The Chicago Bears trading for D.J. Moore does have an eerily similar feel to the Philadelphia Eagles adding A.J. Brown. An ascending quarterback meets an ascending wide out and magic could happen for both sides.
Beyond that, the fit is even better the deeper you dig into it. The stylistic play of D.J. Moore complements Justin Fields well.
Justin Fields will excel with Chicago Bears new WR D.J. Moore deep down the field
In the first two seasons that Moore played, he was used underneath. He had an 11.8% deep ball rate and a 16.2% rate deep ball rate, per PFF. However, as he has grown into the NFL he started to become a significant down the field pass catcher.
Moore had a 22.7% deep ball rate in 2020, but in 2022 he saw a career-high with 27.5% of his targets coming 20 yards or more down the field. The thing is that he was still efficient.
According to PFF Moore was ninth in yards on deep passes. He was also fifth in the NFL in target rate on balls down the field.
On the flip side, Justin Fields is a big game hunter. Only Mitch Trubisky, Russell Wilson, and Sam Danold threw the ball down the field more often last season. Darnold just so happened to do it this year with Moore. The year before, it was just Wilson. Fields attacks down the field like no other quarterback.
His deep ball accuracy is better than his quick game accuracy because his processing in between the hashes is a bit slow. However, when he sees one-on-one on the outside, he knows where to put the football.
Justin Fields is one of the most aggressive downfield passers in the NFL, and now gets one of the more underrated downfield threats. Moore is a top-ten downfield threat based on last year's stats and had three different quarterbacks. When you put two and two together, things start to look pretty good.