Ian Cunningham plans to steal a draft strategy from the Bears as he leads Atlanta’s process for the first time
Ian Cunningham certainly learned a thing or two during his time with the Chicago Bears.
The Chicago Bears front office suffered a big blow last week when assistant general manager Ian Cunningham, the right-hand man to general manager Ryan Poles, was hired by the Atlanta Falcons for their vacant general manager position.
There’s still much debate over who’s actually in charge of things within the Falcons front office due to Matt Ryan’s role as the team’s president of football. But, the organization made it crystal clear that the general manager will operate the same as any other general manager in the league.
That means having control of the 53-man roster and draft decisions, which will be the first order of business for Cunningham with free agency and the 2026 NFL Draft right around the bend.
Ian Cunningham’s plans to build the Falcons through the draft, but has limited resources
During his introductory press conference with the Falcons on Tuesday, Cunningham made it clear that he intends to build his new team through the draft with the guidance of Ryan and new head coach Kevin Stefanksi.
“I never want to mortgage the future for the now,” Cunningham explained. “You gotta be intentional and thoughtful in that approach. And this roster, the cupboard isn’t bare, we have talent on this roster. But, it’s going to be my job to continue to add competition to it to enhance it and help Kevin and his staff get the right players in here so we can consistently compete for championships.”
The problem with building through the draft is the fact that the Falcons only have five draft picks in the upcoming draft, and don’t have a first-round pick after the previous regime used the 2026 first-round pick to trade back into the first-round last year to select James Pearce Jr.
However, working with limited resources and creating more out of those limited picks is something Cunningham has experience with going back to the 2022 NFL Draft while in Chicago.
“I love picks, man,” Cunningham explained. “You use those as currency. You can use it as trading up, you can trade for proven players, it allows you more swings at the plate. There’s different ways you can use them and that’s why we will value them. We only have five right now, but we only had five in Chicago my first year there too and I think we ended up with 10. We love those picks and we’re definitely going to build through the draft that way.”
Bringing up that 2022 Draft is a great example because it’s the exact situation now Cunningham finds himself in again with the Falcons. That year, the Bears didn’t have a first-round pick after the previous regime traded it away but the Bears turned five picks into 10 draftees by making five total trades from the start of the new league year to the end of that draft. Here’s the full trade history for context.
- Traded Khalil Mack to LAC for a 2022 second-round pick (48) and 2023 sixth-round pick
- Traded 2023 sixth-round pick for two 2022 seventh-round picks (254 and 255)
- Traded 2022 fifth-round pick (148) for 2022 fifth-round pick (168) and sixth-round pick (203)
- Traded 2022 fifth-round pick (150) for 2022 fifth-round pick (166) and sixth-round pick (207)
- Traded 2022 fifth-round pick (166) for 2022 fifth-round pick (174) and seventh-round pick (226)
Now, nailing those selections is a different story and something Cunningham will have to be mindful of as well considering only one of those 10 selections (Kyler Gordon) received a second contract with the Bears. But, that’s part of the game, not every pick is going to be a hit.
All in all, we should expect to see Cunningham be active on the phone lines once the new league year starts until the end of the 2026 NFL Draft. He’s going to want more swings at the plate and will be flexible to make that happen.
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