View of Bears First Round Pick Is, As Usual, A Matter of Perspective

 

It’s interesting the effect that a different view point can have.

I grew up in the suburbs of St. Louis. The neighborhood in St. Charles, Mo. was predominantly white and relatively prosperous. When I left to go to college to experience the world, I was a typical conservative suburbanite. I didn’t know that’s what I was. But that’s what I was. Members of my family that stayed in that environment are, too.  And they don’t know they are, either.

Forward 30 years later after spending 15 of that living in downtown Chicago and I can honestly say that I’m a much different man than I was then. If you ever wonder why big cities are more liberal than urban environments, move to one and you’ll find out. Few people can walk past multiple homeless beggars on their way to work every day and not be affected. I wouldn’t call myself a liberal. But how would I know? I just know now that I was very conservative before.

How you view the Bears first round last night is also largely a matter of perspective. Nationally the pick of quarterback Mitchell Trubisky has been almost universally panned because media experts and anonymous scouts who have an interest in seeing the quarterbacks fall have almost universally disparaged the class. And the Bears actually traded up a spot to get theirs.

But in stark contrast to the national reaction, the local media were generally positive about the move.

Brad Biggs at the Chicago Tribune was (and has been) amongst the most out spoken.

“[General manager RyanPace said the strength of the draft was on defense and plenty of observers would agree. Moreover, the Bears have a host of needs on that side of the ball. But they haven’t had a greater need, period, than quarterback and that pre-dates the Phil Emery era. In fact, the Bears have mismanaged the position for far too much of the post-Sid Luckman era.

“Something had to be done and when the Browns didn’t draft Trubisky, who was raised in the Cleveland suburb of Mentor, with the No. 1 pick, Pace paid big-time to acquire the No. 2 pick from the 49ers. The Bears forked over the No. 3 pick, their third-round pick (No. 67 overall), fourth-round pick (No. 111) and a third-rounder in 2018. The exchange was a steep price, equivalent to a second-round pick according to a source with another team, but when you’re seeking a franchise quarterback, you have to be bold and the Bears have spent far too much time being meek.”

 

Rick Morrissey at the Chicago Sun-Times, usually ready to fire at the Bears at the drop of the hat, was fine with this (albeit with a parting shot):

“A tip of the cap to general manager Ryan Pace for having the courage to make a choice that is very much a roll of the dice. I have no idea whether Trubisky will be a good NFL quarterback. But I like the idea of the Bears throwing caution to the wind and going for it. They haven’t had an excellent quarterback since Jim McMahon, and I think it has slowly dawned on them that they can’t win a Super Bowl without one. And when I say slowly, I mean slooooooooowly.”

Even David Haugh at the Tribune, who I rarely completely agree with, nailed this one perfectly in my mind:

“It’s about time.

“The Bears could have stayed in the third spot and taken a defensive player to suit coach John Fox, or maybe even Trubisky if he was still on the board. They could have gone by the book like NFL executives typically do and the way Pace fooled everyone into believing he would.

“But going all-in to draft a Trubisky for all the Grabowskis in Chicago, Pace opted for bold over blase.”

People who actually follow the Bears are bound to have a different perspective on this once they settle down and ponder it this morning. It’s really easy if you are covering or following a NFL team that has a good quarterback to trash this pick. But try doing that if you are following a team that hasn’t had a quarterback in 30 years (or more) and who hasn’t even tried to draft anyone to solve the problem in 13 years.

Do that year after year after year and watch what happens to your attitude. It certainly has had an effect on me. And I’m not alone.

In contrast to media reports, NFL teams actually valued this quarterback class a great deal. We know that because, depite deceptive anonymous quotes, their actions spoke louder than their words. General manager Ryan Pace stated that they knew that the 49ers were receiving offers to move up for a quarterback because they were receiving offers from the same teams. And the 49ers confirmed that they had two offers on the table.

That’s not all. Immediately after the Bears took Trubisky, the Browns reportedly tried to engineer a trade for Kirk Cousins, something that could have been done well before the draft but was likely attempted only after the guy they, themselves, planned to trade up to get disappeared. It’s worth noting that the Chiefs also traded up to get ahead of the Browns and the Saints to keep them from taking Pat Mahomes. Houston traded up a long way to get Deshaun Watson at 12 overall. And many, many other teams worked these players out privately before the draft despite the class’s supposed lack of quality.

Needless to say that, when you aren’t just a media pundit and your job is actually on the line when your team doesn’t win, it obviously affects how you see things. These people thought a lot more highly of these players than reports indicated.

The Bears had to make this move. They had a guy they liked, they aren’t planning to be drafting this high again, and they don’t have a developing quarterback, a position that Pace has stated repeatedly that he’d like to draft every year.

For the record, I’m warming to the pick and to Trubisky. He is, after all, the only one of the top quarterbacks who has been characterized as accurate, something that arguably can’t be taught. Indeed, the only major criticism that’s usually leveled is that he was a one year starter. Well, so was Marshawn Lattimore. So was Ryan Ramczyk. So were quite a few of the top prospects in this draft. You do your due diligence, evaluate and project based upon what you have. That’s all their is to it.

I didn’t like the price but 2 third round picks and a fourth round pick isn’t exactly giving up the farm. And if he’s the guy you like, there’s no price too high for a potential franchise quarterback.

At least not if you have been exposed to the Chicago Bears for any length of time.

 

Bears Mismanagement of the Quarterback Position Very Likely to Continue Tonight and Tomorrow

 

Brad Bigs at the Chicago Tribune addresses the possibility that there will be a quarterback available for the Bears in round 2:

“I can tell you this: There are plenty of scouts who don’t believe the quarterbacks will free-fall. The need is simply too great, and you can’t argue the Bears’ need. I wrote Tuesday that the Bears’ need for a quarterback is too great for them to ignore at No. 3, and I believe that. That doesn’t mean they see it the same way.”

Many of us really think the Bears have to take a quarterback this draft as Biggs does. But it is looking increasingly like they aren’t going to do it at three overall. Pace’s stubborn insistence on undervaluing the position means that he’ll wait until the second round to see which quarterback falls. That’s where the Bears have put in the most work with the prospects.

According to Biggs the Bears have invited Mitchell Trubisky and Deshaun Watson in for no pre-draft visits or private workouts. On the other hand, the two qurterbacks mostly likely to go some time after the top two have gotten a great deal of attention.

Pace, coach John Fox, offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains, quarterbacks coach Dowell Loggains and player personnel director Josh Lucas all went to Lubbock to work out Mahomes. Mahomes also made a pre-draft visit to Halas Hall.

Deshone Kizer has had two pre-draft visits to Halas Hall, including the local day workout.

Bears fans had better prepare themselves for some major disappointment. If the Bears don’t take a quarterback at three overall, it looks very likely to me that none of these four quarterbacks are going to be available to them in round two. And that likely they won’t be doing it at all. And that, despite all of our hopes that it would be otherwise, means that Pace will be no better than his predecessors as he serially mismanages the position for the Bears.

 

Bears Must Draft a Quarterback at Three Overall

 

Brad Biggs at the Chicago Tribune gives 13 reasons why the Bears will want to draft a quarterback in the first round:

If not now, when?

The time to invest a first-round draft pick in a quarterback appears to have come for the Bears, who have not selected a passer in Round 1 since Rex Grossman in 2003. The Bears dealt two first-round picks to the Broncos in the 2009 Jay Cutler deal, a trade that proved to be too good to be true because teams don’t deal away franchise quarterbacks.

It took the Bears longer than most to realize Cutler wasn’t that player, and now here they are with the No. 3 pick Thursday night, staring down the opportunity to solve their never-ending issue — if they can pick the right quarterback.

I couldn’t agree more.

The Bears aren’t currently developing a quarterback. They have failed to even attempt to draft one for years now. That must end here. Quarterback is the only position that you absolutely cannot do without to achieve consistent success. That has now been proven over and over again.

You have to take your swings at the position and you have to take guys who have a shot at actually being good. That means early in the draft and, this year, that means the first round. How do I know that?

A couple weeks ago I participated in a mock draft.   Representatives for each team drafted who they wanted in the proper order and trades were allowed. They were, of course, extremely knowledgable about their teams current situation and thinking.

My plan going in was probably what many of you are thinking. Assuming I couldn’t trade down (I tried), I would take the best defensive player available, then take the best quarterback available in the second round or trade up into the tail end of the first round to get the third or fourth best available (likely Patrick Mahomes or Deshone Kizer). So I took defensive end Soloman Thomas and felt pretty good about it.

And then I watched as my world slowly fell apart. It started at the 7th pick where Cleveland traded up to take Mahomes. Crazy, right? Could have maybe even waited for the second to get that guy, right?

Wrong.

The quarterbacks few off the board like pigeons getting out of the way of a speeding car. Arizona took Deshaun Watson at 13. Carson Palmer is aging but you probably figured that they’d wait and take a long-term project later. And you would have been wrong. Same with Kansas City, who traded up to 22 to get Mitchell Trubisky. Then Houston took Deshone Kizer at 25 and you were left with… who?

At that point there was one quarterback left that I thought might – maybe – turn into a good starter, Davis Webb. And I had both New Orleans at 32 and SanFransisco at 34 drafting ahead of me. There was no way I could possible wait and take the chance that I’d be drafting a Nate Peterman at the top of the second round. So I had to trade a fourth round pick to move up from 36 to 30 to get what amounted ot the dregs of the starting quarterback class.

I hear over and over again that you don’t “reach” for a quarterback. But if the rest of the league values the position more than you do, as was definitely the case with me in this mock draft, are you reaching or are you undervaluing the prospects and their potential impact?

The draft is always a crap shoot. It’s even more of one when it comes to quarterbacks. That’s the way it is. There’s a rookie cap so it isn’t like you set your franchise back 5 years by missing on a one in the first round anymore. You take your swings until you find one. If that means taking one that you like best at 3 overall, so be it. And that certainly looks like that’s the case this year.

 

Message from NFL Personnel Men: Stay Away From Deshone Kizer

 

One of the most enjoyable aspects of draft season for me is reading the anonymous quotes from NFL personnel scouts and executives that Milwaukee Journal Sentinel columnist Bob McGinn collects. There are always a few surprises here.

Probably the most interesting article of the series this year was the one that McGinn did on Deshone Kizer. Like many athletes are big football schools, quarterbacks are apparently worshiped on the Notre Dame campus and it evidently affected Kizer because McGinn’s scouts absolutely eviscerated him.

“You look at that team, they’ve got players,” an AFC personnel man said. “There’s no way they should win just four games. It was because of this guy, the quarterback. Boy, at times he looked bad. He was so bad against Stanford in the first half that they benched him.”

“You look at that team, they’ve got players,” an AFC personnel man said. “There’s no way they should win just four games. It was because of this guy, the quarterback. Boy, at times he looked bad. He was so bad against Stanford in the first half that they benched him.”

An NFC personnel man described Kizer as a selfish player worried mostly about status and money.

“That’s what drives him,” said the executive. “It’s all about him. Prima donna. Thin-skinned.”

We all know its lying season in the NFL and its possible these three men are all hoping that Kizer will fall. But his own actions lately have seemingly backed this evaluation up.

On April 20, Kizer was quoted as comparing himself to Tom Brady and Cam Newton.

“Name a college quarterback who goes into the game-plan meetings on Monday and throws his notes at the coaches,” Kizer said. “No one else game plans the way I do. No one else prepares the way I do. No one else knows football the way I do. No one else is as big as I am. No one else is as powerful a runner as I am. Pat Mahomes might throw the ball 80 yards and I can only throw the ball 72, but I guarantee he can’t throw an out route the way I can. No one else can do what I can do. And I’ve truly figured out in this process, if I can maximize all my potential in every aspect of the game – this is bold – I do have the ability to be the greatest quarterback to ever play. Imagine taking Brady’s intellect and Brady’s preparation and putting it on a guy with Cam Newton’s body. Why can’t I be the greatest? The only thing stopping me from it is me. That’s what’s driving me now.”

OK, the guy is confident. Not very unusual if you are a quarterback. Probably a lot of them think it even if they don’t say it.

But Kizer, apparently realizing how arrogant he sounded, decided to claim that his comments were taken out of context the very next day.

Not even drafted yet and he’s already blaming the media? Apparently upon thinking about it, Kizer thought so, too. Because the NEXT day, he decided to effectively retract his claim and own up to the quote.

The point? Kizer’s first instinct was to blame someone else after his misstep. He then decided that those optics weren’t too good either and that he’d better say what he had to to protect his brand.

Sounds pretty much exactly like the kind of guy the anonymous evaluators were describing. Even his college head coach said that he needs more time to grow not only on but off the field.

As Miami fans know well a la Dion Jordan, most NFL draft picks don’t fail due to lack of talent. They fail because they don’t have the attitude it takes to succeed. And Kizer sounds to me like he’s got a great deal of Ryan Leaf in him.

Bottom line, heaven help the team that spends a high draft pick to draft Kizer.

 

John Fox Is Going Nowhere without Ryan Pace

Dan Durkin at The Athletic answers your questions:

“If Myles Garrett and Solomon Thomas go first and second respectively, you’ll learn a lot about who is in charge and where the franchise thinks it is. This scenario gives Pace the option of taking the top quarterback in the class, or the top defensive back in a very deep and talented class. If a quarterback is taken, it’s clearly [general manager Ryan] Pace’s team and timeline. If a defensive player is selected, [head coach John] Fox’s preservation plan is still alive and well.

“All moves point to this team being in the middle of a long rebuild. But Fox seems to be under more pressure to win. Pace inherited an aging roster from Phil Emery, who was simply not good at picking players. Truth hurts. Thus, Pace has more time to build this roster.”

I have to disagree with this completely. I’ve seen no indication whatsoever that Pace and Fox aren’t joined at the hip.

Yes, the Bears are, indeed, in the middle of a long rebuild. But I fail to see how ownership can cut Pace slack on what is a much poorer roster talent-wise than it was when he took over while not giving Fox more time to win with the same roster.

The strong suspicion here is that the team needs to show improvement next year but not as much as some people seem to think. If things still appear to be headed in the right direction, even if it’s slowly, George McCaskey will likely continue to be patient with both Pace and Fox.

And the guess here is that the Bears definitely will show improvement. Three wins is a low bar to exceed and the truth is that a Bears team with even average health beats that by a win or two with no off-season improvements at all. If the Bears win 5 to 6 games, both men are probably safe.

Loggains the Best Indicator that the Bears Did the Right Thing With Hoyer

As John Mullin at CSNChicago.com mulled over the appearance of stability within the Bears organization the other day, he offhandedly threw out this little nugget:

“[W]hen the Bears didn’t re-sign Brian Hoyer this offseason, which may not have appeared to be benchmark non-move but was, at least one Bears coach was apoplectic at not staying a course with a quarterback who delivered 300 passing yards and zero turnovers in his brief Bears ‘career.’”

Given their past history together with the Cleveland Browns, the bet here is that the coach in question was Dowell Loggains.  And, because of that, if anything I applaud this non-move.

First of all, Hoyer would have been a place holder for a draft pick.  True, Mike Glennon might turn out to be the same but that’s the worst case scenario for him.  He’s got enough upside to ultimately turn out to be the guy.  Because of that, he represents both the placeholder that Hoyer was and a swing at the position, which Hoyer wasn’t.

But the fact that Loggains was against this non-move makes me all the more happy with it because, let’s never forget, Loggains was the one pounding the table for Johnny Manziel with the Browns, ultimately getting that entire coaching staff fired in the process.

If Dowell Loggains was for it, you can bet that the right thing to do was the opposite.