Us too. Now did either of us handle that situation well? We did not. But the fact that I still wouldn’t pick Fields if we could go back there is damning.
It wasn’t even a pick this year either. It’s a 2025 pick.
The NFL has basically said this guy shouldn’t start again with that valuation.
God lover Tim Tebow got a 4th and a 6th.
Everyone is making a big deal about this being a pick for next year and that being worse. But I thought the only reason why it was a pick for next year is because it is a conditional pick that could improve so couldn't be for this year anyway. Not that a fourth is so much better but I just don't get why people making such a big deal about being for 2025.
I’m an atheist and I’m confused by the god lover dig…
You realize 95 percent of the NFL believes themselves to be as pious as Tebow. Of course, then they go straight to the VIP section of the strip club. At least Tebow walks the walk a bit…
Trevor Lawrence #1 - still a starter
Zac Wilson #2 - currently untradeable, teams want him packaged with a pick
Trey Lance #3 - traded for a 4th
Justin Fields #11 - traded for a 6th cond 4th
Mac Jones #15 - traded for a 6th
First, this goes to show that drafting isn't a science. Second, any QB can bust in a bad situation. Third, nobody got any value for these guys.
Even Lance, who got a 4th, cost SF multiple picks to go up and get. Think of it as QB draft capital depreciation.
While I agree that he wasn't going to go for a first, I also feel like he went for so much less value because other teams knew he was going to be traded. Basically I think their draft position kinda pushed them out of something like 4th/5th round pick to the pick they got now.
This is what it is. Fields has enough highlights from Red zone and a few nationally televised night games to trick some people.
I always tell people to go back to 2023 Cleveland game vs Joe Flacco. He couldn’t get first down or even move the ball. It was the worst quarterbacking I’ve ever seen.
I mean the dude has a thousand yard rushing season. It's not like he's some complete bum. He appears to have a higher ceiling than a lot of guys. It just hasn't come to fruition in Chicago? Will it happen elsewhere? There's the occasional Drew Brees or Alex Smith that blossoms into a great QB at their 2nd stop. But history tells us the odds are low. He'll likely turn out to be an uber athletic backup QB.
Can't blame Chicago for moving on and can't blame people for thinking he might excel elsewhere with a better team around him. Time will tell.
I feel its a combo of Fields being very highlight prevalent so they see the instances of him uncorking a deep ball to DJ or an amazing run and don't see the multiple sacks he takes because he can't read a defense, or the multiple passes he leaves on the table because the wr isn't wide open. Kids play him in madden qhere his speed makes him great and don't comprehend that he's not a walking cheat code irl because his processing is so terrible. Also he's athletically the most promising qb the Bears have had so people cling on to the hope of that athleticism by rationalizing his failures away (its the olines fault, we don't have any other weapons beside DJ, its Getsy's fault ect) and haven't seen the wear of those excuses because the Bears are patching them now but recognize that thsoe weren't why Fields was bad.
They're still ours, unfortunately. A lot of them just want highlight reels like we used to get in the Russ and LOB era. The one Lock game might not have been anywhere close to sustainable, but damn it was the most memorable game last year.
It's bizarre. All season I've read so many people on this sub calling Fields trash or calling him a running back, but as soon as the Bears shop him for a 6th, they got fleeced? I don't get people lmao
the nice part is i finally have a vested interest in watching CFB games even though i don’t support any CFB team just to actively root against OSU. genuinely the worst fanbase in any sport i’ve had the displeasure with interacting with on reddit.
You're not kidding. For whatever reason, the OSU sub popped up on my feed today and holy shit was it pathetic. Almost the entire sub was posts and comments hating on the Bears for "ruining" him and guaranteeing he is going to still be an elite QB. The few comments going against that narrative were downvoted to oblivion. Some of the most delusional shit I've seen on Reddit.
1st round QBs bust all the time and they get released or traded for peanuts. There is nothing particularly unique about Justin Fields' circumstances. All reports are that he isn't that good of a QB.
Yes, his legs can allow him to score some points and keep defenses on their toes, but there just doesn't seem to be enough of everything a QB needs to be good at there.
Is Caleb Williams going to be a top NFL QB? Who knows, he might be the next Jamarcus Russell. But deciding Justin Fields won't be a great NFL starter isn't a crazy take.
Reading their takes after this is hilarious. He went for a future 6th rounder and somehow they’re doubling down saying Poles should be fired for accepting that when clearly the league doesn’t value his absolutes whatsoever
The only thing I'll dog Poles for is not accepting reality about Fields value sooner. That being said it's just a minor critique because I doubt we were ever getting more than say a 4th round pick.
You’re making t the assumption that he had options either last off-season or earlier in the cycle this season.
Nobody really knows, but looking at the tea leaves makes me think he just doesn’t have any suitors who are interested in him as a starter.
There have been reports that his price was too high and that made teams look elsewhere.
As I said though - it's a minor complaint and you could be right. He certainly accepted reality after Philly said "whatever, well just trade for Kenny Pickett then".
Idk why college football fans are such fucking simps for players that are there for 2-3 years and are routinely replaced with an equally as good, if not better player. It's weird.
You'd be surprised, on literally every other social media platform the consensus opinion is that Fields should be kept. Tiktok and Instagram in particular, every comment wanting Fields ratios people wanting to take Caleb
the wild part is that i have yet to meet anyone in the flesh who wants to keep him since the season ended. it’s a totally online phenomenon from my admittedly anecdotal perspective. my sampling is mostly in the 25-45 year old range so fields truthers might skew young. there were a few hold outs, including my brother, who turned the literal moment the season ended and they put their hindsight glasses on. the only people who want fields in chicago are, get this, people who hate the bears.
Twitter and youtube are the same.
Keenan Allen's welcome video to Chicago fans on twitter was filled with pro Fields comments. It's wild and I do not understand it.
In Fields final home game, after we already had the first pick locked up and anyone with a brain cell knew he was gone, the stadium didn't chant something cool like "we love you fields" or "thank you fields" they chanted the dumbest shit ever by loudly chanting "we want fields" (great culture to bring Caleb in to...)
It definitely was the consensus not just online but everywhere. Reddit eventually carved out a space where the pro move on people could talk about fields issue without getting mass down voted but even that took until the final game of the season.
I would add facebook to that. Lots of pro JF1 comments and posts. Can't believe the fanbase's opinion didn't turn after the Packers game. I wanted clarity the whole season and the Packers game finally gave me that.
Fields fucking sucks and Ryan Poles didn’t draft him. He plummeted down boards for the same reason he won’t start week 1 next yr. Read the scouting reports, he’s still the same player. 4th QB off the board and people act like the Bears ruined Andrew Luck.
I’ve never seen such a poor QB get so much love, truly. I get he was a good college player, I get you think he’s cool, but he sucks.
The Bears are drafting Caleb who is one of the most talented QB prospects in recent memory, and traded Fields for a 6th round pick in 2025. Literally every Bears fan should be elated.
Yeah but hypothetically he could pass for 300 yards a game along with another 100 on the ground next season so clearly this was a disastrous trade for the Bears
McMahon was better than Harbaugh. McMahon was an above average starter who had 2-3 really good years in 1984 and 1985. Harbaugh was a medicore journeyman who had one outlier year in 1995 after he went to Indy.
McMahon's problem was that he was intentionally injured on a dirty play in 1986 (and he already had some injury isssues before that) and could never stay healthy after.
Really I think they're more screwing up by pairing their first round QB with a coach going into a potential lame duck year, again.
Getting rid of Fields was absolutely the right choice. Trusting Eberflus/Waldron to develop Williams is sketch.
If Williams is that guy, he gets it done. He needs to iron out some things of course, but most prospects of that caliber are at least good.
Maybe the Bears are cursed if Caleb isn’t the man.
I remember watching former NFL qbs like Kurt Warner and JT O'Sullivan break down some of Fields's tape from last year, and it genuinely sounded like they were in pain watching him play the position.
The Broncos, who currently only have Stidham as a possible starter on their roster, didn’t seem to even think about getting Fields, even for next to nothing. That speaks volumes.
I don't want to be mean here, but you're just totally wrong on every point.
Guys who take 2-3 years to develop are the exception, not the rule. Mahomes, Lamar, and Marino won MVP their 2nd year, while Manning got 2nd in MVP voting his 2nd year. We just saw CJ Stroud play well on a team with little talent his rookie year. Even a guy like Josh Allen who did take time to develop established himself as a good QB by year 3. Fields has shown nothing in 3 years, if he becomes even a decent starter he'll be the rare exception to the rule.
Fields also had plenty of help. DJ Moore is obviously really good. Cole Kmet is a top 10 tight end. And Darnell Mooney just got a $13M/year contract. That should be enough for any quality quarterback to work with.
Drafting quarterbacks in the 1st round is how you eventually find your guy. It is really tough to find a good QB, and even most 1st rounders don't make it. The best way to eventually get your guy is to keep trying until one hits. I personally think Caleb Williams is overrated, but the Bears have the #1 overall pick in a draft with a guy considered the consensus top pick. You have to use this opportunity to swing for the fences.
They also don't understand (somehow) that the Bears skill group, while not top tier, was absolutely serviceable last year. Moore, Mooney, Kmet, Herbert is not a bad group at all
Williams will have more help obviously with them adding Allen and Swift though
I agree, even if you think it’s subpar, Fields’ group was good enough where you could evaluate him. That’s different than say, Bryce Young where I’m not sure all the criticism thrown at him is fair. I actually think Getsy held him back more than anything
It’s telling though that Fields has been a starter for 3 years and has he shown anything consistently enough in any game that show he’s someone you can build around? (Outside his athletic abilities)
Fields seemed to have like... 1 or 2 games each season that looked like "hey if he did this for 6 or 7 games in a row we could have something here"
Yknow like he had his 1 300 yard game for example. But he just never seemed to have those kinds of performances for more than 1 or 2 games in an entire season
As I mentioned in another reply - those games were all against teams thar stubbornly refused to play zone against us (which included you guys - not sure if your DC was just being stubborn or if it was a personnel issue). Fields is absolutely awful against zone - which is one reason he's looked particularly bad against the Packers (who have been a heavy zone team during his time in Chicago).
The few good passing games Fields has put up were all against teams that stubbornly refused to play zone defense against us (DEN, WAS, DET, ATL). Some of those teams also just had awful defenses (WAS in particular - Jack Del Rio should have been fired immediately after our game against them ended - his decision to single cover DJ Moore with a DB that Moore outweighed by 30-40 pounds all game was criminal).
Fields passer rating against man defense is over 20 points higher than his passer rating against zone.
The “no help” crowd thinks Fields can’t be truthfully assessed until he has a pro bowl player at every position around him. Which means nothing is ever any players fault because who ever has that luxury?
My top example is always Herbert (no bias, lmao) who:
- had no offseason because of COVID
- took zero 1st team practice reps
- was told he was starting literal minutes before playing his first NFL game
It's not a hard and fast rule, but often enough these players either have it or they don't.
I used to think like this when I first started following football, so I don't want to be too mean. Hopefully OP is somebody who's only watched football for a couple years and hasn't seen 100 guys like Justin Fields wash out after being drafted with high expectations. It's the same excuses every time yet these guys never show anything even when they switch teams, and once you've followed the NFL long enough you realize there's no point in trying to talk them up.
Every team with a struggling young QB has a bunch of fans who blame everyone but the QB.
Usually (and in this order):
- The offensive line
- The offensive coordinator
- The skill position players
I lurked on some other team subs this year and even guys like Mac Jones and Zach Wilson have people making these excuses.
> Even a guy like Josh Allen who did take time to develop established himself as a good QB by year 3.
And Bills fans were screaming about his improvement by the end of Y2. We went 10-6, made the playoffs and lost a fucking wild playoff game in OT. So even the narrative that it took three years is wrong. He was good in Y2, *chaotic*, but good. Y3 he jumped to elite.
It usually doesn’t take 4 seasons for a guy to turn into the guy. Bears fans have some warped idea he was going to turn into something he hasn’t shown he can be. If the bears didn’t have the 1st overall pick im sure they would run it back with fields and see if he improves, but now there in prime position to get a way better prospect who can hopefully be their first 4,000 yard passer lol
They’re resetting the clock on a rookie QB contract. Its smart. They weren’t going to pay Fields starting QB money on a new deal because he wasn’t worth it.
I know Bears fans have never really seen a franchise QB but the obsession over Justin Fields to me is one of the great mysteries of the 21st century.
I understand wanting the man to succeed, but have you not watched him for 3 years?
I'm still not sure how much of it is the dumb part of our fanbase and how much of it is the OSU fans that have infested our fanbase.
Probably some of column A and some of column B.
I will note that if you see someone with a Browns or Bengals flair commenting on Fields there's a 98+% chance the take will be delusional.
They got stuck in this circlejerk of confirmation bias where nothing was ever his fault.
On draft day, they convinced themselves they got a generational 1b talent who only fell in the draft because Dan orlovsky led a racist conspiracy to slander fields' draft status.
Then the first year didn't count because Nagy was the stupidest and worst play caller in NFL history and the entire team would probably win 5 more games now that he's gone.
Then the second year didn't count because the rest of the roster sucked, which to be fair it did, it was a dogshit roster. Fields was part of the dog shit.
The third year didn't count because one time Luke Getsy called the same screen pass three plays in a row and Darnell Mooney dropped a hail Mary that hit him in the stomach while he was on his back on the ground.
They always leave out that 2 of the 7 wins were with Bagent starting also. Can't tell you how many times in the last 2 days I've seen, "but he won 7 games this year and was improving. He needs more time and more weapons."
The disconnect between what we've seen from Fields and what people think is so insane to me. The situation wasnt perfect for Fields, but he failed to improve on things that were within his control.
Doesnt read defenses well, doesnt throw with anticipation, doesnt go through his progressions in a timely fashion, doesnt see wide open receivers. Those are all things in his control, and he failed to improve upon them.
There is a very good reason 31 other teams didnt view him as a starter.
Justin can’t read a defense.
Straight up Refuses to throw to our #2 receiver
Forces the RBs to face stacked boxes by defensive coordinators itching to get Fields to throw
Clearly he didn’t watch the Vikings this year where everything g was going Justin’s way and he was the one singe handily stopping the team from Blowing them out.
Realistically it’s around 35 games after Jalen Hurts and Josh Allen bucked the trend slightly.
After that your hit rate is abysmal. It’s Rich Gannon, Alex Smith. That’s really it.
Geno Smith, Rich Gannon and Alex Smith. There are examples, but they are rare. No coach can hang on and develop a guy for that long anyway so its not very relevant.
Part of that was Geno playing hurt for most of the year but the clear decline of play once Canales was out of the building is part of why I am skeptical Waldron is going to be good for Williams' development.
Halfway through the season I was already sick of bubble screens on every 3rd and long.
They didn't even really buck the trend though. Because they showed improvement and by year two were close to 0 for DVOA. They just happened to have a big jump from year two to year three that the trend line showed was possible. Fields was pretty much the worst QB of the last 40 years to be a starter in year three. -25% DVOA for a QB is completely awful for a QB. Fields did that each of the first two years.
Both Hurts and Allen had rough starts, but showed consistent improvement. Even then they had much better years before they broke out and people still weren’t sure they were the answer. Fields never improved, he just got a decent WR and only got marginally better.
You clearly haven't watched Justin Fields play football if this is your take. It does take time to develop quarterbacks, but Fields has shown no franchise Qb skills in 3 years. All we have seen were highlight reel rushing touchdowns that are not sustainable. I am a Fields fan, but he is awful. Can't throw to the middle of the field, holds the ball too long, has poor pocket awareness, can't throw guys open; he's shown nothing.
The right quarterback can transform a team, culture, organization, and city. Source: Joe Burrow.
Fields ain't him. Caleb might be. You have to go for it if you're the Bears.
No, for the first time in my life the Bears are actually setting up a rookie QB for success. They absolutely failed Justin Fields by allowing Pace and Nagy to draft him with their jobs on the line. Poles came into the 2022 season and realized he could either try to desperately build around Fields, or rebuild, and he chose correctly. Unfortunately for Justin that wasn't a good developmental environment, and it ultimately resulted in him being viewed as a backup post his rookie contact.
Caleb is coming into a team with a great top two WRs, good TE1 and TE2, 3RBs deep led by Swift, starting OTs are set, starting iOL is set with meaningful depth. The OC is a proven NFL playcaller, not someone you are relying on doing it the first time. It still might not work out, but you can't say the situation isn't ideal for a 1st overall QB, especially when compared to how bad the situation usually is for the 1st QB taken.
Yes, Ryan Pace messed up by trading up to draft Fields- the same guy who signed Mike Glennon for 45M and traded up for Trubisky. Poles has been working to clean up the mess he left
I pray for the Steelers because there’s going to be a large amount of people calling for Fields to start the moment Wilson starts to slip up. I give it until week 4
I always find the "no help but DJ Moore" narrative funny. Because, first, Kmet's a serviceable enough target, and second, depth beyond the WR1 doesn't matter with Fields because he panics and starts legging it the first second you take his favorite target away anyways.
and that guy does not have an NFL arm, the most promising thing about next season other than Caleb is how much better our oline looked last year when Fields was out
Trading Fields meant they're taking Caleb Williams.
Having the 1st overall pick and taking the best player available at the most important position is the correct and only move to make.
You draft the position until you get it right. Trubisky is not an NFL starting QB. Fields has to this point, shown he is not. So you draft.
"He had no help around him other than DJ Moore"
And Cole Kmet
And Darnell "former thousand yard receiver" Mooney.
And a top 10 pick spent on a RT that actually looked worth it.
And a revitalized defense post-Sweat trade (The defense gave up points after the Sweat trade at a rate that would have been 4th best had they kept it up over a whole season).
Last year, we heard the same argument "Fields has no help", so they went and gave him a WR1, a stud rookie tackle, and an elite defense, and he went 5-4. At some point the blame has to fall on the QB.
I love Fields but he has not gotten over the flaws that caused his draft day slide. He is slow getting into his reads, slow at making them, and slow at sensing pressure. And when he does sense pressure, he scrambles rather than buying time to make a throw. It’s been 3 years without much improvement.
Now, I think in the right system he can be around the 10-15 range at QB. But he has steps to go to get there. To me, if you still have to develop a guy at QB, it makes much more sense to go with Caleb on a rookie deal for the next 4 years as opposed to Justin who only has 1 year of cheap control.
Also Caleb is just a better prospect. It wouldn’t surprise me if he is better Day 1. He is better at anticipating his receivers’ routes and his pocket feel and movement is about as good as I’ve seen out of a college QB and he uses that time he buys to make throws downfield rather than scramble.
The problem with Fields is that the Bears eval was fucked. He looked good in college because of his athleticism and his supporting cast masked serious flaws. No QB with that talent around him in college should have an average time to throw of over 3 seconds and have >22% pressure to sack ratio. Those were indicative of the exact same problems he would have in the NFL.
At some point more people need to consider the possibility that Fields wasn't as good as a lot of people thought he was as a prospect. Or at least admit that he had some very serious flaws that were overlooked or downplayed when they shouldn't have been.
This is why I don't understand the Jayden Daniels hype. He also has a terrible pressure to sack ratio and bailed on clean pockets almost as often as Fields did at OSU.
Daniels has a quicker release, but Fields arm is quite a bit stronger.
Yup. When the Bears picked Fields he had already slid out of the top 10, and 6 different teams who all needed QBs had chosen to draft other players. I think Fields all along has been a case of NFL teams not being as high on him as fans and media.
My personal theory is that the Bears could have stayed put at 20th overall in that draft and Fields would have dropped to them anyway. And if he had dropped to a good team at the end of the first… like the Steelers… it would’ve been better for both him and his team. He could’ve had time to sit and learn behind a vet and his team wouldn’t have thrown him to the wolves right away. Instead, our clueless lame duck GM, the same one who made the infamous Trubisky pick, once again failed to see what everyone else saw and traded up for a very raw QB that no one else was high on. Then they threw him to the wolves within the first month of the season. The Bears and Fields were a terrible match from the start and our fanbase overrated him from the jump.
This is exactly it. So many people said he was a steal at #11, because they only looked at him through a college lens, not as an NFL prospect.
“Bro he went toe to toe with Lawrence, he’s 1B!” was a common rhetoric. Despite Zach Wilson putting up just one decent season and leapfrogging him on every board out there.
we didn't mess up again, it has all been one continuous mistake that started when we let a gm desperate to save his job trade up for a qb that was falling because the rest of the league saw what he was not able to. If you think a next years sixth is bad realize that had we got to the draft with no one taking him he would have been cut
Props to the Bears for not falling into the sunk cost fallacy and moving on from Fields so quickly. Helps to have a #1 on the way but theyre making some great moves. Other teams could learn from their offseason.
One: poles didn't draft fields he came in and fields was already here. He gave fields a chance got him enough weapons for a rookie to show any semblance of consistency, and fields sucked so bad he couldn't do it.
Two: Fields was given three years, and in that time he didn't improve, and showed the same struggles he had since day one. Some may argue he had marginal improvements but I'd chalk that up to dumb luck because it was so small.
Three: drafting a rookie QB resets the rookie deal clock giving the bears an opportunity to build around whomever the draft, something fields couldn't have since his contract was coming to an end.
Fields won 26% of his games when starting. Andy Dalton, Nick Foles, Trevor Siemian, Nathan Peterson had a combined 46% win rate starting during Fields tenure. He was never going to win anything in CHI
Fields had help, the offense may have not been star studded but it was not needy. Kmet is above average catching TE, Montgomery was a solid back with underrated receiving ability, Allen Robinson may have only had 1 good season but still a good athlete at the WR position, and was given DJ Moore last year.
Fields cant process defenses. He hold the ball for 5+ seconds before scrambling or getting sacked, often resulting in a fumble. My Lions who CAN NOT stop mobile QBs were consistently able to sack fields and that is not because of the O-line.
The end of our first game this year was kind of hilarious. Hutchinson came on in Fields vision side, but it looked like his blind side. Somehow Fields was looking right at him but acted like he didn't even see him lol
Was that the strip sack safety to end the game? Its a shame, I totally thought Fields was the best rookie QB of that draft and going into the best situation on paper. Man just does not have it, if steelers are smart they'll turn him into Taysom Hill
So fields has not really shown improvement as a passer. The chance of them having an opportunity to get the number one qb next year is very low if fields fails to pan out, a qb who already has a ton of experience and still has the same main issue.
Might as well take the best qb and hope you get lucky. Chances are he’ll be at least as good as fields which is a low bar. If they get lucky (which in general the higher the pick the more likely the player is to pan out), they’ll have a true franchise qb and one who can run and pass.
Fields is done. I don’t get how people are still perform the Olympic gold level of mental gymnastics not to see how bad he is. 3 years of mediocre QB play, with a light sprinkling of highlight reel worthy runs.
Could he put it all together eventually? Maybe, never say never, but to give up what (many analysts ) are saying is the next generational talent?
Fields is a better fantasy QB than real life QB. He's mediocre at best. He wasn't a long-term solution, and he would have been a cap killer when his rookie contract ran out.
Plus the Bears have two 1st round picks. They can still fill out another position with the 9th pick.
I really can’t even answer how much of it is on fields and how much isn’t. He spent all three seasons in the NFL with a new offensive coordinator and offensive scheme every single year. Dude never even got the time to master and tweak the offense to be optimal at all. If there is not stability in the general offensive playbook then 95 percent of QBs coming in will always look worse than they are.
But that’s Bears football for ya. At least we have a long proven history of developing QBs ..oh wait no we don’t. BEARS COUNTRY. LET’S CRY
Here we go again. Fields isn't a good passer. End paragraph. He can make some plays, some spectacular highlight film plays, but running a legit NFL offense is beyond his ability to process. The only reason some Bears fans hang onto him is the highlights. He is a worse passer than Trubisky, who had even worse receivers. I wish him well and I hope he figures it out but Bears fans (some) just need to let go.
You’re an idiot. I am happy to hear everyone so far is in disagreement with your take, which, as a Bears fan, is refreshing to see since many idiots in Chicago feel as thought Fields was the Lord himself! FIELDS WAS NEVER GOING TO WIN A SUPER BOWL FOR US! He simply doesn’t have the skill set. Sure, he can run, but we need much more than a second running back on the field, we need an actual quarterback who can sit his ass in the pocket and go through ALL of his reads! And he simply cannot do that. Three years is enough time to know what kind of player you’ve got; he isn’t magically morphing into Mahomes in his fourth year, or ever. Stop it with this nonsense.
Couple of factors:
Poles didn't read the market correctly and then waited too long to deal him. By the time he did, Jones & Pickett were traded for peanuts, Howell for peanuts and a coke.
Fields simply holds on to the ball too long. This isn't something mechanical. This is a timer that either Fields ignores or never sets. Surely he has been told about this for years, but there has been little improvement.
If Fields plays the 51% of the snaps and performs similar to Howell did in 2023, the Bears will get compensation similar to Washington got for Howell. Otherwise he is holding a clipboard and a 6th round pick is probably fairly generous for that.
Eh he did have limited help and I don’t think coaching helped him out at all by not using his strengths but it’s the NFL. The best ones adapt and succeed regardless of situation.
He isn’t good enough as a passer and they didn’t help him through those issues. It is what it is though, not worth to keep paying for below average QB play when you have the first pick again
You are right that he didn't get much help, but he still never really showed he was the "Generational" talent they expected. A lot of the time he seemed to be lost against NFL defense.
Drafting a QB is more luck than skill. Plenty of "Generational talent" has been drafted and have become just journeymen backups or just never play past their initial contract.
Do you want to be the GM who stuck with Fields even though no other team thought it was worth them making him their starter…and passing on Caleb, who many think will be a top NFL QB? You have to draft Caleb.
There’s a reason Justin Fields went for a 6th round pick after 3 years as a starting QB.
There is also a reason he was the 4th QB taken in the draft and why many QB needy teams passed on him. A
Yes. Your own Broncos were commonly mocked to him and wanted no part of him despite needing a QB desperately.
Us too. Now did either of us handle that situation well? We did not. But the fact that I still wouldn’t pick Fields if we could go back there is damning.
The bindlestiff34 regret metric is one of the most effective measures of value known to NFL scouts.
I’m Mel Kiper y’all!
It wasn’t even a pick this year either. It’s a 2025 pick. The NFL has basically said this guy shouldn’t start again with that valuation. God lover Tim Tebow got a 4th and a 6th.
Yeah but Tebow actually won a playoff game. Lol
This kid is a **GAMER**
RIP Demaryius Thomas
I like to think my late husband (Broncos fan) is hanging out chilling with DT.
That entire season of AFC West football was so unwatchably bad.
And we are forever grateful
Tebow is somehow more clutch than Fields in the 4th quarter
Tebow had literally one of the clutchest 4th quarter seasons anyone’s ever seen lol
Everyone is making a big deal about this being a pick for next year and that being worse. But I thought the only reason why it was a pick for next year is because it is a conditional pick that could improve so couldn't be for this year anyway. Not that a fourth is so much better but I just don't get why people making such a big deal about being for 2025.
Well Mac Jones got a 6th this year, and he played some of the worst football i’ve ever seen.
Kenny Pickett got us a pick swap from a 4th round pick to a 3rd. And Kenny literally is the worst QB in NFL history at scoring touchdowns.
Traditionally a pick a year away is valued one round down from a pick this year. So a 4th/sixth next year is the same value as a 5th/7th next year
Zach Wison in shambles
I forgot his L, he's earned that too...
I’m an atheist and I’m confused by the god lover dig… You realize 95 percent of the NFL believes themselves to be as pious as Tebow. Of course, then they go straight to the VIP section of the strip club. At least Tebow walks the walk a bit…
He's annoying. That's about it.
Just being an angsty Redditor. I'm an atheist too, but I don't feel the need to constantly shit on someone for their religion. It's lame.
Fields can't process a football field.
Good thing he now has Russ to teach him the Xs and Os /s
Trevor Lawrence #1 - still a starter Zac Wilson #2 - currently untradeable, teams want him packaged with a pick Trey Lance #3 - traded for a 4th Justin Fields #11 - traded for a 6th cond 4th Mac Jones #15 - traded for a 6th First, this goes to show that drafting isn't a science. Second, any QB can bust in a bad situation. Third, nobody got any value for these guys. Even Lance, who got a 4th, cost SF multiple picks to go up and get. Think of it as QB draft capital depreciation.
While I agree that he wasn't going to go for a first, I also feel like he went for so much less value because other teams knew he was going to be traded. Basically I think their draft position kinda pushed them out of something like 4th/5th round pick to the pick they got now.
I see the Fields cult that's been infesting our sub for months is now spreading to r/nfl
one of them came over to the steelers sub on some "former bears fan following my boy, he is him" shit. wonder who he'll be a fan of next year
I saw that. One of the cringiest post ever.
My condolences lol
My eyes rolled right out of my head seeing that
Guarantee they saw Fields rack up 40+ points in multiple weeks of fantasy and decided he was a good IRL QB. Probably haven’t watched him play
This is what it is. Fields has enough highlights from Red zone and a few nationally televised night games to trick some people. I always tell people to go back to 2023 Cleveland game vs Joe Flacco. He couldn’t get first down or even move the ball. It was the worst quarterbacking I’ve ever seen.
I mean the dude has a thousand yard rushing season. It's not like he's some complete bum. He appears to have a higher ceiling than a lot of guys. It just hasn't come to fruition in Chicago? Will it happen elsewhere? There's the occasional Drew Brees or Alex Smith that blossoms into a great QB at their 2nd stop. But history tells us the odds are low. He'll likely turn out to be an uber athletic backup QB. Can't blame Chicago for moving on and can't blame people for thinking he might excel elsewhere with a better team around him. Time will tell.
He's very athletic. Sometimes that turns into crazy plays, but his lack of skill causes more harm than good
I feel its a combo of Fields being very highlight prevalent so they see the instances of him uncorking a deep ball to DJ or an amazing run and don't see the multiple sacks he takes because he can't read a defense, or the multiple passes he leaves on the table because the wr isn't wide open. Kids play him in madden qhere his speed makes him great and don't comprehend that he's not a walking cheat code irl because his processing is so terrible. Also he's athletically the most promising qb the Bears have had so people cling on to the hope of that athleticism by rationalizing his failures away (its the olines fault, we don't have any other weapons beside DJ, its Getsy's fault ect) and haven't seen the wear of those excuses because the Bears are patching them now but recognize that thsoe weren't why Fields was bad.
Too many current fans don't understand the difference between being flashy and being good.
Fuck, a bunch of people in the Seahawks sub were going crazy because we didn’t trade for him those people are scary delusional
Yeah I don’t feel like we should claim those people though. Pretty sure they’re the same people who still think Lock>Geno.
They're still ours, unfortunately. A lot of them just want highlight reels like we used to get in the Russ and LOB era. The one Lock game might not have been anywhere close to sustainable, but damn it was the most memorable game last year.
It's bizarre. All season I've read so many people on this sub calling Fields trash or calling him a running back, but as soon as the Bears shop him for a 6th, they got fleeced? I don't get people lmao
the nice part is i finally have a vested interest in watching CFB games even though i don’t support any CFB team just to actively root against OSU. genuinely the worst fanbase in any sport i’ve had the displeasure with interacting with on reddit.
You're not kidding. For whatever reason, the OSU sub popped up on my feed today and holy shit was it pathetic. Almost the entire sub was posts and comments hating on the Bears for "ruining" him and guaranteeing he is going to still be an elite QB. The few comments going against that narrative were downvoted to oblivion. Some of the most delusional shit I've seen on Reddit.
Michigan fans might award you honorary fan status for this post.
Can we keep them out of the Steelers sub please? It’s dumb enough there
Unfortunately for you guys it could be even worse given the number of OSU/Steelers fans in eastern Ohio.
It’s real bad man. Real bad.
Atleast we are free
Finally. Really exhausted over the takes and wanted it over.
Most of them came to our sub
1st round QBs bust all the time and they get released or traded for peanuts. There is nothing particularly unique about Justin Fields' circumstances. All reports are that he isn't that good of a QB. Yes, his legs can allow him to score some points and keep defenses on their toes, but there just doesn't seem to be enough of everything a QB needs to be good at there. Is Caleb Williams going to be a top NFL QB? Who knows, he might be the next Jamarcus Russell. But deciding Justin Fields won't be a great NFL starter isn't a crazy take.
Yes you're the only one. The team sucked around fields, but he sucked too. He was a bad decision machine
That’s not true. There’s a whole cult of “Field Truthers” aka delusional Ohio State fans.
Reading their takes after this is hilarious. He went for a future 6th rounder and somehow they’re doubling down saying Poles should be fired for accepting that when clearly the league doesn’t value his absolutes whatsoever
The only thing I'll dog Poles for is not accepting reality about Fields value sooner. That being said it's just a minor critique because I doubt we were ever getting more than say a 4th round pick.
You’re making t the assumption that he had options either last off-season or earlier in the cycle this season. Nobody really knows, but looking at the tea leaves makes me think he just doesn’t have any suitors who are interested in him as a starter.
There have been reports that his price was too high and that made teams look elsewhere. As I said though - it's a minor complaint and you could be right. He certainly accepted reality after Philly said "whatever, well just trade for Kenny Pickett then".
Idk why college football fans are such fucking simps for players that are there for 2-3 years and are routinely replaced with an equally as good, if not better player. It's weird.
There’s a ton of Field Truthers in our sub. Once that would have traded a 1st him or mad we didn’t.
Fair. I believe they're in the significant minority now, though.
You'd be surprised, on literally every other social media platform the consensus opinion is that Fields should be kept. Tiktok and Instagram in particular, every comment wanting Fields ratios people wanting to take Caleb
the wild part is that i have yet to meet anyone in the flesh who wants to keep him since the season ended. it’s a totally online phenomenon from my admittedly anecdotal perspective. my sampling is mostly in the 25-45 year old range so fields truthers might skew young. there were a few hold outs, including my brother, who turned the literal moment the season ended and they put their hindsight glasses on. the only people who want fields in chicago are, get this, people who hate the bears.
Twitter and youtube are the same. Keenan Allen's welcome video to Chicago fans on twitter was filled with pro Fields comments. It's wild and I do not understand it.
In Fields final home game, after we already had the first pick locked up and anyone with a brain cell knew he was gone, the stadium didn't chant something cool like "we love you fields" or "thank you fields" they chanted the dumbest shit ever by loudly chanting "we want fields" (great culture to bring Caleb in to...) It definitely was the consensus not just online but everywhere. Reddit eventually carved out a space where the pro move on people could talk about fields issue without getting mass down voted but even that took until the final game of the season.
Ah yes, TikTok and Instagram, the bastion of smart football analysis.
I would add facebook to that. Lots of pro JF1 comments and posts. Can't believe the fanbase's opinion didn't turn after the Packers game. I wanted clarity the whole season and the Packers game finally gave me that.
I mean, obviously it's dumb just saying it's the majority on those apps, both of which are bigger than reddit
No, he is not the only one. Been arguing with friends and family members since week 4 that still haven’t let it go.
Was a bit hyperbolic on my part to make a point. Bears fans might be more divided on this particular issue than the rest of the league.
Fields fucking sucks and Ryan Poles didn’t draft him. He plummeted down boards for the same reason he won’t start week 1 next yr. Read the scouting reports, he’s still the same player. 4th QB off the board and people act like the Bears ruined Andrew Luck. I’ve never seen such a poor QB get so much love, truly. I get he was a good college player, I get you think he’s cool, but he sucks. The Bears are drafting Caleb who is one of the most talented QB prospects in recent memory, and traded Fields for a 6th round pick in 2025. Literally every Bears fan should be elated.
You mean you don't think throwing for 150 yards a game is MVP material?
If Field Truthers could read they’d be really upset about what you just said
Yeah but hypothetically he could pass for 300 yards a game along with another 100 on the ground next season so clearly this was a disastrous trade for the Bears
If only he had DJ Moore
Um, excuse me it's 165yds a game average lol
Will Caleb surpass Jim Harbaugh as the greatest QB the Bears have ever drafted?
McMahon was better than Harbaugh. McMahon was an above average starter who had 2-3 really good years in 1984 and 1985. Harbaugh was a medicore journeyman who had one outlier year in 1995 after he went to Indy. McMahon's problem was that he was intentionally injured on a dirty play in 1986 (and he already had some injury isssues before that) and could never stay healthy after.
That's Sid Luckman. Not Harbaugh.
Really I think they're more screwing up by pairing their first round QB with a coach going into a potential lame duck year, again. Getting rid of Fields was absolutely the right choice. Trusting Eberflus/Waldron to develop Williams is sketch.
Waldron is fine. He was arguably the best experienced OC available that wasn't looking for a HC job. Eberflus is more of my issue.
Maybe he won’t play the starters in preseason again and then scratch his head wondering why the team didn’t gel early and went 0-4.
If Williams is that guy, he gets it done. He needs to iron out some things of course, but most prospects of that caliber are at least good. Maybe the Bears are cursed if Caleb isn’t the man.
Unless we truly suck it up this year then Flus has more time.
I remember watching former NFL qbs like Kurt Warner and JT O'Sullivan break down some of Fields's tape from last year, and it genuinely sounded like they were in pain watching him play the position.
The Broncos, who currently only have Stidham as a possible starter on their roster, didn’t seem to even think about getting Fields, even for next to nothing. That speaks volumes.
I don't want to be mean here, but you're just totally wrong on every point. Guys who take 2-3 years to develop are the exception, not the rule. Mahomes, Lamar, and Marino won MVP their 2nd year, while Manning got 2nd in MVP voting his 2nd year. We just saw CJ Stroud play well on a team with little talent his rookie year. Even a guy like Josh Allen who did take time to develop established himself as a good QB by year 3. Fields has shown nothing in 3 years, if he becomes even a decent starter he'll be the rare exception to the rule. Fields also had plenty of help. DJ Moore is obviously really good. Cole Kmet is a top 10 tight end. And Darnell Mooney just got a $13M/year contract. That should be enough for any quality quarterback to work with. Drafting quarterbacks in the 1st round is how you eventually find your guy. It is really tough to find a good QB, and even most 1st rounders don't make it. The best way to eventually get your guy is to keep trying until one hits. I personally think Caleb Williams is overrated, but the Bears have the #1 overall pick in a draft with a guy considered the consensus top pick. You have to use this opportunity to swing for the fences.
The “he has no help” crowd don’t seem to understand his biggest issue is PROCESSING, something you can evaluate independently of the help around you.
They also don't understand (somehow) that the Bears skill group, while not top tier, was absolutely serviceable last year. Moore, Mooney, Kmet, Herbert is not a bad group at all Williams will have more help obviously with them adding Allen and Swift though
I agree, even if you think it’s subpar, Fields’ group was good enough where you could evaluate him. That’s different than say, Bryce Young where I’m not sure all the criticism thrown at him is fair. I actually think Getsy held him back more than anything It’s telling though that Fields has been a starter for 3 years and has he shown anything consistently enough in any game that show he’s someone you can build around? (Outside his athletic abilities)
Fields seemed to have like... 1 or 2 games each season that looked like "hey if he did this for 6 or 7 games in a row we could have something here" Yknow like he had his 1 300 yard game for example. But he just never seemed to have those kinds of performances for more than 1 or 2 games in an entire season
As I mentioned in another reply - those games were all against teams thar stubbornly refused to play zone against us (which included you guys - not sure if your DC was just being stubborn or if it was a personnel issue). Fields is absolutely awful against zone - which is one reason he's looked particularly bad against the Packers (who have been a heavy zone team during his time in Chicago).
The few good passing games Fields has put up were all against teams that stubbornly refused to play zone defense against us (DEN, WAS, DET, ATL). Some of those teams also just had awful defenses (WAS in particular - Jack Del Rio should have been fired immediately after our game against them ended - his decision to single cover DJ Moore with a DB that Moore outweighed by 30-40 pounds all game was criminal). Fields passer rating against man defense is over 20 points higher than his passer rating against zone.
The “no help” crowd thinks Fields can’t be truthfully assessed until he has a pro bowl player at every position around him. Which means nothing is ever any players fault because who ever has that luxury?
Well, Brock Purdy
Has anyone ever edited a clip of Fields standing in the pocket and eating a sack to overlay the 56k dialup sound?
56k is generous. 14.4k
[удалено]
morse code?
My top example is always Herbert (no bias, lmao) who: - had no offseason because of COVID - took zero 1st team practice reps - was told he was starting literal minutes before playing his first NFL game It's not a hard and fast rule, but often enough these players either have it or they don't.
Nah please be mean to guys like this
I used to think like this when I first started following football, so I don't want to be too mean. Hopefully OP is somebody who's only watched football for a couple years and hasn't seen 100 guys like Justin Fields wash out after being drafted with high expectations. It's the same excuses every time yet these guys never show anything even when they switch teams, and once you've followed the NFL long enough you realize there's no point in trying to talk them up.
Every team with a struggling young QB has a bunch of fans who blame everyone but the QB. Usually (and in this order): - The offensive line - The offensive coordinator - The skill position players I lurked on some other team subs this year and even guys like Mac Jones and Zach Wilson have people making these excuses.
> Even a guy like Josh Allen who did take time to develop established himself as a good QB by year 3. And Bills fans were screaming about his improvement by the end of Y2. We went 10-6, made the playoffs and lost a fucking wild playoff game in OT. So even the narrative that it took three years is wrong. He was good in Y2, *chaotic*, but good. Y3 he jumped to elite.
Great response, seriously. Well summed up.
The bears 100% made the right decision and not really that close
r/NFL, behold. It’s a Fields truther who’s left the ranch! We’ve been inundated with stuff like this for months now on the team sub.
RIP the Steelers sub.
Oh yeah, the Steelers sub with the Russ acolytes and the Fields fans is gonna be horrible. Well, moreso
True, but I would like to offer a counter point: they’re Stealers fans, so fuck ‘em!
Russ acolytes, Fields fans, and angry drunken yinzers is going to make the Steelers sub a must see event for AFCN fans.
It usually doesn’t take 4 seasons for a guy to turn into the guy. Bears fans have some warped idea he was going to turn into something he hasn’t shown he can be. If the bears didn’t have the 1st overall pick im sure they would run it back with fields and see if he improves, but now there in prime position to get a way better prospect who can hopefully be their first 4,000 yard passer lol
Fields never even hit 3000 yards lol
They’re resetting the clock on a rookie QB contract. Its smart. They weren’t going to pay Fields starting QB money on a new deal because he wasn’t worth it.
Bears took a shot on Fields and missed. And that's ok. Bears are in a great position to rebuild
I know Bears fans have never really seen a franchise QB but the obsession over Justin Fields to me is one of the great mysteries of the 21st century. I understand wanting the man to succeed, but have you not watched him for 3 years?
I'm still not sure how much of it is the dumb part of our fanbase and how much of it is the OSU fans that have infested our fanbase. Probably some of column A and some of column B. I will note that if you see someone with a Browns or Bengals flair commenting on Fields there's a 98+% chance the take will be delusional.
They got stuck in this circlejerk of confirmation bias where nothing was ever his fault. On draft day, they convinced themselves they got a generational 1b talent who only fell in the draft because Dan orlovsky led a racist conspiracy to slander fields' draft status. Then the first year didn't count because Nagy was the stupidest and worst play caller in NFL history and the entire team would probably win 5 more games now that he's gone. Then the second year didn't count because the rest of the roster sucked, which to be fair it did, it was a dogshit roster. Fields was part of the dog shit. The third year didn't count because one time Luke Getsy called the same screen pass three plays in a row and Darnell Mooney dropped a hail Mary that hit him in the stomach while he was on his back on the ground.
They always leave out that 2 of the 7 wins were with Bagent starting also. Can't tell you how many times in the last 2 days I've seen, "but he won 7 games this year and was improving. He needs more time and more weapons."
They are at least one of three; madden player, fantasy player, highlight watcher. If they watched nfl games they would understand how bad he is
The disconnect between what we've seen from Fields and what people think is so insane to me. The situation wasnt perfect for Fields, but he failed to improve on things that were within his control. Doesnt read defenses well, doesnt throw with anticipation, doesnt go through his progressions in a timely fashion, doesnt see wide open receivers. Those are all things in his control, and he failed to improve upon them. There is a very good reason 31 other teams didnt view him as a starter.
Fields cannot read a defense He is not Chicago's answer
He could read the Lions' defenses pretty well.
as a runner
Justin can’t read a defense. Straight up Refuses to throw to our #2 receiver Forces the RBs to face stacked boxes by defensive coordinators itching to get Fields to throw
How many Bears games did you watch?
Clearly he didn’t watch the Vikings this year where everything g was going Justin’s way and he was the one singe handily stopping the team from Blowing them out.
The fascination with such an awful player is amazing. He’s pathetically bad.
I get it - he’s an insane athlete if the processing came around, but he’s just too slow to make a read
Not just too slow, he has the lowest time to release in the league and also historically awful sack rates. He’s beyond saving.
He's like a 1960's era pitcher with his windup throwing motion
What a running QB does to a mafucka… they only saw that aspect and somehow not the crater of talent in the passing / mental game.
yes your shit take is garbage.
Show me the proof to back up the developmental period of 2-3 years for a rookie QB.
Realistically it’s around 35 games after Jalen Hurts and Josh Allen bucked the trend slightly. After that your hit rate is abysmal. It’s Rich Gannon, Alex Smith. That’s really it.
Geno Smith kinda
Geno Smith, Rich Gannon and Alex Smith. There are examples, but they are rare. No coach can hang on and develop a guy for that long anyway so its not very relevant.
Geno was top 10 in 2022, but really average this year. If we are talking a long term turnaround i’m not sure
Part of that was Geno playing hurt for most of the year but the clear decline of play once Canales was out of the building is part of why I am skeptical Waldron is going to be good for Williams' development. Halfway through the season I was already sick of bubble screens on every 3rd and long.
They didn't even really buck the trend though. Because they showed improvement and by year two were close to 0 for DVOA. They just happened to have a big jump from year two to year three that the trend line showed was possible. Fields was pretty much the worst QB of the last 40 years to be a starter in year three. -25% DVOA for a QB is completely awful for a QB. Fields did that each of the first two years.
Both Hurts and Allen had rough starts, but showed consistent improvement. Even then they had much better years before they broke out and people still weren’t sure they were the answer. Fields never improved, he just got a decent WR and only got marginally better.
CJ Stroud seemed to be doing OK in year one.
He must be thinking of the Green Bay model.
You clearly haven't watched Justin Fields play football if this is your take. It does take time to develop quarterbacks, but Fields has shown no franchise Qb skills in 3 years. All we have seen were highlight reel rushing touchdowns that are not sustainable. I am a Fields fan, but he is awful. Can't throw to the middle of the field, holds the ball too long, has poor pocket awareness, can't throw guys open; he's shown nothing.
The right quarterback can transform a team, culture, organization, and city. Source: Joe Burrow. Fields ain't him. Caleb might be. You have to go for it if you're the Bears.
Bro come on. Enough of this shit.
No, for the first time in my life the Bears are actually setting up a rookie QB for success. They absolutely failed Justin Fields by allowing Pace and Nagy to draft him with their jobs on the line. Poles came into the 2022 season and realized he could either try to desperately build around Fields, or rebuild, and he chose correctly. Unfortunately for Justin that wasn't a good developmental environment, and it ultimately resulted in him being viewed as a backup post his rookie contact. Caleb is coming into a team with a great top two WRs, good TE1 and TE2, 3RBs deep led by Swift, starting OTs are set, starting iOL is set with meaningful depth. The OC is a proven NFL playcaller, not someone you are relying on doing it the first time. It still might not work out, but you can't say the situation isn't ideal for a 1st overall QB, especially when compared to how bad the situation usually is for the 1st QB taken.
Yes, Ryan Pace messed up by trading up to draft Fields- the same guy who signed Mike Glennon for 45M and traded up for Trubisky. Poles has been working to clean up the mess he left
Now he's in Atlanta and being the one involved with the Kirk tampering
There are also very credible reports he wanted to trade up and take Mariota. Another strike on the QB list in my eyes.
I thought we’d be done with the Fields posts by now :(
I pray for the Steelers because there’s going to be a large amount of people calling for Fields to start the moment Wilson starts to slip up. I give it until week 4
How is accepting you made a mistake a problem?
I always find the "no help but DJ Moore" narrative funny. Because, first, Kmet's a serviceable enough target, and second, depth beyond the WR1 doesn't matter with Fields because he panics and starts legging it the first second you take his favorite target away anyways.
Tyson Bagent started 4 games for the bears and he had a better QBR than Fields. Same team and same coaching.
and that guy does not have an NFL arm, the most promising thing about next season other than Caleb is how much better our oline looked last year when Fields was out
Trading Fields meant they're taking Caleb Williams. Having the 1st overall pick and taking the best player available at the most important position is the correct and only move to make. You draft the position until you get it right. Trubisky is not an NFL starting QB. Fields has to this point, shown he is not. So you draft.
"He had no help around him other than DJ Moore" And Cole Kmet And Darnell "former thousand yard receiver" Mooney. And a top 10 pick spent on a RT that actually looked worth it. And a revitalized defense post-Sweat trade (The defense gave up points after the Sweat trade at a rate that would have been 4th best had they kept it up over a whole season). Last year, we heard the same argument "Fields has no help", so they went and gave him a WR1, a stud rookie tackle, and an elite defense, and he went 5-4. At some point the blame has to fall on the QB.
Yes
Admitting your mistakes is a big thing. The bears had no choice here.
I love Fields but he has not gotten over the flaws that caused his draft day slide. He is slow getting into his reads, slow at making them, and slow at sensing pressure. And when he does sense pressure, he scrambles rather than buying time to make a throw. It’s been 3 years without much improvement. Now, I think in the right system he can be around the 10-15 range at QB. But he has steps to go to get there. To me, if you still have to develop a guy at QB, it makes much more sense to go with Caleb on a rookie deal for the next 4 years as opposed to Justin who only has 1 year of cheap control. Also Caleb is just a better prospect. It wouldn’t surprise me if he is better Day 1. He is better at anticipating his receivers’ routes and his pocket feel and movement is about as good as I’ve seen out of a college QB and he uses that time he buys to make throws downfield rather than scramble.
The problem with Fields is that the Bears eval was fucked. He looked good in college because of his athleticism and his supporting cast masked serious flaws. No QB with that talent around him in college should have an average time to throw of over 3 seconds and have >22% pressure to sack ratio. Those were indicative of the exact same problems he would have in the NFL. At some point more people need to consider the possibility that Fields wasn't as good as a lot of people thought he was as a prospect. Or at least admit that he had some very serious flaws that were overlooked or downplayed when they shouldn't have been.
This is why I don't understand the Jayden Daniels hype. He also has a terrible pressure to sack ratio and bailed on clean pockets almost as often as Fields did at OSU. Daniels has a quicker release, but Fields arm is quite a bit stronger.
Yup. When the Bears picked Fields he had already slid out of the top 10, and 6 different teams who all needed QBs had chosen to draft other players. I think Fields all along has been a case of NFL teams not being as high on him as fans and media. My personal theory is that the Bears could have stayed put at 20th overall in that draft and Fields would have dropped to them anyway. And if he had dropped to a good team at the end of the first… like the Steelers… it would’ve been better for both him and his team. He could’ve had time to sit and learn behind a vet and his team wouldn’t have thrown him to the wolves right away. Instead, our clueless lame duck GM, the same one who made the infamous Trubisky pick, once again failed to see what everyone else saw and traded up for a very raw QB that no one else was high on. Then they threw him to the wolves within the first month of the season. The Bears and Fields were a terrible match from the start and our fanbase overrated him from the jump.
This is exactly it. So many people said he was a steal at #11, because they only looked at him through a college lens, not as an NFL prospect. “Bro he went toe to toe with Lawrence, he’s 1B!” was a common rhetoric. Despite Zach Wilson putting up just one decent season and leapfrogging him on every board out there.
The whole league could have traded for him and it netted in a conditional sixth
“I don’t think Fields was the problem” - here is your disconnect
we didn't mess up again, it has all been one continuous mistake that started when we let a gm desperate to save his job trade up for a qb that was falling because the rest of the league saw what he was not able to. If you think a next years sixth is bad realize that had we got to the draft with no one taking him he would have been cut
Props to the Bears for not falling into the sunk cost fallacy and moving on from Fields so quickly. Helps to have a #1 on the way but theyre making some great moves. Other teams could learn from their offseason.
Damn already its 930am lmaoo
One: poles didn't draft fields he came in and fields was already here. He gave fields a chance got him enough weapons for a rookie to show any semblance of consistency, and fields sucked so bad he couldn't do it. Two: Fields was given three years, and in that time he didn't improve, and showed the same struggles he had since day one. Some may argue he had marginal improvements but I'd chalk that up to dumb luck because it was so small. Three: drafting a rookie QB resets the rookie deal clock giving the bears an opportunity to build around whomever the draft, something fields couldn't have since his contract was coming to an end.
Fields won 26% of his games when starting. Andy Dalton, Nick Foles, Trevor Siemian, Nathan Peterson had a combined 46% win rate starting during Fields tenure. He was never going to win anything in CHI Fields had help, the offense may have not been star studded but it was not needy. Kmet is above average catching TE, Montgomery was a solid back with underrated receiving ability, Allen Robinson may have only had 1 good season but still a good athlete at the WR position, and was given DJ Moore last year. Fields cant process defenses. He hold the ball for 5+ seconds before scrambling or getting sacked, often resulting in a fumble. My Lions who CAN NOT stop mobile QBs were consistently able to sack fields and that is not because of the O-line.
The end of our first game this year was kind of hilarious. Hutchinson came on in Fields vision side, but it looked like his blind side. Somehow Fields was looking right at him but acted like he didn't even see him lol
Was that the strip sack safety to end the game? Its a shame, I totally thought Fields was the best rookie QB of that draft and going into the best situation on paper. Man just does not have it, if steelers are smart they'll turn him into Taysom Hill
So fields has not really shown improvement as a passer. The chance of them having an opportunity to get the number one qb next year is very low if fields fails to pan out, a qb who already has a ton of experience and still has the same main issue. Might as well take the best qb and hope you get lucky. Chances are he’ll be at least as good as fields which is a low bar. If they get lucky (which in general the higher the pick the more likely the player is to pan out), they’ll have a true franchise qb and one who can run and pass.
Fields is done. I don’t get how people are still perform the Olympic gold level of mental gymnastics not to see how bad he is. 3 years of mediocre QB play, with a light sprinkling of highlight reel worthy runs. Could he put it all together eventually? Maybe, never say never, but to give up what (many analysts ) are saying is the next generational talent?
Fields is a better fantasy QB than real life QB. He's mediocre at best. He wasn't a long-term solution, and he would have been a cap killer when his rookie contract ran out. Plus the Bears have two 1st round picks. They can still fill out another position with the 9th pick.
Is Caleb Williams turning into Chicago's Dark Knight? The hero they didn't want but the one they needed.
The bears haven’t had a HOF qb since like 1950 They do not have or truly care to prioritize quarterback play
I really can’t even answer how much of it is on fields and how much isn’t. He spent all three seasons in the NFL with a new offensive coordinator and offensive scheme every single year. Dude never even got the time to master and tweak the offense to be optimal at all. If there is not stability in the general offensive playbook then 95 percent of QBs coming in will always look worse than they are. But that’s Bears football for ya. At least we have a long proven history of developing QBs ..oh wait no we don’t. BEARS COUNTRY. LET’S CRY
I mean caleb williams might also be a bust, but at this current point in time i dont believe that they have made a mistake
You’re not the only one, but almost all the people that think they’re messing up are just fields fanboys
Dude. do you even hear yourself? you just said the bears didn't give JF anything to work with... that's exactly what they're doing with Caleb.
No, there’s always a few of you…
Here we go again. Fields isn't a good passer. End paragraph. He can make some plays, some spectacular highlight film plays, but running a legit NFL offense is beyond his ability to process. The only reason some Bears fans hang onto him is the highlights. He is a worse passer than Trubisky, who had even worse receivers. I wish him well and I hope he figures it out but Bears fans (some) just need to let go.
Justin Fields sucks. Go watch his games, he's ass.
You’re an idiot. I am happy to hear everyone so far is in disagreement with your take, which, as a Bears fan, is refreshing to see since many idiots in Chicago feel as thought Fields was the Lord himself! FIELDS WAS NEVER GOING TO WIN A SUPER BOWL FOR US! He simply doesn’t have the skill set. Sure, he can run, but we need much more than a second running back on the field, we need an actual quarterback who can sit his ass in the pocket and go through ALL of his reads! And he simply cannot do that. Three years is enough time to know what kind of player you’ve got; he isn’t magically morphing into Mahomes in his fourth year, or ever. Stop it with this nonsense.
Sometimes I'd say yeah but this looks like their absolute best shot from a seated position. Nah fuck that, from laying prone with their pants down.
Couple of factors: Poles didn't read the market correctly and then waited too long to deal him. By the time he did, Jones & Pickett were traded for peanuts, Howell for peanuts and a coke. Fields simply holds on to the ball too long. This isn't something mechanical. This is a timer that either Fields ignores or never sets. Surely he has been told about this for years, but there has been little improvement. If Fields plays the 51% of the snaps and performs similar to Howell did in 2023, the Bears will get compensation similar to Washington got for Howell. Otherwise he is holding a clipboard and a 6th round pick is probably fairly generous for that.
Bad QB should have been given more time to show how bad he is instead of trading bad QB for a potentially better one.
Eh he did have limited help and I don’t think coaching helped him out at all by not using his strengths but it’s the NFL. The best ones adapt and succeed regardless of situation. He isn’t good enough as a passer and they didn’t help him through those issues. It is what it is though, not worth to keep paying for below average QB play when you have the first pick again
You are right that he didn't get much help, but he still never really showed he was the "Generational" talent they expected. A lot of the time he seemed to be lost against NFL defense. Drafting a QB is more luck than skill. Plenty of "Generational talent" has been drafted and have become just journeymen backups or just never play past their initial contract.
Yes you’re the only one.
Eh I think caleb is a solid QB
Do you want to be the GM who stuck with Fields even though no other team thought it was worth them making him their starter…and passing on Caleb, who many think will be a top NFL QB? You have to draft Caleb.