Rahimi, Harris & Grote Show - What’s the No. 1 priority now for the Bears after Drew Dalman's retirement?

Episode Date: March 4, 2026

Leila Rahimi and Mark Grote discussed what the Bears’ top priority should be this offseason following center Drew Dalman’s surprising retirement at 27 years old.

Hello and good Wednesday morning. This is Rahimi Harrison Grotie on 104-3 The Score. And for everybody who took pictures and video of Marshall and I, because we were playing some audio from the White Sox and Instagram video that they had. And then we got Ray in our ear telling us about Drew Dalman retiring. Yeah, yeah, that look was genuine. We were shocked.

It was sudden. And now we are trying to figure out what the bear's newest priority is. this off season. Thanks for joining us here on 104.3, the score, Mark Grody in today with me. And Mark, I do want to get your reaction, just kind of picking up where we left off, because as the Bears reporter for our station, you had a lot of conversations with Drew Dalman. And he is a guy who I always found him really interesting. You know, I feel like he had a lot to say whenever he did speak. And number one, you hope he's okay. And then number two,

you try to figure out why, and then number three, you also figure out what's next. Absolutely, all those things. And continuing on with the office theme, and I love anytime Tyler Buterbaugh, he's a real beaut, anytime he can put some office quotes into an open or throughout the show, you know I love it. Do you remember when Toby, the Human Resources man, who Michael Scott hates, that's the running bit, he leaves for a while. And then he comes...

He goes to Costa Rica. He goes to Costa Rica. And Michael Scott thought he was never coming back. He does come back. Michael Scott didn't believe it. And then when he saw him, he just goes, no! No! No!

That was kind of my reaction when I heard that Drew Dalman was no more, that Drew Dalman had decided to retire at the age of 27. So you and Marshall were... And I saw the pictures. You guys, that was the exact appropriate response. No is the answer because right now, because we don't have an explanation about it, we all feel helpless right now. We want to get mad. We want to be sad, but we also want to know what's going on with the human being.

So it's difficult for us to just be like, who do I get mad at? Who do I get? Who is responsible? I can't get mad at Ryan Poles for this because Ryan Poles probably did not see it. I'd like to think that Ryan Poles had no idea this was going to happen until probably a couple of weeks ago. Same thing with Ben Johnson. Same thing with Dan Rocher. So right now, I feel a little bit helpless just like everybody else. As far as my relationship with Drew Dalman, I'm not going to overplay it. I probably had five or six or seven conversations with him throughout the year. I do

remember when they rolled out Drew Dalman and a lot of their new players in a special day at Hallis Hall, where the families come out. I do remember, like all these things start to resonate and you don't want to like overplay it. But I do remember how important family was to him. His wife was there and it was clear that they were very close. Like she was looking on adoringly and all of that. Of course my brain goes back to that very first day and knowing how important the family was. But there was not a single second in that locker room throughout the season during practice sessions at games where I thought like sensed anything about, and why would you? The and played 17 games this season for the Bears.

Took more snaps than anybody. That's what he does. He actually, the one who snaps the ball. As a matter of fact, all three of those offensive linemen on the interior played every single game. So that's another reason why I was like, no! And I understood, no, I understood what Ben Johnson was saying when he said, it's never going to be the same again. But this was not what I had anticipated.

And my guess is that Ben Jansen had not anticipated that either. Well, that's it. is that we talked about this. And yeah, Brad Biggs alluded to it too, that there was some scuttlebutt around the House of Bears around Hallis last week. But if that were the case, Tyler Bueberbaugh brought this up. Would Ben Johnson have been at the Bulls game instead of at offensive lineman Day at the Combine in Indianapolis on Sunday? Joking around.

I don't think he's taking his shirt off, the comedy tour. Probably not. And that's not really what's important, right? what's in the grand scheme of things. Like, we'll put it all together. We'll try to piece it together because you always want to know, too, retirement implies if you don't want to do something anymore, when you're really good at it, you want to ask why.

But there's also the truth of football in this. And you can make a lot of money playing it, but at what cost to your future, at what cost to who you are as a person? And, you know, I love the, uh, whatever we bring up the idea of the bear as a especially this front office being like, we've got to get somebody who loves football. Max Crosby also told you in so many different terms. It's not about how he loves football. It's about how obsessed he is with doing his job and doing it well.

There's a bunch of different ways. You can be productive. You don't have to love the game. There's the person you are and there's the job you do. And salute to anybody who gets to separate those and have them be two very different things. Right. And for whatever it's worth, there was never a time. where I sense that Drew Dalman was not into what he did.

As a matter of fact, one of the most pertinent conversations that I had with him with Drew Dalman was at the beginning of the year when things were not going particularly well. If you remember, remember the bear's not able to get one yard on two straight downs, on a third down and a fourth down. I think that happened multiple times where it was like, okay, now I got to go talk to Drew Dalman about this because there's some culpability there. And I just remember him giving a very thorough, complicated answer about what was going on with the office. So in other words, I'm telling you that to tell you that this man cared a lot and he acted like an offensive lineman.

Most offensive linemen are pretty smart guys who are easy to talk to and care a lot. And Drew Dalman fell into that category. I don't think that anybody would disagree when you consider how many games he played. and that was such a level of calm that they brought. You know, that was so appreciated just how forever we'd had so many different combinations of offensive linemen every season. The season before that had gotten up into the 20s as far as the various combinations of linemen. So that's not starting, obviously. That's during games and what happens in a game, whatever.

So to have that calm and to have that be reliable and to also just not have a question about his play. How many times did you ever question whether or not Drew Dahlman was off on something? I think I can name three times the entire season. When he was off on something? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there was some snap issues here. It wasn't perfect.

For all of the Bears' cadence concerns that clearly were a problem the year before and additionally were a problem at the beginning of the season, I think Drew Dahlman helped Caleb Williams with that immensely. Or they helped each other. Football is a team sport. But either way, I credit him with a lot of what made the end. offensive process so smooth and productive. Right. I mean, you have to have a center who can identify what the defense is doing,

what the linebackers are doing at the line of scrimmage. I mean, that is essential competency, I would say, for any center, but it would appear that he did it particularly well, which guys took a lot of heat off of Caleb Williams. Not that Caleb Williams can't identify things, but he, of course, to say, to say, some degree was completely dependent on Drew Dalman for that. And really, one of the hardest parts of this is, I mean, you can make the argument that through the years with all the issues the Bears' offensive line has had, the center position is, and I'm here to hear arguments, was the biggest of the bugaboos. When we think about when they signed, when polls got here,

and I will say, when they signed Lucas Patrick, I'll raise my hand, I liked it. Like when they signed it, I was, they sold me on it. Lucas Patrick, I'm just saying at the time, Lucas Patrick did not work out. Sam Mustifer was never intended to be a starting center in this league. The Bears knew that. Sam Mustifer knew that. Coleman Shelton, obviously, not bad, but it has been, and I can go on and on,

that position has been a difficult one to fill for the Bears over the last five or six years. So it just felt so good having that adult as your center for at least one year. Well, and how about Coleman Shelton? I saw his name quite a bit during the playoff loss to the Rams. Yeah. Because he's the center for L.A. So Coleman Shelton, all's well that ends well. It also goes back to my theory that there's no such thing as a left tackle store

and when it is the price is monumental. These guys are, they'll always find jobs, you know. I was reading earlier this week about Larry Boreham being a guy who could likely get a big payday just because of the lack of available offensive linemen. And he had started as a good amount of games. games in Miami. So I say all that to say, like, there's the sadness knowing that that was a really solid Bears offensive line, the concern knowing that you might not get to see something like that again, especially when left tackle is such a question. The offensive line was so good.

You didn't worry about left tackle. Honestly, it was one of the number one reasons that I would push, Ben. I've done this a lot on the podcast, on Take the North, pushing back gently on Ben Johnson when he has gone through this whole thing of, hey, man, we ain't the same anymore. One of the big reasons they were the same to me was because you could depend on the offensive line. You have the quarterback coming back. You have the receivers coming back. You have the running backs coming back.

But we all know that it started with the offensive line. And back to your point, too, about the tackles that you bring up Larry Boreham. Like, you're going to get paid if you are a left tackle or a right. tackle or starting caliber offensive lineman, it always amazes me, like when I hear people talk about Braction Jones and say, well, maybe the Bears will give him a one-year prove-it deal. He's going to get an offer from somebody else in the league that's not a one-year. See Charles Leno, who around was not, was not, and I was part of it. Charles Leno was not particularly valued in this town as a left tackle.

He was all every year. It was like, replace him, replace him, replace him. Then he goes and gets his three-year deal. I promise you. He got paid a job. Washington. He did. Brackton Jones is going to get paid to and Bracton Jones should go. He owes nothing to the Bears. No. And also, again, the market value of capable left tackle. You know, that's it. And unfortunately, that's when the domino effect occurs of how much this

truly affects a Bears team who is over the salary cap. You know, that's the concern. And for every, that was one of my first questions. And I hadn't had to research how retirement and salary cap works. We were getting the information real time. So because of that, we didn't get to, like, research in the quiet and, like, take notes and write stuff down. It's hard. A lot of people asking the questions. So this is according to over the cap. Yes. The bears will place Dalman on the reserve slash retired list. Yes. So they will keep his rights in the event, Dalman comes out of retirement in the future. I would imagine this is all-off Frank Ragnow last year. Dirty Frank. That's a Pearl Jam reference. It's not offensive to Frank Ragnon.

once that occurs, the Bears will take on a $4 million dead cap money charge for the remaining portion of a $6 million signing bonus that they paid him in 2025. So that's big. And his $14 million cap charge will vanish. So there's an exchange there. Dolman will forfeit his $9.5 million salary guarantee for the year. So the team will then save $10 million in cap room,

but we'll have a gaping hole in the middle of the line. Thanks for reminding us over the game. cap. I came here for cap news. The Bears will have the option to claw back $2 million in bonus money in 2026 and another $2 million in 202027. Players forfeit signing bonus money when they walk

away from a contract, though it is up to the team to enforce the provisions in the contract and try to recover the money. The Bears would not get salary cap relief for that the season as that would start to come next season. So that is why this gets real tough,

real quick. You didn't have a lot flexibility to work with previously. Your GM told you he didn't want to do the whole kick the can down the road thing. Like they just did in Dallas, by the way. Adam Schaefter reported the Cowboys of Restructure the contracts of Dak

Prescott and Tyler Smith creating $47 million in cap room per field Yates in him. By the way, that still leaves 9 million that they're over the cap. 47 million they cleared up and they're still 9 over. So Ryan Poles has talked about how he doesn't want to necessarily do the

into perpetuity thing. So I take all of this into consideration and understand this team has now some very large holes to fill and some very big needs when it comes to how they put this together for next year. Your top need right now? Center. The end. That's my number one now because of this. It's replacing Drew Dalman with somebody capable.

And yeah, the wish list, of course, is Tyler Linderbaum. But if he can't get to a 12. million dollar agreement with the team who drafted him in Baltimore. What on earth is the deal he's going to command? Yeah, that seems outlandish, not something the bears will be able to do. But it's funny because the question was asked backstage in our pre-show meeting. I hesitated for a second on the question of what's the most important because I went through my mind, like, a left tackle, defensive end.

but then I thought about everything and the importance like really to narrow it down to simplify it. The importance of Drew Dalman to the man who wears number 18 for the Chicago Bears. That would be Caleb Williams. And there's myriad reasons why it's Drew Dalman, but that is number one with a bullet right there. That filling that center position was just huge this year. So yeah, the Linderbom thing seems like a dream will continue to bring up his name and the possibilities of it, but

the Tyler Biotish, that sounds more plausible. I know Connor McGovern's name has come up with the bills, and an old friend, too, that I mentioned as well, that we all just sort of laughed at was James Daniels. James Daniels, who was only played, I don't believe

he has been a center at all at the NFL. I believe it has been all guard, but he did play some center at Iowa. I remember when he came to the Bears, there was some question as a second round pick by the way, whether or not he would play guard or center, he obviously played guard. I will say that when Ryan Poles was going through the rebuild, that was the one move to me that I was like,

huh, really? Get rid of James Daniels? I didn't like it at the time, but I don't... For a guy like Nate Davis. For a guy like Nate Davis. So I don't actually think that James Daniels is going to be your center, but I just thought it was interesting that his name came up. Well, and also, I know people have talked about Luke Newman, but... Newman. He didn't take a lot of snaps, like in game scenarios. I understand that most of his reps were in the offseason and during training camp to test versatility. So that's something that I think we try to figure out as well.

But I don't know how you look at this and don't say this changes everything. It does. It does. Right. The chain reaction of all of this and being so locked in and potentially getting Max Crosby, which we will talk about on this program. later on in a couple of segments and the left tackle situation, what you could put into that.

You're right. Everything has changed and we're going to discuss it all day here on Rahimi Harrison Grody. We are. We are on 1043 The Score. That is Mark Grody. I'm Lailorah Rehemi. Thank you for joining us, both on 670 and 1043. Or maybe you're hanging out with us on Twitch.

Twitch.tv slash The Score Chicago. Our address did change. It is The Score Chicago. Our Twitch mob is up and chatting. They are emoting. We are also on YouTube. Shout out to our YouTube viewers at the Score Chicago there as well. Ray Diaz, Tyler Bueberbaugh and Brandon Fryer are our producers. Our video team is Connor O'Donnell, Jacob Stutz, and Max Curtis.

Cody Westerland helps us out as well. And we broadcast live through the score Hyundai Studios brought to you by your local Hyundai dealers. Coming up next, someone who can offer a lot of perspective, both from Drew Dalman's standpoint, and then also the idea of being one of the best in the NFL at your position. Joe Thomas, the Brown's offensive tackle for 10 years. The Hall of Famer joins us next.