At the beginning of his first free agency as Chicago Bears general manager, Ryan Poles sat in the back of a car and had a conversation that he said “tore me to pieces.”

The Bears had agreed to a three-year, $40.5 million deal with defensive tackle Larry Ogunjobi, but a physical revealed an unexpected issue with the right foot Ogunjobi had surgically repaired in January.

Speaking Monday at the NFL’s annual meeting at The Breakers Palm Beach, Poles said he wouldn’t go into detail about the issue.

“But it wasn’t what it should have been,” he said in his first comments about the situation.

From a business perspective, Poles said the decision was very clear. He needed to tell Ogunjobi while they were in the car together why he wouldn’t be signing him to his first multiyear free-agent deal.

It surely was frustrating news for Ogunjobi, who had suffered the injury in a Cincinnati Bengals playoff game. But it also was a challenging start for the new GM.

“I’m going to listen to our doctors,” Poles said. “I’m going to look at the evidence and go with what I think is right for the organization. The toughest thing I’ve had to go through — it was emotionally draining — was to deny someone an opportunity when you have this verbal agreement that that’s what’s going to happen. … That was hard. Really hard. Because I was excited about him.”

The decision forced Poles and coach Matt Eberflus to regroup quickly.

The Bears agreed to the deal March 14, the first day of the free-agent negotiating period. Ogunjobi didn’t fail his physical until March 17.

During that span, Poles said the Bears likely lost out on negotiating with potential replacements, and he wonders if everyone would have been helped if they had the medical information sooner.

“I’ve had a lot of conversations and I almost feel like the process is flawed a little bit where I wish we could have some of these images and some of the physical done before (the agreement),” Poles said. “That’s going to be some type of rule change. I don’t know the process in getting that done. It’s probably something at a meeting like this in the future. But I think a lot of people were hurt just with the whole timing of it.”

The Bears pivoted to Los Angeles Chargers three-technique defensive tackle Justin Jones, a cheaper — but less effective — option.

Jones, who said Eberflus called him the night of March 17 and swayed him to pick the Bears instead of the Indianapolis Colts, has 4½ sacks over four seasons. Ogunjobi has 21½ sacks over five seasons.

Poles knew Jones from the Kansas City Chiefs’ AFC West meetings with the Chargers. He called Jones tough and physical and said Jones “has an element of being destructive in both the run and the pass game.”

The Bears signed Jones to a two-year deal worth $12 million.

“You just have to adjust and adapt, and you always have alternatives,” Poles said. “Just like the draft, there’s a board, there are tags that are just stacked with different values, and you go to the next one. Or maybe you look across and you go to a different position.

“You just constantly have to stay on your toes, and we’re ready for that. It was a little bit of a shock, but we just adjusted and we went to the next player.”

It’s not the only adjusting Poles will have to do this offseason, as he learned Monday afternoon.

In the middle of his media session with Chicago reporters, Poles learned the Buffalo Bills had matched the Bears’ offer sheet for offensive lineman Ryan Bates. Poles said the news “stinks.”

“We’re going to keep at it,” Poles said. “We’ve been in conversations with other people that are still out there too. There’s always work to be done, especially up front, so we’ll keep at it.”

As for Ogunjobi, Poles didn’t close the door on bringing the defensive tackle in on a deal — perhaps a lesser one — down the road.

“We haven’t crossed that bridge yet,” he said. “But it’s a conversation I would like to have.”

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