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PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA - APRIL 23: Dillon Thieneman of Oregon celebrates after being selected twenty-fifth overall pick by the Chicago Bears during Round One of the 2026 NFL Draft at Acrisure Stadium on April 23, 2026 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Emilee Chinn/Getty Images) | Getty Images
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The NFL Draft couldn’t have fallen better for the Chicago Bears, as versatile safety Dillon Thieneman from Oregon was there at 25 for the taking.
This is a great start for Chicago’s draft, as he’s the consensus number-two safety in the class.
As a part of her Making Monsters pre-draft podcast series at 2nd City Gridiron, Taylor Doll spoke with Jon Helmkamp, who covers the draft and is a huge Oregon Ducks fan, and he gave us a lot of good stuff on Thieneman.
“Oregon’s defense likes to play more of a split safety type defense,” Helmkamp said on the pod. “They’re not like a single high type of role, but at Purdue, he played single high. So, he’s shown the ability to play a variety of different alignments from the safety position, which is something that I think NFL teams are going to love.”
Helmkamp added, “He could play down close to the line of scrimmage. He can muck it up in the run game. What you see time and time again when you put on the tape of the Oregon defense is Dillon Thieneman is the one that is identifying what’s going on on the offense and getting other people lined up. Like he knows what’s happening. His film study is great. He looks for the trends. He sees what’s going on.”
According to our partners at FanDuel Sportsbook, the over/under win total for the Bears is 9.5, which is fair, but if their defense gets another playmaker or two this offseason, I could see a lot of action coming in on the over.
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