Chicago Bears: Two Wide Receiver Prospects From Senior Bowl to Target

The Chicago Bears have a glaring need at wide receiver. Here are two prospects who played in the Senior Bowl who they can target.

The Chicago Bears have a lot of holes on the roster to plug. In addition to having poor play on some units, they also have over 30 players who are potential free agents and another handful who are eligible for contract buyouts.

New general manager Ryan Poles had to hit the ground running to turn the team’s fortune. In addition to finding coaches and strengthening the front office, he has to plug those holes in the roster. He has to find the right players to fit his and his new head coach hire, Matt Eberflus’ philosophy. They want young, hungry players who play hard and with discipline.

In our recent article, we wrote about how Poles wanted to emphasize building up the offensive line. It is important to keep the franchise quarterback, Justin Fields, upright. He can’t make big plays if he’s constantly on his back.

Additionally, Fields cannot make the big plays if he doesn’t have receivers to catch his throws. The Bears receivers struggled to create space in 2021. As a result, Fields, as well as Andy Dalton, had trouble consistently hitting their targets.

This offseason, things are even tougher. When the new season officially begins, the Bears will have just one wide receiver under contract, Darnell Mooney. They could re-sign or tag Allen Robinson again but there might be too much bad blood between the two sides for that to happen. Even a regime change might not be enough to convince him to come back.

Poles indicated that he’d build the team through the draft. Well, while he’s still looking to fill jobs, the draft season began. We’ll be seeing a number of bowl games with prospects galore trying to show teams that they are the best choices for them to succeed.

Senior Bowl receivers who can help the Bears

The bowl season kicked off last week with the East/West Shrine Game and the Senior Bowl. There were two wide receiver prospects in the Senior Bowl who can help the Bears in 2022. Here are the two:

Khalil Shakir, Boise State

The NFL is a copycat league. with all the success Los Angeles Rams wide receiver Cooper Kupp had in 2021, teams around the league are already looking for similar receivers.

Khalil Shakir receives a lot of comparisons to Kupp. Just like Kupp, Shakir hasn’t gotten a lot of attention as a prospect. He got a chance to change that during the past week. Additionally, Shakir has excellent quickness and great elusiveness. He gets a lot of yards after catches and can turn a short pass into a huge gain.

Shakir had 77 catches for 1,117 yards and 7 touchdowns in 2021 for the Broncos. He impressed scouts during the week with his ability to blow past defenders. Just like Kupp, Shakir has the explosiveness right off the snap to leave defenders in his dust.

What’s more impressive with Shakir is his ability to go after the ball at the catch point. He goes high for it and yanks it out of the air. He consistently outmuscles defenders for the ball.

As mentioned earlier, Bears receivers had trouble creating space for their quarterbacks. Shakir really helps with that. He can blow past receivers off the snap and can turn short passes for big gains. He does that despite not having blazing speed.

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Jalen Tolbert, South Alabama

One of former Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Pace’s positives was how he found some diamonds in the rough we’ll see if Poles finds some as well.

One of them could be Jalen Tolbert from the South Alabama Jaguars. Of course, coming out of a small school many scouts overlook him because of the competition. However, he’s had great production and earned a look. He continued to impress people through Senior Bowl week.

In his last two seasons with the Jaguars, Tolbert caught 146 balls for 2,559 yards and 16 touchdowns. Numbers like those earn you a chance and he’ll get drafted somewhere.

Tolbert has good speed and is a downfield threat. His speed might be straight-line, though. He is a big-play threat. Also, he can play on the outside or in the slot.

Tolbert does a good job of running his routes well and creating space. Furthermore, he does a good job of beating the press and leaving the defender.

As you can see from his totals in the last two seasons, Tolbert isn’t a feast-or-famine receiver. He’s always ready to have a big game and plays well despite being the focus of attention. He also has a short memory and doesn’t pack mistakes on top of mistakes. He learns from those mistakes.

Tolbert had a good week of practice and it’ll be interesting to see how he performs at the NFL Combine. He showed he wasn’t intimidated by the boost in competition. He could really help the Chicago Bears.