Russell Wilson or Sam Darnold, Choose
If a team says it's accepting trade offers on a player, then said player is gone unless there really is no option for replacing him.
The New York Jets have a real opportunity to replace Sam Darnold with a clear upgrade in Zach Wilson, a player some draft analysts actually suggest is better than Trevor Lawrence. In that case, maybe Jacksonville should draft Wilson and the Jets draft Lawrence.
So, the Jets are said by ESPN's Jeremy Fowler to be "intrigued" by Wilson, and have indicated they'll listen to offers for Darnold.
The Chicago Bears in the past have been linked to interest in Darnold.
The problem is, right now the Bears seem to have interest in lots of different quarterbacks: Russell Wilson, Deshaun Watson, Alex Smith and/or maybe a few others. Ryan Pace on Tuesday said they would need to be able to rapidly "pivot" as they pursue a QB and free agency.
It looks like they're pivoting like an NBA low post at the moment. Darnold would at least end this pivoting.
It's entirely possible Darnold is going to improve greatly with different coaching. He could improve if coached by Matt Nagy and staff as opposed to being coached by offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains and the Jets staff he's been with for the past few years.
As much as Bears fans seem to want to bash Nagy, he's been fairly successful at upgrading Trubisky like he was with Alex Smith in Kansas City. It's just, there are limits to coaching and it seems Trubisky's ceiling was so much lower than GM Ryan Pace thought.
Trubisky under Nagy has been 12.3 points higher in passer rating (89.8 to 77.5), more accurate overall (65.3% completions to 59.4% completions), thrown a higher percentage of touchdown passes (4.6% TDs to 2.1%) and had a much better ratio of touchdown throws to interceptions (1.9 under Nagy, 1.0 in 2017). He didn't improve significantly in yards per pass attempted, going from 6.6 as a rookie to 6.7 with Nagy.
Saying Nagy would pull Darnold all the way up to higher NFL levels based on this is assuming too much, although some improvement would seem likely.
Also, Darnold would be coming to a team with a superior defense to what he had with the Jets. Playing from ahead or without facing huge deficits can improve a passer's numbers, as well.
There are benefits and drawbacks to this opportunity, if it actually is one.
1. The Bears would be giving up on the chance to get Russell Wilson
That's drawback No. 1. You're not pursuing both quarterbacks.
The Bears at some point have to become realistic and decide whether the idea that Seattle would actually want to trade Wilson even really exists.
No matter what noise Wilson is making, if Seattle has no desire to trade him then he isn't getting traded because no one takes cap hits of $39 million on a lark. The only thing it seems they've done, according to an ESPN report, hear calls being made without responding.
What the Bears could do with the Darnold situation is apply pressure to the Seahawks to respond or at least admit it's possible they'd be interested. They could simply say they're looking at acquiring another quarterback and need to know now what Seattle wants in exchange for Wilson, if anything.
2. The Bears most likely would be giving up on a first-round QB
Unless a miracle happened and Zach Wilson, Trey Lance, Mac Jones or Justin Fields dropped into their laps, a trade for Sam Darnold would have to mean the Bears look strongly at drafting a first-round tackle to protect their new passer and Nick Foles.
Darnold is young enough that drafting a better quarteback of the future by trading away draft picks isn't necessary. In fact, it would be better to protect any quarterback by upgrading at tackle.
They could take a QB later as a potential project, but it would be wasteful considering Darnold's status in development. It wouldn't be a total waste, though, especially if a top pick fell to them.
It's always possible Darnold is like Mitchell Trubisky and has a ceiling low enough Nagy would be unable to elevate him more than a small amount. So then a rookie who learns in 2021 could become a 2022 starter.
It's just better to think positive and use the early pick to build around Darnold with an upgrade at tackle if you're convinced enough in his ability that you've traded to get him.
3. Allen Robinson would return
Why let him leave? Unless the trade for Darnold would involve Robinson, what's the point of letting him get out of town? The salary cap would no longer be an issue with Darnold, who is on his rookie contract. Robinson's deal could be easily brought in under the cap with a few contract restructures.
And in case the Bears are trading Robinson in the deal for Darnold, New York better be sending back draft picks, too, because Robinson is a sure thing and Darnold's improvement is only someone's vivid imagination at this point.
The Bears would be better off just leaving Robinson out of this trade and acquiring Darnold for draft picks. If Carson Wentz was worth only a second and a third, Darnold couldn't be worth better than a couple mid-round picks. Wentz at least has shown he could be at an MVP level in the right situation. All Darnold has done is run around in circles and throw incompletions or interceptions. He's thrown 45 TDs to 39 interceptions.
In fact, if this is an option, the Bears might be better off signing Jameis Winston with 121 touchdowns to 88 interceptions. Winston has a better arm and more experience, has been coached by decent coaches the last two years and if he elevated his game a bit might be better than Darnold could ever climb.
In both cases, though, there would be no reason to let Robinson leave. Even if it means playing on a tag until 2022 when more cash would be available on a long-term contract with a larger salary cap, the Bears should try to retain Robinson.
4. The Bears could focus on an offense they know works
Darnold is very mobile. He'd allow them to keep running the offense Trubisky ran last year.
Last week Robinson did an interview with Cris Collinsworth in which he detailed all the problems the Bears encountered trying to run two different kinds of offenses with two different kinds of quarterbacks.
If they wind up starting Foles in 2021, they're back to the style of attack which didn't work well and abandoning the style Trubisky ran which seemed to work. Even though they beat weaker teams using it, they did also move the ball better at times against better defenses using the outside zone running scheme and bootleg passing. At least it worked better than the spread with inside zone runs.
Darnold lets them do what works. Starting Foles could lead to bigger problems, unless they have somehow secretly improved how they operated the Kansas City style of West Coast attack since they de-emphasized it.
Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven
