro Football Focus<\/a>, who gave the Thieneman selection an &#8220;elite&#8221; grade &#8212; just one of two picks to earn the honor.<\/p>\n<p>1 \/ 1<\/p>\n<p>How NFL experts graded the Bears&#8217; selection of Dillon Thieneman<\/p>\n<p>2026 NFL Draft: Bears select Dillon Thieneman in first round (No. 25)<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"fill\" class=\"cropped-img\" style=\"position:absolute;height:100%;width:100%;left:0;top:0;right:0;bottom:0;color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/5c169ec84bf1c45adc10797107572bb9.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>1 \/ 1<\/p>\n<p>How NFL experts graded the Bears&#8217; selection of Dillon Thieneman<\/p>\n<p>2026 NFL Draft: Bears select Dillon Thieneman in first round (No. 25)<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Thieneman didn\u2019t often make it to Chicago in mock drafts, but the\u00a0Bears\u00a0will certainly be happy he was available here. Thieneman earned 89.0-plus PFF grades on multiple defenses \u2014 2023 with\u00a0Purdue\u00a0and 2025 with\u00a0Oregon\u00a0\u2014 and can cover, defend the run and bring high-end athleticism. Given that the Bears came into this draft with a clear need at safety, this is an ideal scenario for Dennis Allen\u2019s defense.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>It was a great value pick for the Bears to address a position of need in the first round of this year&#8217;s draft, as Thieneman joins free-agent addition Coby Bryant in the secondary, and now they&#8217;ll look to build off of that throughout the rest of draft weekend.<\/p>\n<p>Follow Bears Wire on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/TheBearsWire\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Twitter;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Twitter&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Twitter<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheBearsWire\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Facebook;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Facebook&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Facebook<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/bearswireusat\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Instagram;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Instagram&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n<p>This article originally appeared on Bears Wire: <a href=\"https:\/\/bearswire.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/nfl\/bears\/2026\/04\/25\/bears-dillon-thieneman-nfl-draft-grade-elite\/89776185007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Bears earned &#039;elite&#039; grade for Dillon Thieneman selection in NFL draft;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;Bears earned &#039;&quot;}\" class=\"link \">Bears earned &#8216;elite&#8217; grade for Dillon Thieneman selection in NFL draft<\/a><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After the first round of the 2026 NFL Draft, several experts and media networks were quick to hand&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":630143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,1248,169847,255268,3263,593,85],"class_list":["post-630142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-chicago-bears","tag-coby-bryant","tag-dillon-thieneman","tag-draft","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/630143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}