During his frst two seasons as general manager of the Chicago Bears, Ryan Poles was speaking and acting like he could do no wrong.
In his third season as the Bears' general manager, Poles seems to be faced with a fading approval rating. Poles, himself, stated that the goal for this season was for Bears to contend for a playoff spot. Three games before the end of the season, the Bears have already been eliminated from playoff contention. Beyond, the 2024 season has been such a failure that the Bears fired their head coach in-season for the first time in the history of the organization and the hiring of offensive coordinator Shane Waldron proved to be one of the worst coordinator hires in team history.
Given that scrutiny, many are taking a second look at the misses Poles had in the seasons prior to now. One loud mistake was Poles' decision to a trade a second-round draft pick to the Pittsburgh Steelers at the 2022 NFL Trade Deadline for wide receiver Chase Claypool.
In fact, Bill Barnwell of ESPN listed that as the Bears' biggest mistake since 2020.
"The Bears got something close to the worst-case scenario instead. They didn't sign Claypool to that deal, and they got virtually nothing from him. He had 18 catches for 191 yards over 10 games in Chicago and put some embarrassing blocking attempts on tape before the team cut bait and dealt him to the Dolphins for a swap of late-round picks," Barnwell writes.
Given the steady regression that the Bears have seen from second-year cornerback Tyrique Stevenson, it's worth highlighting that the Steelers used the pick acquired by the Bears to draft ascending cornerback Joey Porter Jr.
There is no question that the Claypool trade was a major mistake of Poles, but that is far from his biggest. The biggest mistake that the Bears made since 2020 was the decision to bring back Matt Eberflus as their head coach last January. No matter what defense Poles used at the time to explain why Eberflus was being given a third season as the team's head coach, it has proven to be a lie. If Poles wants to get his approval rating trending in the right direction, he will need to get this next head coach hire right.