USC wide receiver Brenden Rice had a stark warning for Bears general manager Ryan Poles in regards to drafting his former teammate Caleb Williams with the No. 1 overall pick.
"If you can risk [not picking him] and picking apart his game and letting him fall, have fun losing your job, man," Rice told the Sun-Times at the Senior Bowl Thursday. "Honestly, have fun. I'm proud of my quarterback."
Poles doesn't need to be told that his future in the Bears' front office depends on what he does in this year's draft. Last month, he said he would need to be "blown away" by a quarterback in the draft to move on from Justin Fields.
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"I'll just stay very wide open with the different paths that we go, and as we collect information, if that closes some of those pathways down, then we'll do that and move to some of the other ones, but I'm going to be wide open about this," he said at the end-of-season press conference.
Rice is the son of NFL Hall-of-Fame receiver Jerry Rice. He played for two season at USC with Caleb Williams and has also declared for the 2024 NFL draft.