ON EARLY WEEKEND mornings while his friends were sleeping in or watching cartoons, Westfield, Indiana, fifth grader Dillon Thieneman opted to sweat alongside his brothers at their high school football workouts. Even at half his brothers’ size, Thieneman possessed a level of talent and determination in 2016 that people around him knew would take him far.
A decade later, the Chicago Bears selected Thieneman, a University of Oregon safety, with the No. 25 overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft. Bears coach Ben Johnson’s post-win locker room chant of, “Never let it rest ’til your good gets better and your better gets best,” became a rallying cry during the Bears’ 2026 Cinderella season. According to his family and youth coaches, Thieneman has modeled this mantra his whole life.
“He got better every year,” Westfield High School coach Jake Gilbert says of Thieneman. “Some kids just get a year older. He got a year better every single year because he put in so much work.”
Westfield coaches watched that ambitious fifth-grade tagalong grow from a novice football player to a bona fide star.
“He’s just relentless and passionate about being the best, but not settling,” Westfield strength coach Tavio Henson adds.
As a starting defensive back at Westfield High School, Thieneman led the team to the state championship in Indiana’s biggest conference during his sophomore and junior years. Despite a shortened senior season due to an ACL injury, he earned the Indiana Mr. Football Award.
Thieneman’s athleticism was noted by his family from a young age.
“We’ve known his whole life that he was going to be different,” says his older brother, Jake Thieneman. “Like from 3 years old.”
It only took a few more years for Jake to reach the moment he knew football would be his brother’s sport of choice, when he refereed one of Dillon’s flag football games.
“I think he was in second grade,” Jake says. “It’s eight-on-eight. We watched this man juke out all eight of those kids. Kids were falling on their faces. He was shaking everyone out of their shoes, and he scored the touchdown. And that’s just one example. That was every game. It was rare for Dillon to touch the ball in second, third, fourth, or fifth grade and it not be a touchdown.”
It did not take long for local high school coaches to notice the youngster’s talents.
“When he was in sixth grade, he broke off about a 60-yard run to beat the best team in the city of Indianapolis. He just ran away from all their players,” Gilbert recalls. “I remember right then and there, on that particular play, thinking, Wow. This guy’s going to play a lot of football for us and do a lot of special things.”
As a middle schooler, Thieneman regularly joined his brothers Jake and Brennan, eight-and-a-half and six-and-a-half years older, respectively, in their high school workouts with safeties coach Steven Shackleford. Both older brothers went on to play safety at Purdue, where Dillon started his college career.
“We always knew Dillon was going to be the best out of all three of them,” says Shackleford, who was with the Thieneman family when his name was called in Pittsburgh on the night of April 23.
The drive from Westfield to Chicago is about three hours. Dillon Thieneman’s family and Westfield coaches plan to make as many trips as possible to Soldier Field to watch him play with the Bears.
“Bears fans should be really excited,” Jake says. “A lot of guys kind of hit their ceiling. They lose motivation, they lose the drive, or they don’t keep working at it. Or they just don’t love football that much. Dillon loves football. He loves the process. He loves the actual process of working, training, and getting better. He loves studying film. He’s a player that’s just going to continue to get better, and better, and better year, over year, over year.”
