Bear Digest

Why Trade Rumors About Maxx Crosby to Chicago Are Wasted Thoughts

One elite NFL insider spelled out the edge rusher's status and paints a very clear picture about the possibility of a Raiders trade with the Bears or anyone else.
Gene Chamberlain|
Maxx Crosby pressures Bears QB Caleb Williams during last year's 25-24 Bears win.
Maxx Crosby pressures Bears QB Caleb Williams during last year's 25-24 Bears win. | Stephen R. Sylvanie-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

The closest the Bears will get to Maxx Crosby this offseason was the podcast Caleb Williams did with him.

It seemed an unlikely possibility that they would have a chance to trade for one of the game's biggest game wreckers, but NFL Network's Ian Rapoport spilled out very succinctly why the most likely scenario is Crosby remains in Las Vegas.

"This is as complicated a situation as I can remember," Rapoport told Rich Eisen on Eisen's show.

The main reason there is even discussion about the Raiders trading Crosby is the  way last season ended, with the team shelving him instead of letting him play out the season. It frustrated Crosby and later those who had contact with him or his reps, like Fox's Jay Glazer, reported a real anger by the edge rusher toward his team.

The thing is, the team did this largely because of a knee injury Crosby had. As it turned out, the injury was severe enough that he had to have surgery on it to repair meniscus damage.

"It was an organizational decision and also a medical one because, like, he did have a major injury," Rapoport reported.

Rapoport classified this as a meniscus "repair" rather than a "trim."  That's more damage. This wasn't something he should have really been playing with if he could avoid it. So he can't be too upset at the Raiders for letting him avoid a potentially worse situation.

The severity of it means something in regards to the NFL offseason schedule, with free agency and trading starting up, because "...that's (meniscus repair) usually months (away) not weeks, so I don't think he'd get cleared (medically) to be traded in March, anyway, unless somebody wanted to take a leap of faith," Rapoport said.

Rapoport said if they wanted to trade him,  the window would be pushed back to the draft or in training camp.

The other reason Rapoport saw as an obstacle to Crosby being traded is his defensive line coach, Rob Leonard, was just named the new Raiders defensive coordinator.

That's just another way to placate a player like Crosby.

Ultimately, Rapoport stopped short of saying a trade of Crosby is not happening but all his arrows point this way, and the fact it would be later, if at all, is not something that would bring the Bears into the mix.

The possibility of money being thrown at Crosby to keep him satisfied was tossed out by Eisen, similar to the way the Browns did it with Myles Garrett last offseason. Rapoport couldn't deny this is a way to make everyone happy.

"When in doubt, money, generally money," Rapoport said.

No one should get too overly excited about made-up rumors of interest by the Bears or anyone else regarding Crosby unless there is some other drastic turn of events downward in his relations with his current team. A new coach with the background of Klint Kubiak should keep Crosby happy with where he's at after a year when they made an entirely stupid decision by bringing in a coach who was well overdue for retirement.

Adding a $35 million cap hit for yet another defensive lineman never seemed like a Bears possibility, anyway, and it's more than likely they'd look to improve their pass rush situation through the draft. It's a more sound way after they spent so much money on free agent defensive players Dayo Odeyingbo and Grady Jarrett last year without a dividend.

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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.