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Bear Digest

What Could Go Wrong for the Bears?

Analysis: Cash doesn't guarantee success for the Chicago Bears when free agency begins and here are potential problems.
Gene Chamberlain|
What Could Go Wrong for the Bears?
What Could Go Wrong for the Bears?

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Chicago Bears

The Bears have an unusually large amount of salary cap space to spend in free agency.

Make no mistake—they could still foul it up.

The Bears have more than twice as much money than any team except Atlanta. And the Falcons aren't within $37 million of the Bears' total.

Yet, Pro Football Focus named its most likely landing spots for the top 50 free agents this week and if you're a Bears fan you have to be dissatisfied with what this showed.

PFF's Brad Spielberger and Arjun Menon found only two free agents in PFF's top 49 for the Bears.

They sent Eagles defensive tackle Javon Hargrave and 49ers offensive tackle Mike McGlinchey to Chicago.

Menon and Spielberger concluded if Hargrave makes it to free agency, the Bears "almost certainly will be a suitor," and based it on their poor interior defensive line last year. Hargrave is next-best option to Daron Payne, who will be tagged a franchise player according to The Athletic. McGlinchey is an obvious fit as a successful run-blocking right tackle in a similar wide zone scheme.  

The disappointing part was Spielberger and Menon sent four of the top 49 to Las Vegas and Houston. Houston has only $25 million cap space and Vegas $39.4 million, compared to $88 million for the Bears.

The 50th player on the list of 50 was linebacker Bobby Okereke and they projected him to the Bears, like about everyone else seems to be doing. Okereke is from Eberflus' Colts HITS system so it only makes sense.

Bleacher Report did something similar but with the top 10 free agents and found a landing spot in Chicago for two of them—Hargrave and Patriots wide receiver Jakobi Meyers. Meyers would be an ideal Bears fit as a bigger, more physical pass catcher who can line up outside or even in the slot.

Nevertheless, one might expect with two or three times the available cap space of many teams that the Bears could land more of the top free agents.

While freelancing and conducting a poll once for a national publication, I needed to ask agents the main reasons players sign where they do in free agency. It was done anonymously but the poll was multiple choice anyway and did not ask for side comments.

Very few responded and this could be expected, but those who did answered  unanimously that No. 1 was guaranteed cash and second just cash.

So the Bears should have a big edge if they are willing to spend it, but somehow these simulated free agencies determined few Bears signings among the top players.

Here are possible situations that could be factors leading to free agency failure for GM Ryan Poles despite his abundance of cash. 

Even better, label this things to worry about if you're a Bears fan heading into free agency.

1. HITS Principle

Last year after his hiring, Matt Eberflus warned players they needed to come to spring workouts and OTAs with their track shoes because they had to be ready to run.

The HITS principle can be a tough sell because of all the extra running they must do during scrimmages and between sections of practice. It's not so much wind sprints but the constant running from here to there between parts of practice and between plays. Then there is always the fear of being called out for loafing in games.

Eberflus also said the HITS principle must be applied all over again in 2023. So they can all expect more running again this year.

Players adjusted last year. No one seemed to complain. At season's end, some players complained about having to wear pads in practice in December according to Eberflus. Nothing much was said about the running.

Still, given a choice of going to a team where they must run excessively and one where they train in more familiar ways, it's difficult to imagine free agents choosing to go where they can run more.

Physical torture is not necessarily popular.

Many of the free agents the Bears drew in last year had ties to members of the staff or Poles. They weren't exactly the cream of the free agency crop due to lack of cash available.

Lucas Patrick and Equanimeous St. Brown had ties to offensive coordinator Luke Getsy. They brought in Al-Quadin Muhammad and Matthew Adams because they were familiar with the HITS principle from Indianapolis. Byron Pringle was familiar with Poles.

So it will now be interesting to see how many players without ties to the HITS system or the coaching staff will come to Chicago based on the money and opportunity, and whether tougher training and scrutiny with "loafs" make a difference to free agents.

Eberflus himself is an up-front guy and players like him. This is important. No one wants to play for someone with a bad reputation.

Jones said of Eberflus that he has "100% of my trust."

Still, it's safe to assume there could be some free agent players wouldn't want to come to Chicago because of the reputation of HITS.

2. Talent Deficiency

The Bears' reputation could precede them. They are so short on talent that it could scare away free agents even if there are more starting opportunities. Sure, some players want to come for the opportunity to play but the best players want to go to a winning team or one with a chance to win. Do they think a 3-14 team can win?

Also, the talent is so deficient that the Bears might not even have required money to bring in the very top tier of free agents in sufficient numbers to make a huge impact.

They could realistically use two starters on the offensive line, a running back, a couple wide receivers, at least one tight end, four or five defensive linemen, two or more linebackers and a few cornerbacks. Can free agency address all of this?

By the time the money goes out for just half of that list, they might be short of cash.

This can work the other way as free agents see more of an opportunity to start in Chicago, but if they're bringing in nothing but players in this category then they're not really going to be much better off than last season. They need immediate impact players.

The trick will be balancing out the cash without wasting too much of it on one or two players, much the way Jacksonville accomplished it last free agency.

3. The Extensions

They need a big chunk of that cap space to extend Darnell Mooney, Cole Kmet, Jaylon Johnson and possibly Chase Claypool so they don't get to free agency in 2024.

This doesn't even include David Montgomery, who actually is a free agent in March. This could deplete some of their cash.

All of this takes away from what's available for free agents.

4. Justin Fields

The Bears QB wows fans and they enjoy seeing him develop, but is it the same way with players?

Of course his own players back him.

However, former NFL running back LeSean "Shady" McCoy experessed a different viewpoint during the offseason. He wondered why wide receivers would ever want to come to Chicago.

"There's no hype to go play for Justin Fields. He can't throw," McCoy said.

It's the old Muhsin Muhammad comment coming into play: Chicago is where wide receivers go to die.

To be fair, many people said this of Jalen Hurts and where was he last season?

It's also been suggested Fields holds the ball too long to cause many of the sacks that his offensive linemen are blamed for, so offensive linemen might not want to come to Chicago.

Whether these are valid concerns or not, if McCoy thinks this then it is not unreasonable to assume some NFL free agent receivers or linemen might also think these things and scratch Chicago off their lists.

5. Supply

Already the top wide receiver supply was diminshed when players signed in advance, such as DK Metcalf, Terry McLaurin and Deebo Samuel. The top defensive tackle could be tagged. 

It's possible more tags and late signings are coming. There is a finite amount of talent. Last year the Bears found this out on the defensive line. Their cash supply could actually exceed the talent supply. 

The Bears need to have Plan B ready at every position and get to it quickly when Plan A fails.

6. Weather

Fields himself said it during Super Bowl week: He doesn't like playing in that cold and wind at the lakefront and would like to play in a dome.

Bear weather has been proven as a myth. It might prove an advantage for a winning team in Chicago playing a weaker team from warmer weather, but they'd have an advantage against a weaker team regardless of weather.

Warm weather or dome games in December and January are more fun for players than frozen tundra and snow, so why go to Chicago in free agency?

You could point to Green Bay and say the Packers are successful despite the cold and it is true. But the Packers haven't used free agency very much. They have depended greatly on the draft.

7. Personnel Inexperience

It might seem this shouldn't be a factor because Poles and assistant GM Ian Cunningham went through free agency together last year.

However, Poles has only been in charge one year and last free agency hardly counts. They had little money to spend and after the Larry Ogunjobi failed signing disaster they were left scrambling to sign lower-level free agents just to fill out roster spots.

It's partly why they ended up with Pringle, St. Brown, Patrick, Adams, Muhammad, Joe Thomas, Dakota Dozier and Dane Cruikshank instead of bigger names.

So will Poles be able to move on, network properly and rapidly sign bigger free agents?

He'll definitely have the chance to prove he can.

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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.

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