Cap Space Alone Won't Flip Bears Overnight

Complete rebuilds like the one the Bears have undertaken are tricky maneuvers.

There are the failures, which can seem like running on a treadmill because they go nowhere if left unchecked. It's more like a maze where the team wanders around without a clue of escape. Detroit did this for several years under Matt Patricia.

Successful operations definitely require resources and the Bears will have plenty of those in the offseason. Besides resources, it can require time, although some teams achieve it faster than others.

The Lions have achieved what must be considered a rapid rebuild now. They went one miserable season under Dan Campbell, and in the middle of a second miserable season caught fire to make a run at the playoffs.

This would be a model Bears fans have to hope they can follow, although they seem more likely to fall under the Cincinnati Bengals version of this.

The Bengals went 2-14 and 4-12 under Zac Taylor before catching fire the third year and going straight to the Super Bowl.

The Jacksonville Jaguars seem to be in the midst of a version even faster than both under Doug Pederson, who was initially a candidate for the Bears job. Theirs isn't a model everyone can follow.

Sometimes the groundwork gets laid by the preceding regime to make turnarounds occur faster. It definitely didn't in Chicago, with the exception of Justin Fields.

The Jaguars went through four years of misery in various coaching regimes and all along were selecting early in the draft. They had some talent in place.

They had their quarterback in place, just as the Bears did when they started this year's rebuild.

Yet the Bears are 3-11 and Jacksonville is the hottest thing next to the Lions and making a run in the AFC at a wild card.

The Bears were busy trading away draft capital in the past under the previous GM instead of selecting early first-rounders the way the Jaguars were, but the key for Pederson's team came when this year's free agency began.

In a matter of hours, they signed Brandon Scherff for three years/$49.5 million, Foyesade Oluokun for four years/$45 million, Christian Kirk for a much-criticized four years/$72 million, Evan Ingram for a year and $9 million, Foley Fatukasi for three years/$30 million and Zay Jones for three years/$24 million.

Bears GM Ryan Poles dumped all the aging veterans and their big contracts and chose, instead, to eat those players' prorated bonuses that make possible all of the signings like the Jaguars had in one day. So now he can undertake something like Jacksonville did.

Is it even possible for the Bears to duplicate what many considered a wild spending spree in free agency by the Jaguars?

It is, but it's also possible for the Bears to make the Jaguars look like complete cheapskates.

Jacksonville had about $61 million available in cap space in March when they went on their spending spree.

The Bears will have $115 million according to Spotrac.com, unless they were to cut a few more players and pad their available cap space even more.

The Jaguars took all of that spending and started out 2-6 under Pederson. Now, they look like geniuses as the momentum builds and Trevor Lawrence makes throws to capable pass catchers behind a functioning offensive line. They still need to win two games just to get above .500.

The lesson here for Bears fans is patience.

When free agency comes and goes and the Bears are done spending, they still won't be a rebuilt team ready to step into the playoffs.

In 2021 the Patriots broke the bank in spending a record $163 in guaranteed money during free agency and they haven't had a playoff win from this. This year the Jaguars spent over $175 million in guaranteed money to break the Patriots' record and they may not even make the playoffs, let alone win a playoff game.

According to CBS Sports, seven times the record for spending guaranteed money has been broken in free agency, and the Jaguars are trying to become the first team to do it and win a playoff game in the same year they spent all that cash.

It takes some gametime playing together on a field to organize all of the cash spent and get it to function like a winning team. The Jaguars showed this with their 2-6 start.

The 2022 salary dump added a year to the Bears rebuild. The rebuild the Bears have undertaken will be in Year 2 and it's very possible they won't get a playoff win in 2023 unless they buck a real trend.

It would need to look more like the Bengals rebuild for the Bears, although they might want to try to avoid a four-win season in the second year of the rebuild like the Bengals had because the natives tend to get restless when $115 million gets spent and there's nothing to show for it until the following year.

Those late-season streaks like the Lions and Jaguars have going are nice for whetting the appetite and placating fans who want a turnaround to occur yesterday.

They build legitimate hope.

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The Line: Bills by 8 1/2. Over/under 48 1/2.

BearDigest Record to Date: 11-3, 6-7-1 ATS.

Prediction: Bills 30, Bears 13

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