The best offseasons are the quiet ones, and Bears general manager Ryan Poles would love to see what that’s like.
A drama-free summer would be ideal as the team heads into a season with legitimate expectations and none of the wink-wink leeway Poles got as he demolished the roster in the first phase of his rebuild. He has had two drafts and free agencies, traded for a couple of receivers and taken ownership at quarterback by solidifying his commitment to Justin Fields.
Real standards will apply. No one will tolerate anything close to another 3-14 season in the name of cleaning up the mess Ryan Pace left behind. That was a one-time allowance.
With that on the horizon, snags like the ones the Bears hit leading up to last season will be far more costly. What difference did it really make that Roquan Smith missed weeks of training camp because of a contract dispute ahead of a season that was going nowhere anyway? It’ll hit harder if it happens again.
The biggest items on Poles’ summer to-do list are seamlessly resolving contract situations of players in line for extensions.
That starts with cornerback Jaylon Johnson, who reported for voluntary Organized Team Activities last week without a long-term deal and tried to calm concerns by emphasizing that he’s a different personality than Smith and saying, “100% I look forward to staying and extending with the Bears.”
Poles said of Johnson in April, “I hope he’s a guy we get to keep here for a while,” so it should be simple, right? It rarely is.
But there’s more pressure on the Bears to get this done than there was with Smith, whom they similarly praised but clearly believed was replaceable. They absolutely can’t let a 24-year-old cornerback of his caliber leave the building, and it’s imperative that Johnson’s deal is finished by the start of training camp.
The other three players aren’t so clear-cut and they don’t have Johnson’s leverage.
Poles has already said he’ll need to see “more” from wide receiver Chase Claypool, so there’s not much to discuss there. The bigger issue for the Bears is redirecting Claypool’s trajectory so he gets to a point at which they’d want to extend him.
Both sides envisioned a long-term relationship when Poles dealt a second-round pick (No. 32 overall, ultimately) to the Steelers for Claypool in November. But Claypool managed just 14 catches in seven games after the trade and he has missed offseason practices due to multiple injuries.
Wide receiver Darnell Mooney should be a relatively easy deal once the Bears are convinced that he has fully recovered from the ankle injury that ended his season. He has been one of Poles’ favorite players he inherited from Pace and had a 1,000-yard season in 2022.
The Bears are banking on DJ Moore to headline their passing attack with Fields, but Mooney is an important piece behind him. And the upside is that Poles might save a little money because of the injury and Mooney having a down season of 40 catches, 493 yards and two touchdowns as the offense spiraled.
Figuring out what to do with tight end Cole Kmet is the most complicated ordeal. The Bears are heading into their fourth season of deciding whether he can be a top-tier weapon at his position. Poles came from the Chiefs, who have four-time All-Pro Travis Kelce, so his standards are high.
Kmet caught 50 passes for 544 yards and seven touchdowns, leading the Bears in all three categories. Those numbers ranked 15th, 13th and third, respectively, in the NFL. Kmet has climbed throughout his three seasons, but Poles has to assess whether he’ll continue to do so, because that’s still not quite enough production.
That’s a weighty list of decisions for Poles, though none are nearly as combustible as what he encountered last year. They don’t have to be, anyway, but that’s up to him.
