The Bears are 5-3, which is progress, but they’re still several pieces away from contending. General manager Ryan Poles seemed to see that at the trade deadline Tuesday when he kept their future draft assets and salary-cap space intact and made one minor move: trading a seventh-round pick to the Browns for defensive end Joe Tryon-Shoyinka.
Here are the highlights from Poles talking with local reporters Wednesday morning:
– Poles reiterated that the priority is to continue building the roster sustainably through the draft, rather than sacrifice the Bears’ upcoming first- and second-round picks to make a splashy move.
“We want to sustain for a long period of time,” he said. “We feel like with Joe we can move the needle a little bit and we can continue to get better just through execution, but then also continue to build through the draft so that we can sustain it a lot more rather than throwing [out] money, draft picks — that timeline starts to get shorter and shorter once you get there.”
– Tryon-Shoyinka is expected to make his debut Sunday against the Giants.
“He didn’t get a lot of time in Cleveland, but the tape that you saw, there was a lot of traits to help us both in the run game and the pass game,” Poles said. “Loved the effort and the motor, the range that he has… reliable, dependable.”
– Tryon-Shoyinka played just 31 snaps with the Browns before getting traded, but Poles attributed that simply to the Browns relying on Myles Garrett, Alex Wright and Isaiah McGuire.
“You’re going to have a couple guys that were homegrown there that got ahead of him, and he just didn’t get worked in,” Poles said. “They felt comfortable with their depth.”
– Linebacker and special teams player Amen Ogbongbemiga will come off injured reserve this week and be available Sunday.