Bears Cannot Talk Themselves Into Overpaying For Carson Wentz

A Carson Wentz trade is imminent. After a week of loud rumblings about the QB's availability on the trade market, Adam Schefter tweeted out on Saturday that a transaction will be completed in the coming days that will land the Philadelphia Eagles quarterback in a different uniform.

As you can see, the important where/when/for what is still a mystery. We broke down a few destinations that make sense for Wentz earlier in the week, but there haven't been any substantial reports linking Wentz to any one particular team.

The Chicago Bears, however, have been brought up several times as a team in contention for the former No. 2 overall pick. Most recently, the Philadelphia Inquirer named Chicago and the Indianapolis Colts as two likely trade partners. The asking price, according to Greg A. Bedard of Boston Sports Journal, is two first-round picks.

Both teams make a lot of sense for multiple reasons. Neither have a solid answer at quarterback as of now. Both staffs include alumnus from the 2017 Eagles championship team and the season that represents Wentz' best to date; Colts HC Frank Reich was the offensive coordinator on that team, while John DeFillipo was the QB coach for that Eagles squad and is currently employed in the same position by the Bears.

Of these two teams, though, it's the Bears who seem most likely to potentially get desperate. There appeared to be a very real chance that coach Matt Nagy and general manager Ryan Pace were on their way out the door via pink slip halfway through the season. A late-year win streak by Mitchell Trubisky and the rest of the team resulted in a playoff berth and almost certainly saved the jobs of their bosses.

But Nagy and Pace won't get another season like that. They need to win, and they know it. The defense is nearing championship-caliber and Chicago definitely would have found more success over the last three years if not for the inconsistent (and usually poor) play from their signal-caller, whether it was Trubisky or Nick Foles.

Thus, it's easy to envision Chicago offering up anything and everything for Wentz. They should not do that. Wentz will not solve all the problems they have because there is no ready-made plan for him to succeed.

Nagy started off his career as one of the NFL's better game-planners, but Chicago's offense has been stagnant at best in recent seasons. Part of this is certainly due to the inadequacies of the player running that offense, to be sure, but Nagy has to take at least part of the blame. He played to Trubisky's strengths in the latter half of the 2020 season, but not before it was almost too late. Acquiring a better quarterback does not erase those mistakes, nor does it mean the offense will suddenly hum along smoothly.

More importantly, the Bears have the same issue the Eagles have had over the last two seasons: there's nobody to throw to. Allen Robinson is a free agent and basically said there was no chance he was coming back to Chicago. That means the team's No. 1 wideout is gone. Darnell Mooney was a fun surprise this year but nobody thinks he's a legit top option in a playoff-worthy offense. Chicago would need to overhaul their entire receiving corps to give Wentz a good shot at success, and it will be awful hard to do that as things stand right now, much less after they take on Wentz' enormous contract and send several high draft picks in exchange for his services.

If Wentz could be acquired for one first-round pick and a couple of seconds along with a decent young player, that's one thing. But if Chicago has to mortgage the immediate future in the form of their next two first-rounders, it's not worth it. Even if last season is a bit of a fluke in the grand landscape of Wentz' career, he is not a quarterback who can win on his on. There are only two or three quarterbacks like that in the National Football League. It's no shot towards Wentz to agree that he isn't one of the top three QBs in the league.

The Bears need a quarterback. It doesn't have to be Wentz. There will be an unprecedented amount of QB movement this offseason and Chicago will have options. They should explore those options before deciding if they want to place all their hopes on the shoulders of Wentz and all his flaw.s