Bear Digest

How Bears stood free agency on its head with trade for Joe Thuney

Analysis: The trade for Joe Thuney has a profound influence on the Chicago Bears offensive line after they had consistently underperformed for four years and here's how it helps.

Gene Chamberlain

Joe Thuney blocks against the Bears at Soldier Field, his new home after being acquired via trade with Kansas City.
Joe Thuney blocks against the Bears at Soldier Field, his new home after being acquired via trade with Kansas City. / Jamie Sabau-Imagn Images
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The Bears apparently saw what everyone else does about the free agent interior offensive line market.

It's terrible, especially with Trey Smith removed.

It's the best way to explain what they've decided to do by acquiring guard Joe Thuney from the Kansas City Chiefs in a trade for a 2026 fourth-round draft pick after they already had traded for Jonah Jackson.

Now they're not going to lean on a poor market with teams fighting to get table scraps at a high price.

The deal, reported by Ian Rapoport of NFL Network and the Athletic's Dianna Russini, lessens their need for interior offensive linemen when combined, of course, with acquiring Jonah Jackson in a trade on Tuesday.

It doesn't eliminate the need, unless they think they have an answer at center in Jackson. But Jackson has very limited NFL exposure to the center position even though he did play it at a young age.

This is not the Bears acquiring Josh Sitton at the end of his career. It's a healthy player who has been consistently productive and at an affordable price.

Basically, the Bears have gamed the system, outsmarted a bad guard/center market in free agency by striking ahead of time to ensure quality while avoiding bidding wars.

Here are the eight ways the Bears are better with a move to game the free agency system.

1. Dependability

Unlike when they had Teven Jenkins, this is a player who is dependable. He's more like a rock than a player. He has missed two games in his nine-year career, both of them when he had a mid-season ankle injury in 2022.

2. Rapid turnaround

Remember at the combine how Ben Johnson pointed out how Carolina turned around their offensive line in a year?

This is how to turn around an offensive line in a year. Doing it through the draft is possible but it takes years to do it that way. It's the reason the Chiefs signed Thuney as a free agent when he was leaving New England.

Why wait for a player to develop when you can afford a veteran player's contract and he can have an immediate impact.

3. Low compensation

The price is so low for him that you almost look around and wonder if there is something wrong with him, but the Chiefs had to get rid of someone because they decided to keep younger Trey Smith and were almost $20 million over the cap. They were going to need to get rid of someone, and if the Bears had waited to see if Thuney was cut there's no guarantee they could have won a bidding war.  It's not a case of being duped into taking a flawed player but one who the Chiefs were going to need to get rid of if they wanted to retain someone else.

4. Intelligence

Many NFL players feared and didn't want to take the Wonderlic test when it was a staple for players at the combine. That was the test asking 50 odd questions to determine intellect.

Thuney was advised not to answer more than 39 questions on the test because might scare off NFL teams with his intelligence. Sports Illustrated's Matt Verderame reported it was feared if Thuney answered more than 40 questions teams would think he was too much of a brainiac and wouldn't draf him.

The intellect didn't scare off the Patriots and apparently didn't scare off Ryan Poles and Johnson. When he arrived in Chicago, Johnson had said he values intelligence in all players.

5. Draft flexibility

They now have a better ability to look at the best available player in the draft instead of feeling desperate to get offensive line help. It might be an offensive lineman because tackle Braxton Jones is in the last year of his contract, but they could also pick an edge rusher. 

They also could even draft explosive running back Ashton Jeanty if he's still there at No. 10.

6. Contract flexibility

Although Thuney is highly paid with a $26.97 million overall cap figure, the final season of his contract in 2025 as $15.5 million in cash in it so the Bears can easily give him an extension and manipulate the cap cost for next year and in the future. The Chiefs must absorb $10.9 million in prorated bonus by trading Thuney because they traded him. Even though Thuney is a highly paid veteran, his contract terms still leave the Bears over $50 million in available cap space.

7. Excellence

According to Pro Football Focus, Thuney didn't allow a sack and committed one penalty last year. Over the last three years he had only five penalties and three sacks allowed. Pro Football Focus grades in the 70s are considered good and high 70s are excellent. He has had eight straight seasons in the 70s or higher, including 80.0 last year and 81.2 in 2021. Perhaps more importantly from Williams, he has had a pass blocking score of 80 or higher in seven of the last nine years. In the past two years, according to ESPN analytics, he has the best pass block win rate of 97.8 over the past two seasons.

8. Leadership

The Bears finally have someone with multiple Super Bowl rings in the locker room. Even when they had acquired DJ Moore and Keenan Allen, they weren't bringing in players with histories of winning deep into the playoffs. Past success can show up as younger players learn from veterans.

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.