The Bears trade down to 9! Roster turnover/Offseason Thread

[Tryptamine]

I wouldn't mind N'keal Harry back as a WR5 if he's willing to take a near league minimum.

[WrigleyField 22]

Can upgrade Scales? Hes our only player to get an All Pro vote!

[rawaction]

I wouldn't mind N'keal Harry back as a WR5 if he's willing to take a near league minimum.

I really like Harry, but there's a reason I don't want him back.

The Bears are already bringing back Mooney, Claypool, Velus Jones and St. Brown. Harry would be the 5th WR on a roster that usually carries 6. I know they carried 7 a lot of this year, and they could cut Jones, St. Brown and/or Harry for minimal dead cap, but I'd hate for them to get rid of Jones so quickly after flashes in the 2nd half, and obviously cheap rookie deal and great speed. St. Brown they obviously value by locking him up before the season ended. So, that limits the number of spots you have to truly upgrade the WR position.

I just don't see much of a path to improvement if you bring back 5 of the 7 players on a bottom 5 WR depth chart in the league.

[Old Style]

I wouldn't mind N'keal Harry back as a WR5 if he's willing to take a near league minimum.

I really like Harry, but there's a reason I don't want him back.

The Bears are already bringing back Mooney, Claypool, Velus Jones and St. Brown. Harry would be the 5th WR on a roster that usually carries 6. I know they carried 7 a lot of this year, and they could cut Jones, St. Brown and/or Harry for minimal dead cap, but I'd hate for them to get rid of Jones so quickly after flashes in the 2nd half, and obviously cheap rookie deal and great speed. St. Brown they obviously value by locking him up before the season ended. So, that limits the number of spots you have to truly upgrade the WR position.

I just don't see much of a path to improvement if you bring back 5 of the 7 players on a bottom 5 WR depth chart in the league.

The FA market is soft on WR's this year, right? If so bring back Harry and draft one. Spend more picks/cap money on protecting Fields up front and let's see what he can do with this group. Then maybe we can make a bigger splash at WR next offseason. Just spitballing here off the top of my head.

[rawaction]

I wouldn't mind N'keal Harry back as a WR5 if he's willing to take a near league minimum.

I really like Harry, but there's a reason I don't want him back.

The Bears are already bringing back Mooney, Claypool, Velus Jones and St. Brown. Harry would be the 5th WR on a roster that usually carries 6. I know they carried 7 a lot of this year, and they could cut Jones, St. Brown and/or Harry for minimal dead cap, but I'd hate for them to get rid of Jones so quickly after flashes in the 2nd half, and obviously cheap rookie deal and great speed. St. Brown they obviously value by locking him up before the season ended. So, that limits the number of spots you have to truly upgrade the WR position.

I just don't see much of a path to improvement if you bring back 5 of the 7 players on a bottom 5 WR depth chart in the league.

The FA market is soft on WR's this year, right? If so bring back Harry and draft one. Spend more picks/cap money on protecting Fields up front and let's see what he can do with this group. Then maybe we can make a bigger splash at WR next offseason. Just spitballing here off the top of my head.

That's a good point. The FA class is really bad. I'd personally rather see if any of those FAs take a 1-year deal than to give Harry a spot. Though, doing both is feasible. Basically, I'm thinking a guy better than Pringle, since they have money this year, but it may not be anyone to spend on, especially for 1 year. Not really interested in a multi-year deal on a WR with potentially Mooney and Claypool to be signed.

[Derwood]

https://twitter.com/IrishBearsShow/status/1617855390410244099?t=nw4-Ek4B4r8DI5UJPZc2cA&s=19

Want back at multi year (price contingent)
- David Montgomery
- DeAndre Houston Carson

Want Back at one year near-min/tender
- Darrynton Evans
- Josh Blackwell
- Patrick Scales
- Blasingame

Indifferent (one year unguaranteed deal only)
- Breon Borders
- Dieter Eiselen
- Andrew Brown
- Morrow
- Blackson
- Lee
- Pennel
- Harry
- Cruikshank
- Adams
- Armon Watts
- Trevon Wesco
- Joe Thomas

Can leave:
- Pettis
- Pringle
- Reiff
- Dozier
- Griffin

Fire into sun:
- Sam Mustipher
- Peterman
- Boyle
- Schofield

I don't know who 90% of those dudes are

[UMFan83]

https://twitter.com/IrishBearsShow/status/1617855390410244099?t=nw4-Ek4B4r8DI5UJPZc2cA&s=19

Want back at multi year (price contingent)
- David Montgomery
- DeAndre Houston Carson

Want Back at one year near-min/tender
- Darrynton Evans
- Josh Blackwell
- Patrick Scales
- Blasingame

Indifferent (one year unguaranteed deal only)
- Breon Borders
- Dieter Eiselen
- Andrew Brown
- Morrow
- Blackson
- Lee
- Pennel
- Harry
- Cruikshank
- Adams
- Armon Watts
- Trevon Wesco
- Joe Thomas

Can leave:
- Pettis
- Pringle
- Reiff
- Dozier
- Griffin

Fire into sun:
- Sam Mustipher
- Peterman
- Boyle
- Schofield

I don't know who 90% of those dudes are

he had to have slipped 2-3 fake names in there

[Splendid Splinter]

https://twitter.com/IrishBearsShow/status/1617855390410244099?t=nw4-Ek4B4r8DI5UJPZc2cA&s=19

Want back at multi year (price contingent)
- David Montgomery
- DeAndre Houston Carson

Want Back at one year near-min/tender
- Darrynton Evans
- Josh Blackwell
- Patrick Scales
- Blasingame

Indifferent (one year unguaranteed deal only)
- Breon Borders
- Dieter Eiselen
- Andrew Brown
- Morrow
- Blackson
- Lee
- Pennel
- Harry
- Cruikshank
- Adams
- Armon Watts
- Trevon Wesco
- Joe Thomas

Can leave:
- Pettis
- Pringle
- Reiff
- Dozier
- Griffin

Fire into sun:
- Sam Mustipher
- Peterman
- Boyle
- Schofield

I don't know who 90% of those dudes are

he had to have slipped 2-3 fake names in there

[minnesotacubsfan]

That, there ladies and gents could be the #1 tank roster of all time

[minnesotacubsfan]

I wouldn't mind N'keal Harry back as a WR5 if he's willing to take a near league minimum.

I really like Harry, but there's a reason I don't want him back.

The Bears are already bringing back Mooney, Claypool, Velus Jones and St. Brown. Harry would be the 5th WR on a roster that usually carries 6. I know they carried 7 a lot of this year, and they could cut Jones, St. Brown and/or Harry for minimal dead cap, but I'd hate for them to get rid of Jones so quickly after flashes in the 2nd half, and obviously cheap rookie deal and great speed. St. Brown they obviously value by locking him up before the season ended. So, that limits the number of spots you have to truly upgrade the WR position.

I just don't see much of a path to improvement if you bring back 5 of the 7 players on a bottom 5 WR depth chart in the league.

The FA market is soft on WR's this year, right? If so bring back Harry and draft one. Spend more picks/cap money on protecting Fields up front and let's see what he can do with this group. Then maybe we can make a bigger splash at WR next offseason. Just spitballing here off the top of my head.

Sure. And if you p/up Pittman or whoever in a trade, it helps your cause overall.

[UMFan83]

This is completely random but was talking to my friend whose not a Bears fan and somehow we started talking about the 2011 Bears. I knew all this information already, but somehow going back through it really reminded me of how snake bitten the Bears were during that era

2010 season ends in the NFC championship game against our archrivals when our starting QB tears his MCL in the first half leaving a 3rd string QB to play the second half. Rodgers played like horsefeathers and the Packers offense only scored 14 points in the game, thus we probably win with any sort of competent offense.

But that's 2010, just mentioning this to set the stage for 2011.... after a slow 2-3 start, the Bears reel off 5 wins in a row to go to 7-3 and firmly in the playoff picture. I remember the discussion at the time being that the Bears should be considered legit contenders in the NFC. But all this horsefeathering horsefeathers all happened to torpedo the season:

-Cutler breaks his thumb making a tackle on an INT that wasn't his fault in the final minutes of a game that the Bears were winning by 11 points. Completely unnecessary INT, completely unnecessary attempted tackle, completely fluke injury. But he's only expected to miss 6 weeks meaning he can come back for the playoffs if the Bears make it.

-Ultimately 3-3 in our final 6 games would have gotten us into the playoffs as we had already won the tiebreaker over the eventual 10-6 6 seed Falcons. This is the schedule we had remaining:

@ Raiders (7-8 without the result of the Bears game) - Hanie played bad but the Bears were driving for the winning score late. Hanie completes a pass and rushes to the line to spike it. Inexplicably he takes a step back before actually spiking the ball, making the play intentional grounding and necessitating a 10 second run off which ends the game

vs Chiefs (6-9) - The Bears lose 10-3 as the offense does absolutely nothing and the only offensive TD of the game, the difference in the game, was a hail mary at the end of the first half by Tyler Palko.

@Broncos (7-8) - The Bears were up 10-0 with just over 2 minutes left in the game. The Broncos score a TD from Tebow to Demariyus Thomas with 2:08 left. The onside kick was unsuccessful, so the Bears had the ball at midfield with 2:05 left and the Broncos had 0 timeouts. Assuming the first play lasts until the 2 minute warning, the Bears can get the time down to about 25 seconds left if they punt back to the Broncos. And since they're at midfield a punt probably really pins the Broncos back. Of course anyone reading a Bears thread on the 15th most popular Cubs website out there knows what happened. Barber runs out of bounds, the Broncos get it back with 1:06 left instead of 25 seconds, Prater kicks a difficult 59 yard FG, the Bears get the ball back in OT and drive all the way to the Broncos 38. Barber gets the ball and looks to be putting the Bears in reasonable FG range and a first down when he inexplicably fumbles the ball away. Tebow leads the Broncos down the field and Prater kicks another 50+ yard FG to win it. Just a dumbfounding loss if I've ever seen one

Seahawks (6-9) - Don't remember anything about this game but it looks like we got trounced

@Packers (14-1) - A loss eliminates the Bears

@Vikings (3-12) - Yay we finally win one.

Really easy horsefeathering schedule that you'd think even with Hanie starting you could go 3-3 in. And they easily could have gone 3-3 even though Hanie played like garbage! It was right there. A couple ridiculous plays away from a 10-6 Bears team with a healthy Cutler being the team no one wants to face in the playoffs.

Then to finish the trilogy, the Bears start next year 7-1, falter down the stretch but still finish 10-6 and are unfortunate enough to be one of the rare 10-6 teams that misses the playoffs because the Packers rolled over against the Vikings on SNF (before of course beating them the next week). Despite leading the team to 11-5 and the NFC championship game, then 7-3 before the starting QB got hurt, then 10-6 Lovie is canned and we hire a CFL coach to replace him.

OK I'm done venting

[rawaction]

I don't remember those Raiders and Chiefs game AT ALL. I remember the Broncos game vividly. And that was the point I gave up all hope for making the playoffs. The Seattle was memorable, even though I didn't see it at all due to a dance recital for my daughter. The game featured a 14-7 Bears lead at halftime and multiple 2nd half pick 6's of Caleb Hanie. Oh and most famously, that was the game Johnny Knox's career ended with the gruesome spine injury.

[WrigleyField 22]

Yea that run was just such a wasted opportunity.

That 2012 offense being wasted on a Mike Tice offense is probably the biggest missed opportunity. By 2013 with Trestman the offense exploded but the Ds run was over (certainly accelerated by firing Lovie and then trying to make Tucker still run his D lol)

[BigSlick]

Yeah that run of years was super weird and annoying because there was a ton of annoying Cutler Discourse to also get through.

Poor Lovie though, still the best coach of my lifetime (well I guess technically I was around for Ditka but I was a wee baby) and really just got some bad luck down the stretch. And we had to suffer through....like 4 terrible coaches after him? Hopefully we got it right with Eberflus now, the early signs are encouraging.

[jumbo]

This was the JaMarcus Webb OL if I remember right? Cutler got hammered year after year and never got the protection he needed.
Cutler's dumb and a meathead but I was a huge fan of his. He got such a bad rap in the national media

[CubinNY]

....like 4 terrible coaches after him? Hopefully we got it right with Eberflus now, the early signs are encouraging.

?

[WrigleyField 22]

This was the JaMarcus Webb OL if I remember right? Cutler got hammered year after year and never got the protection he needed.
Cutler's dumb and a meathead but I was a huge fan of his. He got such a bad rap in the national media

Yea that OL was still bad that year, but it had Marshall at WR. Rookie Alshon and Forte was a good back.

Granted Jeffery and Marshall weren't typical Martz WR, but Tice certainly wasn't the answer at OC.

[David]

Yea that run was just such a wasted opportunity.

That 2012 offense being wasted on a Mike Tice offense is probably the biggest missed opportunity. By 2013 with Trestman the offense exploded but the Ds run was over (certainly accelerated by firing Lovie and then trying to make Tucker still run his D lol)

Yeah, the 2011 team was rolling when Cutler got hurt and I wanted Martz to stick around, despite the warts.

[David]

....like 4 terrible coaches after him? Hopefully we got it right with Eberflus now, the early signs are encouraging.

?

The jury is still out for me, personally, partly because I wanted an offensive head coach and partly because I have to grade him on a curve with a roster that was intentionally loaded with 2nd and 3rd stringers as starters and practice squad players as backups. That said, they did seem well-coached for as much as a team with this little talent could. They stayed in games they had no business being in (thanks to Justin, too), and they didn't *seem* to catch a lot of dumb penalties. The effort appeared to be there.

There's also this. I'm not sure how legit this is, but there are some good teams/coaches around him on this list.



Sidenote - The second half vs first half thing is interesting and almost adds some credence to the narrative that they didn't go out of their way to "risk" winning games later in the year. Or it's just happenstance small sample stuff (as is everything with football stats) and a bad team. But a pretty stark difference, either way.

At worst, it wasn't a coaching clown show like Nagy, Fox, or Trestman. We'll see what it actually looks like when there's $110+M (or whatever the number is) and a #1 pick draft worth of talent added (and, yes, some of that cap space will go toward extensions).

[UMFan83]

This was the JaMarcus Webb OL if I remember right? Cutler got hammered year after year and never got the protection he needed.
Cutler's dumb and a meathead but I was a huge fan of his. He got such a bad rap in the national media

Yeah I was a fan of his most of the time...he was doing the Waddle and Silvy appearances and was wildly entertaining, a side of him that he didn't otherwise show to the public (but we'd see later with his reality tv appearances and unfortunately his podcast). There were also stories out there about him doing a lot of charity behind the scenes, particularly for juvenile diabetes, but he went out of his way to try to keep it out of the media. On the field his inconsistency always made me believe that he wasn't given the right tools around him to succeed, and in some ways that is definitely true, but after several years you are who you are for better or worse. Unfortunately it turned out he was a right wing trumpist douche so horsefeathers him

[gflore34]

Saw a piece written in a negative Bears light about soon to be FA's being tagged by their prospective franchises. Payne is most likely one of those players who'll be tagged, no matter what that dumbass wrote, Payne wasn't the end all be all for the Bears. Given the Bears needs it still should not be too difficult to improve their pass rush via free agency. Not all of the young players are going to be tagged and any one of them will be vast improvement over what the Bears had last season. I'd like to see if Poles and company will be able to identify free agents who are about to bust out and become high impact players.

[WrigleyField 22]

Saw a piece written in a negative Bears light about soon to be FA's being tagged by their prospective franchises. Payne is most likely one of those players who'll be tagged, no matter what that dumbass wrote, Payne wasn't the end all be all for the Bears. Given the Bears needs it still should not be too difficult to improve their pass rush via free agency. Not all of the young players are going to be tagged and any one of them will be vast improvement over what the Bears had last season. I'd like to see if Poles and company will be able to identify free agents who are about to bust out and become high impact players.

Yea the bar is so low that Poles can just take a brunt force approach and end up with a much improved line. People will inevitably freak out about overpaying or whatever but money is the FA game and they have to spend money and there just isn't that much to spend it on internally.

[rawaction]

Saw a piece written in a negative Bears light about soon to be FA's being tagged by their prospective franchises. Payne is most likely one of those players who'll be tagged, no matter what that dumbass wrote, Payne wasn't the end all be all for the Bears. Given the Bears needs it still should not be too difficult to improve their pass rush via free agency. Not all of the young players are going to be tagged and any one of them will be vast improvement over what the Bears had last season. I'd like to see if Poles and company will be able to identify free agents who are about to bust out and become high impact players.

Despite the tons of money the Bears have to spend, I still expect them to look for value in free agency. That's not to say they will bargain shop like last year. I explained this somewhere else, but my example is this.

Da'Ron Payne, he's probably going to get 22Mil AAV on the open market. 2nd highest paid DT makes 21AAV, so I'd guess at 25, he gets a touch more. But as long as Aaron Donald is around, he'll be the 2nd highest paid DT and the best case scenario is his play is that of the 2nd best DT in the league. And based on his salary (and others right below him) we know that level of DT play is worth about 20-22Mil per year. Basically, there's 0 chance he provides surplus value over his cost because you're already paying him tops at his position.

A guy like Dre'Mont Jones from Denver, may cost like 15Mil/year, but he could give you top 10-15 DT level play on the field, which may be worth like 16-18Mil, so essentially you could get a surplus in value because there is a chance (no matter how slight) that he outperforms his salary in any given year.

So, I still think Poles will spend a bunch of money (again he has to). But I do think he will be smart about it. He will look for ascending players, who are still young, potentially improving, and have been successful in smaller roles. And honestly, this is how all teams should look at adding in free agency, if they aren't surely one of the top 5 contenders missing singular pieces here and there.

[UMFan83]

Yes please

[minnesotacubsfan]

https://twitter.com/clayharbs82/status/1618363887874887680?s=46&t=z2HesJ_yoDAF5k4EPy4NpQ

Yes please

Holy horsefeathers that's a haul