Bears off-season thread 2022

[UMFan83]

look on the bright side, this indicates Poles has good taste in free agents and values them appropriately

 

 

on the other hand this roster is hot garbage and the odds that Fields survives year 2 as a Bear are dangerously close to coming off the board.

 

My fear is they evaluate him based on a garbage roster and then cut bait. But if Fields is a legit great QB I’m thinking he shows enough despite the deficiencies to move forward with building around him.

 

I’m perplexed about some of the stuff this offseason but I’m already seeing articles suggesting that Poles should be fired lol

[jersey cubs fan]

why dont I feel like he's been good to date?

because they haven't acquired any good players.

[David]

look on the bright side, this indicates Poles has good taste in free agents and values them appropriately

 

 

on the other hand this roster is hot garbage and the odds that Fields survives year 2 as a Bear are dangerously close to coming off the board.

 

I'm not sure going after RFA's being your go-to plan for the offensive line is in fact "on the bright side". Poles is good, right? why dont I feel like he's been good to date?

 

I'm willing to wait and be proven wrong, but actively choosing to waste another year of Justin's rookie contract AND creating this situation for him to try to develop in is such bad process that I think there's more than a non-zero chance that Poles is very bad at this.

 

Hopefully Fields is good enough to make it academic (basically what I was hoping would happen with the last regime).

Edited March 28, 2022 by David

[Bertz]

Poles was pretty explicit that he was going to focus on depth and the 2nd and 3rd waves of free agency and I think Bears Twitter thought that just meant the guys who don't sign in the first 45 minutes of the tampering period.

That said, there was some smoke thrown out for a legit name at WR and/or OL, and that certainly didn't happen. Poles punted on adding a star unless he hits huge one one of his lower profile signings like Patrick.

[jersey cubs fan]

Poles was pretty explicit that he was going to focus on depth and the 2nd and 3rd waves of free agency and I think Bears Twitter thought that just meant the guys who don't sign in the first 45 minutes of the tampering period.

That said, there was some smoke thrown out for a legit name at WR and/or OL, and that certainly didn't happen. Poles punted on adding a star unless he hits huge one one of his lower profile signings like Patrick.

The 3rd wave of free agency is done and they have nothing. Being explicit about not trying to acquire any players for your completely alone on an island 2nd year QB does not make it a good plan.

[Bertz]

Poles was pretty explicit that he was going to focus on depth and the 2nd and 3rd waves of free agency and I think Bears Twitter thought that just meant the guys who don't sign in the first 45 minutes of the tampering period.

That said, there was some smoke thrown out for a legit name at WR and/or OL, and that certainly didn't happen. Poles punted on adding a star unless he hits huge one one of his lower profile signings like Patrick.

The 3rd wave of free agency is done and they have nothing. Being explicit about not trying to acquire any players for your completely alone on an island 2nd year QB does not make it a good plan.

 

You're kind of proving my point. How is it done already? Literally a third of NFL.com's top 100 free agents are still unsigned. We also haven't gotten a bunch of June 1st cuts as well as training camp cuts, both every year shake out additional starting caliber players.

[raw]

I think Poles definitely thought the market would pan out a certain way and it very clearly didn't, especially at WR. I think he thought Christian Kirk or MVS would be 6-8Mil/year type guys. I think he thought he'd be able to add solid OL help for value prices. That's the naivety of a new GM, I guess. All that is fine.

 

I think the whole 1st, 2nd, 3rd wave stuff is truly where Poles intended to focus his time. But those values not matching what he thought players were worth threw him off, as his 2nd/3rd wave guys were going in the 1st wave that he wasn't willing to get into. That being said, he did get into the first wave for a DT that he was going to pay $13M/year for. My biggest issue with everything is that he wasn't willing to go in that first wave for offensive line help, to actually help his young QB.

 

Seems like way too much focus is on guys who will stand up for their QB after taking a hard hit, instead of focusing on not getting his QB hit in the first place. He told us this line wasn't good enough, then didn't even try to re-sign the best player from that line last year. The 2nd best player on the OL was 40, so he's clearly not coming back. So, now you've added 1 replacement. Granted, it was the weakest piece on the OL, but the replacement isn't exactly a sure thing either.

 

I'm fine with the approach. Not overpaying tier 1 guys is fine. Not going after 30+ year old players is fine. Short term deals on players with upside is fine. But there's nothing about the roster as of March 28, 2022 that is fine. It's terrible and it's not even terrible in a rebuilding way. It's not like the Jets or even Lions roster. It's a roster with no direction for a 22-year old franchise QB.

[UMFan83]

Interesting thread about the parallels to the 2018 Bills who had a new GM take over with a somewhat similar situation. Doesn’t mean that the Bears will end up like the Bills but it gives me a little perspective at least

[jumbo]

Interesting thread about the parallels to the 2018 Bills who had a new GM take over with a somewhat similar situation. Doesn’t mean that the Bears will end up like the Bills but it gives me a little perspective at least

 

Did you mean to link something?

[UMFan83]

Interesting thread about the parallels to the 2018 Bills who had a new GM take over with a somewhat similar situation. Doesn’t mean that the Bears will end up like the Bills but it gives me a little perspective at least

 

Did you mean to link something?

 

Definitely did mean to lol

 

[jumbo]

I think Poles definitely thought the market would pan out a certain way and it very clearly didn't, especially at WR. I think he thought Christian Kirk or MVS would be 6-8Mil/year type guys. I think he thought he'd be able to add solid OL help for value prices. That's the naivety of a new GM, I guess. All that is fine.

 

I think the whole 1st, 2nd, 3rd wave stuff is truly where Poles intended to focus his time. But those values not matching what he thought players were worth threw him off, as his 2nd/3rd wave guys were going in the 1st wave that he wasn't willing to get into. That being said, he did get into the first wave for a DT that he was going to pay $13M/year for. My biggest issue with everything is that he wasn't willing to go in that first wave for offensive line help, to actually help his young QB.

 

Seems like way too much focus is on guys who will stand up for their QB after taking a hard hit, instead of focusing on not getting his QB hit in the first place. He told us this line wasn't good enough, then didn't even try to re-sign the best player from that line last year. The 2nd best player on the OL was 40, so he's clearly not coming back. So, now you've added 1 replacement. Granted, it was the weakest piece on the OL, but the replacement isn't exactly a sure thing either.

 

I'm fine with the approach. Not overpaying tier 1 guys is fine. Not going after 30+ year old players is fine. Short term deals on players with upside is fine. But there's nothing about the roster as of March 28, 2022 that is fine. It's terrible and it's not even terrible in a rebuilding way. It's not like the Jets or even Lions roster. It's a roster with no direction for a 22-year old franchise QB.

 

I'm a little disappointed with losing Armstead to the Dolphins. I didn't want him going into FA, but given that we've added very little (along with WF22's notes on being too low on salary going into next year) I would have done the deal for $15M/year. I thought it was pretty reasonable given that top tier LT is getting $22-23M. Had that signing been made you could put Jenkins and Borom as RT by committee, as neither have played a full season yet, or let them compete for RG, too, and pick up a vet swing tackle.

 

I think Pringle can be a pretty decent low-end to average #2, Mooney being a high end 2 as well and both could get tons of targets. ESB doesn't do much for me, nor does Newsome, yet, but those guys are penciled in as your WR4, 5 or hopefully 5, 6 by the time the roster is set.

[raw]

Interesting thread about the parallels to the 2018 Bills who had a new GM take over with a somewhat similar situation. Doesn’t mean that the Bears will end up like the Bills but it gives me a little perspective at least

 

Did you mean to link something?

 

Definitely did mean to lol

 

 

The big difference is that the Bills were able to draft Allen in that first year, whereas Justin already is a year in. The perspective will change if he puts up 2018 Josh Allen numbers in Year 2, as opposed to Year 1. Very unique situation where a team inherits a 2nd year QB from a GM that just traded a future pick to move up to get him. Teams don't usually allow lame duck GMs to mortgage the future for a QB.

[jersey cubs fan]

Interesting thread about the parallels to the 2018 Bills who had a new GM take over with a somewhat similar situation. Doesn’t mean that the Bears will end up like the Bills but it gives me a little perspective at least

 

Did you mean to link something?

 

Definitely did mean to lol

 

 

I don't understanding how this is supposed to be helpful to Bears fans. Beane was brought in to a team that was effectively run by the head coach who was hired months before him, coming on board after the draft. They played and were above .500 the first year with a team put together before Beane got involved. They then drafted their quarterback of the future the following season and had the luxury of not really needing to see anything about of him in year 1.

 

Poles took over this team from day 1 this offseason with the QB already in place. And contrary to that thread, they don't have 4 years to make a couple runs without having to pay Fields. They have to decide on the 5th year option after year 3, and the longer you wait to sign them to a real extension, the more prohibitively expensive it will be. You can't put Fields in a position to get destroyed with no weapons (people keep giving examples of QBs who succeeded with poor offensive lines, but those examples all had pro bowl caliber skill players and many all pros) while expecting him to take the huge year 2 leap (Eberflus's words). They don't have the luxury of blowing off Fields in 2022. And as others have pointed out, if all you do is save your cap space for a rainy day you will get caught overspending once that day comes. The fact that the Bills managed to draft and develop what may be the best QB in the league says nothing about the Bears ability to take advantage of Fields' abilities.

[UMFan83]

Hey I was just trying to give Bears fans some hope. We're a miserable lot.

[minnesotacubsfan]

remember how we hired that KC coach and it turns out he was a flake? Then we hired that KC admin for GM and it looks like he could also be a flake?

 

cause/causation/whatever, I never want to hire anyone from KC again

[jersey cubs fan]

remember how we hired that KC coach and it turns out he was a flake? Then we hired that KC admin for GM and it looks like he could also be a flake?

 

cause/causation/whatever, I never want to hire anyone from KC again

 

I'm not that down on the guy. I think they are being reckless with how they are treating their quarterback, but they've got a long way to go before assuming this guy is as bad as Nagy was. If Fields wasn't on the team, I'd be completely fine with what they have/haven't done. If this was completely about repositioning for 2024 then fine. But it's not.

[David]

remember how we hired that KC coach and it turns out he was a flake? Then we hired that KC admin for GM and it looks like he could also be a flake?

 

cause/causation/whatever, I never want to hire anyone from KC again

 

phil emery worked in KC before the bears hired him as GM too

[raw]

Looking thru some of the recently drafted QBs, the closest situation to what Fields will be in this year, may be Mariota in Tennessee.

 

Drafted in 2015

New GM in 2016 inherited him

New coach (kinda) as Mularkey was the interim during Mariota's rookie year

 

Mariota also had some bad weapons. Rishard Matthews, Tajae Sharpe as his top WRs. Kendall Wright, who somehow always finds his way in a bad WR room, was there as well. Delanie Walker was then a pretty good TE. They did have Andre Johnson, but he was 35 and a shadow of his former self. They had 2 very good RBs with DeMarco Murray and Derrick Henry. Had a really young OL with Taylor Lewan , Quinton Spain, Ben Jones, Josh Kline, and rookie Jack Conklin all 27 or under.

 

As a comparison...

 

Mooney > any WR on TEN

Matthews = Pringle (young WR, breakout-ish year with his previous team, cheap FA signing)

Sharpe was a 5th round rookie that year, have to assume the Bears will draft a WR early so Advantage: Bears

Wright was a 1st round bust, but did have a big 2nd year in TEN > Dazz

No real equivalent to Johnson, hope it stays that way. But probably > St. Brown even at 35

Walker > Kmet, but not a huge difference

Murray/Henry = Montgomery/Herbert. Just because RBs don't matter and Henry wasn't used much just yet.

Conklin > Jenkins. Conklin was a top 10 pick. Slightly more talented than Jenkins a projected top 25 or so pick last year

Lewan > Borom. Big difference in talent here

Spain, Jones, Kline probably not much better than Whitehair, Patrick and whoever the RG will be. Jones is a solid C. Those other 2 are journeymen at best.

 

Mariota did have his best season that year. 26-9 TD:INT ratio, 3400 passing yards, 61% completions, 95.6 QB rating. Given the circumstances, I'd take that neighborhood of that performance from Fields. Obviously, things didn't continue upward for Mariota so hopefully this year is where the comparison would end.

[champaignchris]

Is there any chance - despite their public remarks to the contrary - that the new Bears brass aren't sold on* Fields and are positioning themselves to get their chosen QB of the future in the 2023 draft?

 

Because if that were the case, they'd be behaving exactly as they have thus far.

 

* And by "aren't sold on" Fields, I mean don't believe that he's good enough to be able to take advantage of the best team they'd be able to surround him with over the course of his rookie contract.

[raw]

Is there any chance - despite their public remarks to the contrary - that the new Bears brass aren't sold on* Fields and are positioning themselves to get their chosen QB of the future in the 2023 draft?

 

Because if that were the case, they'd be behaving exactly as they have thus far.

 

* And by "aren't sold on" Fields, I mean don't believe that he's good enough to be able to take advantage of the best team they'd be able to surround him with over the course of his rookie contract.

 

I suppose it's possible. Nagy said all the right things about Trubisky to get the job but then turned into a complete douche toward him. Would really make me question everything about Poles and Eberflus as talent evaluators.

[WrigleyField 22]

 

Did you mean to link something?

 

Definitely did mean to lol

 

 

I don't understanding how this is supposed to be helpful to Bears fans. Beane was brought in to a team that was effectively run by the head coach who was hired months before him, coming on board after the draft. They played and were above .500 the first year with a team put together before Beane got involved. They then drafted their quarterback of the future the following season and had the luxury of not really needing to see anything about of him in year 1.

 

Poles took over this team from day 1 this offseason with the QB already in place. And contrary to that thread, they don't have 4 years to make a couple runs without having to pay Fields. They have to decide on the 5th year option after year 3, and the longer you wait to sign them to a real extension, the more prohibitively expensive it will be. You can't put Fields in a position to get destroyed with no weapons (people keep giving examples of QBs who succeeded with poor offensive lines, but those examples all had pro bowl caliber skill players and many all pros) while expecting him to take the huge year 2 leap (Eberflus's words). They don't have the luxury of blowing off Fields in 2022. And as others have pointed out, if all you do is save your cap space for a rainy day you will get caught overspending once that day comes. The fact that the Bills managed to draft and develop what may be the best QB in the league says nothing about the Bears ability to take advantage of Fields' abilities.

Yea Bills are not a great model based on prerequisites.

 

Im trying to think of teams who had major regime change (coach and FO) in year 2 of a QB. I'm not sure there's any template to follow. But using other teams 2nd year under a QB, they were all that I have seen far more agressive. Just was the same GM executing strategy. Poles seems destined to make it his 2nd year and Fields 3rd.

 

Which I guess we'll see how it goes, but I don't get it and every support I've seen it makes a weak correlative effect as an assumed causal one.

[raw]

Yea Bills are not a great model based on prerequisites.

 

Im trying to think of teams who had major regime change (coach and FO) in year 2 of a QB. I'm not sure there's any template to follow.

 

Do you have me blocked?

[jersey cubs fan]

Is there any chance - despite their public remarks to the contrary - that the new Bears brass aren't sold on* Fields and are positioning themselves to get their chosen QB of the future in the 2023 draft?

 

Because if that were the case, they'd be behaving exactly as they have thus far.

 

* And by "aren't sold on" Fields, I mean don't believe that he's good enough to be able to take advantage of the best team they'd be able to surround him with over the course of his rookie contract.

 

I suppose it's possible. Nagy said all the right things about Trubisky to get the job but then turned into a complete douche toward him. Would really make me question everything about Poles and Eberflus as talent evaluators.

Trying to picture how this would play out.

 

2022 disaster season, everybody raises questions about Fields and team positions themselves to draft a QB in 2023. This is a very unproven coaching staff though, and a bad start to 2023 is going to put a lot of them on shaky ground. Maybe Eberflus survives, but Getsy would quickly be on the hot seat. They are going to have a tough time recruiting quality OCs to replace him, so they pretty much have to hit on that 2023 QB from the outset, and odds are they won't be able to. Purposefully taking a dive with Fields is just a disaster waiting to happen for all these guys. Nagy took the job with a thin resume, and he wasn't exactly in heavy demand. Poles was supposedly a hot commodity. I can't imagine a situation where you take the job where you have a QB perceived by ownership and the fan base as a stud, and would then feel confident destroying any chance of him succeeding all so you can take a guy in a couple years. A 3-13 debut followed up by another sub .500 record with the next QB, after giving away Fields for pennies on the dollar is going to cause an uproar.

 

However confident you are in the leash ownership has given you, you have to know that Emery/Trestman went down in a ball of fire after just 2 years, and only one of them was sub .500. Pace was given time to rebuild from that mess, but Nagy was fired after his first sub .500 season. The Bears are desperate for longterm stability, but they do not hesitate from cutting bait if things are bad.

 

They've be much better off doing the best they can with Fields, getting the most out of him, and then if that fails, you try again with your guy in 2025.

[WrigleyField 22]

Yea Bills are not a great model based on prerequisites.

 

Im trying to think of teams who had major regime change (coach and FO) in year 2 of a QB. I'm not sure there's any template to follow.

 

Do you have me blocked?

Haha never. Just didn't read ahead.

 

Looks like they didn't do much in that first year either. I guess it's just destined to be a first year GM thing. Ultimate conservative league.

 

https://www.profootballrumors.com/2016/08/offseason-review-tennessee-titans-2016

[jumbo]

I read somewhere that ODonnell and Grant signings were not enough to qualify them as Compensatory Free Agents to offset Bears UFA signings. Does anyone know what teh threshold is? Dalton signed for $3MM and apparently that qualifies. Grant maybe not because he was traded mid season. ODonnell wasn't enough money to qualify according to what I read.

 

I don't think we have much chance of picking up any comp picks with how many roster spots still open, but more curious than anything