Chicago Bears: Historical mistakes could be made again
Chicago Bears must build through the draft instead of trading capital away
The Chicago Bears, according to a rumor, offered the Detriot Lions more for Matthew Stafford. What sounds like a last-ditch effort by head Matt Nagy and general manager Ryan Pace. It might be time to consider a regime change.
Some call it bold, but I call it reckless. If this team does, in fact, trade more than they did to acquire Khalil Mack for a quarterback, they will fail. Normally I am very optimistic. However, let’s explore trading the farm away for top talent.
Hall of fame quarterback Joe Montana was traded to the Kansas City Chiefs for a first-round draft pick in 1993 in return for a third-round pick in 1994 and David Whitmore (safety). The circumstances were a bit different, and the trade was not as extreme, but the Kansas City Chiefs went as far as the AFC Championship in 1993 and lost early in the playoffs in 1994.
That’s what most remember. People forget that Dana Stubblefield won a Super Bowl, was a three-time pro bowl player and a first-team all-pro player once. Had he and the team been on the same page, he might have stayed on the roster longer than his first five years before returning to the team in 2001.
Stubblefield witnessed more player victories on the 49ers, including a Super Bowl victory, than Joe Montana did with the Kansas City Chiefs. Maybe that example is too dated; I have more. Let’s follow the Khalil Mack trade as the Chicago Bears made history back in 2018 with that one. Long story short, Khalil Mack wasn’t talking to the Oakland Raiders. So the Chicago Bears gave up first-round picks in 2019 and 2020, a third-round pick in 2020, and a sixth-round pick in 2019.
In return, the Chicago Bears got the Raiders second-round draft pick and a conditional fifth-round draft pick that became a seventh-rounder. The positive side of that trade was gaining a second-round draft pick back from the Raiders.
Looking at how both teams fared in the end, the Chicago Bears made the playoffs in two of the next three seasons but lost in the wild card rounds. The Las Vegas (Oakland) Raiders failed to capitalize on their draft picks and are yet to see the postseason in the last three seasons.