Chicago Bears rookie outlook: Will 1st-round pick Dillon Thieneman continue to be a quick study?
Dillon Thieneman may be a rookie, but the Chicago Bears safety has an opportunity to be a tone-setter on the field and in the locker room — and that’s by design.
General manager Ryan Poles likened Thieneman’s character to that of tight end Colston Loveland, the team’s first-round draft pick in 2025.
“The work ethic, that passion for ball was off the charts (with Thieneman),” Poles said. “We grade on a scale of 1-9. … There’s a lot of 7s and 8s when you look across this guy’s character.”
Here’s what to know about Thieneman before training camp begins.
How did he get here?
The former Oregon and Purdue safety wasn’t supposed to be available when the Bears picked at No. 25, at least according to many draft analysts.
Poles said about half of the mock drafts his staff assembled projected the Minnesota Vikings would take Thieneman at No. 18, but the Bears’ NFC North rival chose Florida defensive tackle Caleb Banks instead. The Carolina Panthers, another potential suitor, chose Georgia offensive tackle Monroe Freeling at No. 19.
A pair of edge rushers — as dire a need for the Bears as safety, if not more urgent — went off the board when the Los Angeles Chargers drafted Miami’s Akheem Mesidor at No. 22 and the Dallas Cowboys grabbed Central Florida’s Malachi Lawrence at No. 23.
After the Cleveland Browns selected Texas A&M wide receiver KC Concepcion at No. 24, Thieneman became a no-brainer pick for the Bears.
“You’ve obviously got a few teams in front of you and you’re waiting it out,” director of college scouting Breck Ackley said. “But I would say it got tense in terms of you’re waiting for them and there were a few guys left that you’re really excited about. And then once Cleveland picked right before us, it was like, ‘OK, here we go.’ It was kind of a release then.”
Where did he come from?
Thieneman hails from Westfield, Indiana, a suburb north of Indianapolis. He was Westfield High School’s captain as a senior, helped lead the Shamrocks to a pair of state runner-up finishes in Class 6A and was named 2022 Mr. Football at defensive back by the Indiana Football Coaches Association.
He then followed in his brothers’ footsteps and played two seasons at Purdue before forging his own path to Oregon. Jake and Brennan were walk-on safeties for the Boilermakers, and their experiences made an impression on Dillon.
“Dillon got an advantage being a third son to watching his two older brothers walk on, make the team, work hard, become captains,” Thieneman’s mother, Shannon, told the Tribune. “And then Jake got a shot at the NFL, so Dillon, at a young age, saw what it took to get to that point.”
She said Jake also taught Dillon how to read film, and Dillon “had a notebook early on at a young age.”
Father Ken Thieneman added that Jake told Dillon when “you study film, you’ve got to come up with a mechanism to remember everything. He would (say), ‘When you write it, you know it.’ … (Dillon) developed the habits that it took to get better and better. He saw it from Jake and Brennan, and he just executed.”
Ken said Dillon also displayed a commitment to football that was rare even among his peer group of elite high school players.
“It’s one thing to know about (work ethic); it’s another thing to do it seven days a week,” he said. “You’ve got to be very simplistic. You’ve got to park partying and girls and a social life. Dillon’s life is football.”
Why did the Bears draft him?
There was one common refrain from coaches and scouts: speed. Thieneman ran a 4.35-second 40-yard dash at the scouting combine in February, tied for 11th fastest among all prospects, regardless of position.
Among safeties at the combine, he had the top athletic score (85) and third-best production score (77), according to Next Gen Stats. Relative Athletic Score’s 9.71 grade on Thieneman ranks second among rookie strong safeties, excluding undrafted free agents.
Thieneman had double-digit tackles 12 times in his three-year college career, including two games with 10 solo stops.
“It flies off the tape,” Poles said. “He’s a violent football player. He strikes. There’s a knock-back element to his tackling.
“Again, just the speed. There’s speed and then there’s violent speed in terms of the explosion off the spot, and that’s what he brings. It’s pretty easy tape to watch.”
Beyond Thieneman’s physical attributes, the Bears were attracted to his ability to play all over the field, something he learned from a challenging “adjuster” role at Oregon.
“He has nickel flex,” Ackley said. “He has the versatility to play both free and strong (safety). But the thing that stands out, if you can go back to his Purdue tape, ’23 when he had six picks, he’s really got some center-field range stuff.
“Oregon used him a little bit in a rover role and at times in a different role. (His) range, he can flip his hips, he can cover ground, and then you add in the versatility, the run support, the physicality.”
The Bears drafted Thieneman with designs on pairing him with Coby Bryant, another speedy and versatile safety whom they signed away from the Seattle Seahawks in free agency.
“You want to be able to play with two guys that can both play high and low,” Ackley said. “Both fill the run on both sides. So there’s really not a weakness because they can both do everything. It just allows DA (defensive coordinator Dennis Allen) to be much more multiple.”
What his coaches said
Speed is a great trait to have, but without a feel for the game, it’s a lot less effective. The Bears liked Thieneman’s sense for where a play was going.
“You see him tracking the ball extremely well in college,” assistant defensive backs/safeties coach Matt Giordano said. “There’s a lot of deep balls he’s tracking, and he’s either hitting the guy out of bounds or he’s trying to swat the ball out of bounds.”
Coach Ben Johnson added: “He’s got a knack for the football. He’s a great tackler and when he does it, he does it with violence.”
Johnson also lauded Thieneman’s “football IQ.”
“I really do think he’s going to be one of those rare safety types that coordinators are going to have to account for,” Johnson said.
What he said
With Thieneman, there’s a process for everything. Building on the habit he developed as a child, he keeps two notebooks now, one for jotting down everything about schemes and another specifically for scouting his next opponent.
He also has a certain order for watching film.
“Mondays, I’ll do early down (and) run game,” Thieneman said during the combine. “Tuesdays, second (down and) quarterback cut-up. Wednesday is third down, red area. And then I’m watching full games after that. So I’m just making sure I have a feel for every position.”
Of course, Thieneman most recently has been studying the Bears playbook, but he’s also learning the people behind the system. For example, while Johnson often can come off as straight-laced as Thieneman does, the rookie has learned there’s another side to his head coach.
“He looks to mess around,” Thieneman said. “He can be serious when he needs to be serious, but every once in a while he’ll joke around and mess with you.”
What he needs to prove during training camp
Thieneman, who signed with the Bears in early June, had planned to write up a specific plan for training camp in the six weeks since minicamp, setting new goals and routines so he can “come back stronger, faster and more conditioned.”
Like most rookies in camp — they report Saturday, three days before the veterans — he’ll have to prove he can retain the information he’s taught.
“He’s going to learn how to play in the box and play as a post player in the league,” Giordano said. “Doesn’t matter if you’re a first-year or a 10-year vet, you’re always learning.”
As defensive backs coach/passing game coordinator Al Harris sees it, the coaching staff has as much to prove in guiding Thieneman as he does on the field.
“It’s up to us as teachers, as coaches, to make it easy for them,” Harris said. “Regardless if it’s calculus or just one plus one, we have to make it easy. So that’s on us.”