MOBILE, Ala. — Nothing would surprise me this offseason for the Chicago Bears, whose window to contention is open after reaching the divisional round of the NFL playoffs this season.
They finally have a talented quarterback capable of elevating those around him, and if Year 2 with coach Ben Johnson brings Caleb Williams to new heights, the Bears will be well-positioned for years to come.
The most obvious task for general manager Ryan Poles last year — after landing Johnson as the replacement for the fired Matt Eberflus — was clear to all observers. Poles had to stop using patches on the offensive line, something the Bears had been doing before his arrival, and repour the foundation in front of Williams.
It was a job well done with trades for guards Joe Thuney and Jonah Jackson and the signing of center Drew Dalman in free agency. Left tackle looms as a question after second-round pick Ozzy Trapilo suffered a torn patellar tendon in his left knee in the wild-card round. Rehabilitation is expected to carry into next season — more on that situation in a little bit.
While the O-line was the unmistakable first order of business for Poles when he arrived in Mobile for the 2025 Senior Bowl, it’s less clear this year. Edge rusher? Defensive tackle? Left tackle? Secondary?
When I say nothing would surprise me, some will interpret that as code for a splash move in the weeks and months to come. Trade for a marquee defensive lineman? Make a power-play move in free agency? Don’t rule anything out, but I’d probably set odds against both.
“We want to stay flexible,” Poles said after the season. “We want to stay open-minded. We want to stay committed to building this team the right way because I think that’s the best way to sustain success.”
It also wouldn’t surprise me if the Bears pick their spots in free agency — there isn’t an overwhelming crop of star players who will be available — and focus on adding another strong draft class.
The Bears got more out of their 2025 draft class, from top to bottom, than they have from an entire group in a long time. That bodes well for the future of a roster that has lacked young building blocks, players who provide exceptional value during their rookie deals before earning second contracts.
Cornerback Jaylon Johnson, tight end Cole Kmet and nickel cornerback Kyler Gordon are the only current Bears who were drafted by the team and earned a second contract. Former GM Ryan Pace drafted Johnson and Kmet.
Right tackle Darnell Wright is a good bet to join that group this offseason now that the 2023 first-round pick is eligible for a second contract. More Poles draft picks figure to be rewarded down the road.
As the Bears prepare for an offseason in which Poles said there will be more “constraints” because of the salary-cap situation, they need the value of having core players on rookie deals. When you look to the future and the possibility of discussing a second contract for Williams as early as next offseason, it’s even more imperative to hit on draft picks because those “constraints” are heightened once the quarterback is on a massive deal.
Twelve NFL quarterbacks have a 2026 cap hit of $46 million or more. For comparison, Williams will count $10,768,925 against the Bears cap next season.
So when I say nothing would surprise me, really anything is possible. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Poles, who has been aggressive in the past, will pounce with a huge move designed to transform a defense that coordinator Dennis Allen did a really nice job with in Year 1, all things considered.
Or perhaps the Bears will lean into “draft and develop” with Ben Johnson and his staff and pick their spots with free agency and potential trades, feeling good about the group they already have that was one play away from reaching the NFC championship game.
10 thoughts from the Senior Bowl after spending the last four days chatting with folks across the league.
1. The next big NFL event — after the Super Bowl — is free agency, and it’s not a banner class.
Bengals defensive end Trey Hendrickson gestures during a game against the Steelers on Jan. 4, 2025, in Pittsburgh. (Matt Durisko/AP)
That doesn’t mean huge dollars won’t be flying around March 11 when the new league year begins. A list of the top projected free agents has names such as George Pickens, Trey Hendrickson, Tyler Linderbaum, Daniel Jones, Jaelan Phillips and Alec Pierce.
Pickens had a breakout 1,429-yard season for the Dallas Cowboys in 2025 but was viewed as a bit of a malcontent at times in Pittsburgh. Hendrickson, 31, underwent core muscle surgery after his season was derailed by a hip injury. Linderbaum is a standout center for the Baltimore Ravens, but center is not considered a premium position.
Jones probably has a market of one team — the Indianapolis Colts. Phillips is an athletic defensive end but had only five sacks last season between the Philadelphia Eagles and Miami Dolphins. Pierce was a big-play threat for the Colts, but the Glenbard West alumnus is a straight-line runner.
“Not a great year for free agency,” one general manager said Tuesday as he walked into Whitney Hancock Stadium for practice. “I wouldn’t want to count on turning around my team with guys you’re going to wind up having to overpay to sign.”
Added an assistant GM: “This is really what free agency has kind of become. Look back over the past couple years. The guys that are actually available, it’s really never a list that’s going to blow you away. It’s the old deal where you’re better off with the devil you know than the devil you don’t. So teams are re-signing their own guys and there just aren’t many guys in their prime, healthy and coming off productive seasons that are even out there.
“Then you have to pay such a premium to have a chance for the guys that might fit that profile and are really good players that haven’t reached (age) 30. That’s why most teams, the good ones that have a clue what the hell they are doing, they really pick and choose.”
The good news for the Bears is they’re no longer desperately seeking building blocks in free agency to turn around the roster and upgrade the culture in the locker room. The team has spent far too much for far too little in free agency over much of the last 15 years. It’s reflected in the record — and in the fact the Bears rarely have landed compensatory draft picks.
The Bears have reached the point at which they can be more selective in free agency, and the timing is good because they’re tighter against the cap. Yes, they can make moves to free up plenty of space, but the bill always comes due.
It’s because they’re snug against the cap — and because Hendrickson is on the downside of his career, coming off a season marred by injury — that I’m skeptical the Bears would be involved with him. I chatted with a good handful of personnel folks around town, and let’s just say the buzz for Hendrickson that exists on social media wasn’t matched in those conversations.
The Bears’ offseason focus starts on the defensive line, in my opinion — both edge and tackle. It stands to reason they will seek a blend of veterans and draft picks to augment what they have. Ryan Poles and Ben Johnson were pretty emphatic in their support for defensive end Montez Sweat, who came on after a slow statistical start to the season through five games.
The way Sweat began, it was inching toward the point where you would start to wonder if he had a future on the roster in 2026. But then he had at least one sack in four consecutive games and started affecting the quarterback and pocket more regularly. Maybe he’s not the dominant force the Bears dreamed of when they acquired him, but not many teams trade elite pass rushers, the Cowboys and Jerry Jones excluded.
Austin Booker will be really interesting next season — he really came on when he finally got onto the field at midseason. He looked good early in training camp, suffered a knee injury and sort of fell into that trap where he was out of sight and out of mind for a new coaching staff that didn’t know a ton about him.
Booker had 4½ sacks and eight quarterback hits in the final six games, playoffs included, and remains a bit of a wild stallion. But the Bears consider him very coachable and eager, and he plays with a high motor. His ceiling has only gone up since the start of his rookie season.
But the Bears need to add to their group of edge rushers because who knows when Dayo Odeyingbo will be coming back from a torn Achilles tendon. The same goes with 2025 second-round pick Shemar Turner and his return from a torn ACL. If everyone is healthy and productive and a newcomer or two is in the mix, that’s a great problem for Dennis Allen and defensive line coach Jeremy Garrett.
It’s a little early to start linking names to the Bears who are anything but random guesses, but the draft is deep on the defensive line and they will have multiple options in free agency.
“That’s an area we’re going to continue to press and get better,” Poles said on Jan. 21 when asked about the pass rush. “I look forward to Shemar getting back and Dayo getting back. I thought Sweat did a good job this year. I think sometimes we get hung up on sacks, and sacks are important — he did get into double digits (11 including playoffs) — but I think his all-around game was good.
“The way he defended the run, defended the perimeter as well as applied pressure was good. But we need him to continue to get better too. So we’ll evaluate everything, but that’s always — O-line, D-line — that’s always a space where we want to get better.”
2. The four best prospects here, in some order, are probably Clemson defensive end T.J. Parker, Texas Tech defensive tackle Lee Hunter, Florida defensive tackle Caleb Banks and Tennessee cornerback Colton Hood.
National team defensive end T.J. Parker of Clemson runs through drills during practice for the Senior Bowl on Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026, in Mobile, Ala. (Butch Dill/AP)
I’ll get into Parker and some of the edge rushers here. He was the first name National coach Clint Hurtt mentioned Tuesday night after practice when asked who stood out to him on Day 1. Hurtt, the Eagles defensive line coach and a former D-line and outside linebackers coach for the Bears, has a pretty good idea what he’s looking at.
Hurtt sees Parker, who measured 6-foot-3½ and 263 pounds, as a complete defensive end. He certainly has the size and length Dennis Allen seems to seek.
“Parker is an every-down player as a rookie,” said Hurtt, who interviewed last week for the Dolphins defensive coordinator job. “He can set edges in the run game. He’s got some suddenness, so he can beat blocks with power or a beat a guy across his face. He’s got good rush ability and he has the power to run over a tackle, which to me is critical. You’ve got to be able to do that.
“Everybody goes crazy for the super-fast, quick guys, but if they can’t run a tackle over to collapse the pocket on the QB, they struggle. He can do that.”
Parker had a huge sophomore season in 2024 with 11 sacks and 19½ tackles for a loss. That came after a 5½-sack freshman season. His sack total dropped to five in 2025, but in three seasons for the Tigers he amassed 21½ sacks and 41½ tackles for a loss.
“Not great this year, but I can’t unsee what I saw last year,” Senior Bowl director Drew Fabianich said. “That’s special rush tools. He’s twitchy for as long as he is. He’s good against the run. He’s got a great counter and a good toolbox. He’s a really good athlete for his size.”
Parker, 21, probably will fall between the end of Round 1 and somewhere in Round 2, but the draft process is really just getting going.
American team defensive end Zion Young of Missouri runs through drills during practice for the Senior Bowl on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026, in Mobile, Ala. (Butch Dill/AP)
Missouri’s Zion Young is another Senior Bowl player with the measurables to be a physical end that would seem to fit the prototype the Bears have been hunting. He measured 6-5¼ and 262 pounds and put together some strong performances with a long-arm move in one-on-one pass-rush drills. He’s one of many big, athletic defensive linemen Missouri has produced recently.
A transfer from Michigan State, Young had 6½ sacks last season and was second in the SEC with 17 tackles for a loss. He’s considered a plus run defender. A national scout who has been to Columbia, Mo., called him a good fit for any team. I asked about concern over a December DUI arrest and was told, “He’s a good kid. No character concerns.”
Young is probably a Day 2 pick, but the scout said: “He could sneak into Round 1. You’ve got to find 32 of them somewhere.” That comment is indicative of the draft not being stacked with high-end talent, so the rankings from, say, No. 15 to about No. 50 will be significantly different from team to team.
3. Mobile native Lee Hunter has been a popular player.
National team defensive tackle Lee Hunter of Texas Tech runs through drills during practice for the Senior Bowl on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026, in Mobile, Ala. (Butch Dill/AP)
He gained recognition playing for Texas Tech this past season after beginning his career as a redshirt at Auburn and then playing three years at Central Florida before transferring to Lubbock, Texas.
Hunter is 6-3½ and 320 pounds, and you don’t see many men that size who are nimble and quick on their feet. He was a fluid mover in practice and showed the strength and lower-body power to hold up against double teams, and I thought he looked like a guy who can develop a stronger base when he gets into an NFL strength program.
The Red Raiders had the highest-paid defensive line in college football last season, and while end David Bailey has a higher profile, keep an eye on Hunter in the next couple of months.
Hunter had a season-high seven tackles and two tackles for a loss in the Orange Bowl loss to Oregon and was proud to single that out as his best game of the season.
“You know how people say we didn’t play anyone at Texas Tech?” Hunter said. “That was a game where I had a chip on my shoulder and my why — why I play football.”
Hunter plays the run well and can move laterally. His pass skills are raw — he had 2½ sacks last season — but the tools are there.
“I call him ‘Big Sexy’ because he’s got a little pass rush to him,” Drew Fabianich said. “For as big of a man as he is … there are not a lot of big guys like that (who) actually have pass rush to them. Most are going to rush you right down the middle. They can push the pocket but can they actually beat a guy?
“Lee can beat a guy. He can run and he can track dudes. He’ll probably run 5 (seconds) flat (in the 40-yard dash at the scouting combine).”
American team defensive tackle Caleb Banks of Florida runs through drills during practice for the Senior Bowl on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026, in Mobile, Ala. (Butch Dill/AP)
There are other impressive defensive tackles, but none stands out physically like Florida’s Caleb Banks, who is 6-6 and 335 pounds with 35-inch arms. He has some monster measurables, but scouts say he has been inconsistent. A foot injury limited him to three games last season, but he flashed a bunch in 2024. Some of his inconsistency is against the run, but if he gets in the right system with the right coaching, look out.
“He’s going to be a really nice piece because he’s got a lot of positional flexibility,” Fabianich said. “He can play from the nose all the way out to the five (technique) and wreck people. He’s enormous with great hands.”
Banks feels like a boom-or-bust prospect, a guy who probably comes off the board on Day 2. If he hits, you’re talking about the kind of elite player a defensive line can be constructed around. If he doesn’t, you’re looking at someone like another big and athletic Florida Gator, the Bears’ Gervon Dexter Sr., who flashes at times but tends to disappear every now and then as well.
4. The other player Clint Hurtt mentioned who jumped out to him right away was Pitt linebacker Kyle Louis.
National team linebacker Kyle Louis of Pittsburgh runs through drills during practice for the Senior Bowl on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2026, in Mobile, Ala. (Butch Dill/AP)
Linebacker looms as a likely need for the Bears this offseason. The front office will have some tough roster decisions to make as it weighs salary-cap implications. As good as Tremaine Edmunds played in the first half of the season before a groin injury forced him to spend four weeks on injured reserve, he could be a potential cap casualty.
Edmunds was signed to a four-year, $72 million contract in 2023, and he has a $13.9 million base salary for 2026 with a $1 million roster bonus and $100,000 workout bonus for a total of $15 million in cash. If the Bears release him, they would create $15 million in cap space, and as much as they like a defender with such a good combination of height, length and range at the second level, his status looks tenuous from my vantage point.
If the Bears elect to move on from Edmunds — and they haven’t even gotten into personnel meetings at this point — I would expect such a move well before the start of free agency out of respect for the player.
There are more moving parts at the position. T.J. Edwards, who got a contract extension last offseason, will be returning from a broken fibula. D’Marco Jackson proved to be a valuable fill-in and is headed to free agency. Maybe the Bears will try to re-sign Jackson to a modest deal and add a linebacker via the draft.
Circling back to Louis, he’s an interesting prospect and maybe the best linebacker here. He was an All-American at Pitt in 2024, when he had 101 tackles, seven sacks and four interceptions. He followed that up with 81 tackles, three sacks and two picks this past season.
Louis measured at 5-11¾ and 224 pounds this week. That’s a shade smaller than the Bears list Ruben Hyppolite II (6 feet, 236). Hyppolite had a disappointing rookie season after the Bears drafted him in the fourth round out of Maryland. Hyppolite was not invited to the combine but was clocked as fast as 4.39 seconds in the 40-yard dash at his pro day, and the Bears bought into that speed and athleticism.
Louis’ production in college far exceeds what Hyppolite did, although the size is a fair question. Louis told me he played at between 215 and 220 pounds during the college season, and a few teams have asked him about his weight and how he feels about playing with a little more heft on his frame.
“I am a ballplayer as I am right now,” Louis said. “Regardless of what my weight is, I feel like I can win in any situation. Whatever team that drafts me, they’re going to get the best version of me. I am prepared to adjust to any situation.”
Said Hurtt: “He’s small. He’s probably not going to be great for every system out there. But you put him in an attack scheme or something like Lovie (Smith) and Rod Marinelli’s old system, where he can be the weak-side linebacker always playing behind the three-technique and he can just go run and hit stuff? Yes, he’s got some dynamic skills.”
The Bears talk about wanting players who love football. It’s cliche and it will generate headlines the next time a team says that isn’t a prerequisite for employment, but Louis oozes football junkie when you talk with him. His passion for the game is unmistakable.
Interestingly, the National team has used him at nickel a little as well, something he did in Pitt’s scheme. I don’t see a future for him as an NFL nickel back, but it reflects his versatility, something that excites defensive coaching staffs.
“Everything has been going really smooth here,” said Louis, who said his goal for the combine is to run the 40 in the 4.4 range. “Just learning new things every day and having fun out here. Anyone in front of me, I am just looking for a will to win.”
5. The Bears figure to be in the market for a safety in both the draft and free agency.
Bears safety Kevin Byard III intercepts a pass against the Raiders on Sept. 28, 2025, at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
All four safeties on the 2025 roster are out of contract, so some combination of veterans and youth makes sense to rebuild the position.
First they need to see if re-signing Kevin Byard III, who will be 33 in August, makes sense for both parties after he led the NFL with seven interceptions and was an All-Pro selection.
As fantastic as Byard was, I don’t know that he’ll have a robust market in free agency considering his age. If he were 27 or 28, it would be a totally different story. He just completed a two-year, $15 million contract, and it’s worth wondering if something a little above that works, with say 60% of it guaranteed. The Bears even could add some dummy years to the end of the contract to lower his salary-cap hit.
It’s usually a position with plenty of experienced options in free agency, and that’s the case again with the Bears’ Jaquan Brisker available along with players such as Coby Bryant (Seattle Seahawks), Kam Curl (Los Angeles Rams), Jaylinn Hawkins (New England Patriots), Bryan Cook (Kansas City Chiefs), Jalen Thompson (Arizona Cardinals) and many others.
Ryan Poles has drafted three safeties: Brisker (2022, Round 2), Elijah Hicks (2022, Round 7) and Kendall Williamson (2023, Round 7). The Bears have selected only one other safety — Eddie Jackson (2017, Round 4) — in the last nine drafts.
It’s a dramatic shift from how the team used to treat the position. In the 11 drafts GM Jerry Angelo oversaw, the Bears selected nine safeties, including one each year from 2005 through 2011: Chris Harris (2005, Round 6), Danieal Manning (2006, Round 2), Kevin Payne (2007, Round 5), Craig Steltz (2008, Round 4), Al Afalava (2009, Round 6), Major Wright (2010, Round 3) and Chris Conte (2011, Round 3).
The team was basically plugging in a rookie starter each season under coach Lovie Smith, sometimes replacing the guy it had drafted the previous year with a newcomer.
Veteran scouts will tell you it’s a difficult position to draft — more challenging than you might think.
“It takes so much tape because for a 65-play game, they don’t do (crap) for 40 plays,” an assistant GM said. “If offensive coordinators come through the quarterback room — and we know what a difficult position quarterback is to evaluate — defensive coordinators often come through the DB room because you have to understand the whole field. You have to understand the concept and what is being asked, what coverage are they running.
“With cornerbacks, you are hyperfocused on the movement traits and leverage and is he reading stems and all that. Safety, if you don’t have an experienced guy evaluating them, you’re in trouble because there is so much nuance to it. There’s so much focus on leverage, technique, where his eyes are. It’s not just traits and, ‘OK, this guy can run. He works.’”
The assistant GM provided a good example. It was from a free-agent meeting, but the point translates to scouting safeties for the draft as well. His team was reviewing Xavier McKinney in free agency in 2024 after the New York Giants didn’t re-sign the former second-round pick.
“We had some junior scouts do him in free agency and they were banging him,” the assistant GM said. “We were sitting there and we let these guys talk, but it was like, ‘Whoa!’ And then when it came around to my turn, I said, ‘This guy is out of our range, and McKinney is going to become the highest-paid safety in the league in free agency.’
“The traits were average to above average. They weren’t great. But the player is really good. You have to understand the game and what’s being asked and what he’s trying to defend.”
Evaluation of game tape requires discipline too. It requires an understanding of not only how the safety is performing, but as important, what he’s being asked to do.
“That’s why it’s difficult from a bias standpoint,” the assistant GM said. “Say you’ve got a guy who has a label as a box safety. Maybe he’s not a true over-the-top player, but is he good enough to do it?
“If you just kind of take shortcuts and let your bias tell you, because of the way the defensive coordinator is playing him, you say: ‘This is just a box guy. Run the alley and fit. Go hit somebody.’
“But you have to keep watching and you have to start seeing. You have to dig in on it. I need to see 50 plays of him playing in quarters, playing in the post, playing two vertical. I just can’t assume he can’t do it. And it’s especially hard in college because they’re not getting coached that well outside of Georgia, Alabama and a handful of good schools. So is this guy not smart or is he just being coached poorly? Like quarterback, it’s such a mental position. It’s a hard position to play.
“And I’m always skeptical of the, ‘We’ll try him at cornerback and if he doesn’t work there or he loses a step, we’ll move him to safety.’ Too many times it just doesn’t work because the eyes are so different and the keys are different. The whole thing is different.”
Ohio State safety Caleb Downs lines up for a play against Marshall on Sept. 21, 2024, in Columbus, Ohio. (Gregory Payan/AP)
5b. Toledo safety Emmanuel McNeil-Warren was scheduled to participate in the Senior Bowl but backed out because of a minor groin injury. That was disappointing because he’s a potential late Round 1 pick or a Day 2 selection. The Rockets have produced some pretty good defensive backs recently, including standout Eagles cornerback Quinyon Mitchell, who was here at the Senior Bowl two years ago.
The best safety in the draft class is Ohio State’s Caleb Downs, who is not in Mobile. Downs, who played his first season at Alabama before transferring, could be off the board before the Bears select at No. 25.
“He’s really frickin’ talented, man,” a national scout said of Downs. “I think he’s as smart and as good of a player as Nick Saban ever had. It was the same way Nick and Minkah (Fitzpatrick) were tight. That’s the way Saban and Caleb were tight.
“The only thing he’s lacking is he’s not a blazer. He’s probably not going to run real fast. But the dude is a really good football player and he has been since Day 1 and he’s really smart and you can play him a lot of different ways.”
Said Drew Fabianich: “If I needed a safety, I would take him early in Round 1. But even if I didn’t need one, he’d probably be the third-best defensive player on the board. The Bears might not have a shot at him. Caleb Downs is as close to an Ed Reed as I have seen in quite a while.”
Oregon’s Dillon Thieneman, Penn State’s Zakee Wheatley and LSU’s A.J. Haulcy are other names to keep in mind. Pitt linebacker Kyle Louis, whom I detailed above, could project as a box safety for some teams.
6. It’s easy to plug a hole with an experienced starter if you need a safety, wide receiver, guard, tight end — a lot of positions. It’s a lot more difficult to find an experienced left tackle.
Bears offensive tackle Ozzy Trapilo (75) and defensive end Joe Tryon-Shoyinka warm up before a game against the Giants on Nov. 9, 2025, at Soldier Field. (Eileen T. Meslar/Chicago Tribune)
That’s the boat the Bears are in if they’re looking for a starting left tackle for the bulk of the 2026 season while Ozzy Trapilo works his way back to health. It’s way too early to guess at a timeline for his return, and all we have to go off of is Ryan Poles saying it would go “deep” into the season.
If the Bears were pleased with the progress Trapilo was making — and offensive line coach Dan Roushar said he thought the playoff game against the Green Bay Packers was maybe Trapilo’s best of the season — it stands to reason the organization wants to give him a shot at left tackle when he’s healthy and ready to roll. If that isn’t the evaluation — and those meetings are still a ways off with the coaching staff off until after the Super Bowl — then it’s back to the drawing board at the position.
For the sake of discussion, let’s operate with the idea the Bears believe it’s arrow up for Trapilo when healthy. Then what? I don’t see an in-house option who’s under contract. Sure, Theo Benedet and Kiran Amegadjie will be in position to compete for jobs, but they haven’t done enough to this point to be viewed as the solution.
The Bears won’t want to move right tackle Darnell Wright to the left side as a stop-gap measure. They played Joe Thuney there against the Rams in the playoffs, but I’d view that as a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency deal. Thuney isn’t going to play left tackle in Week 1 come September.
On the market, finding a left tackle you can trust, who has experience and is healthy would be expensive. Reality is any good ones will be scooped up by teams not looking for what might be a one-year bridge player.
It’s worth wondering if the Bears would consider bringing back Braxton Jones, which potentially could aid both parties. The current coaching staff hasn’t seen Jones fully healthy. He pressed all offseason to return from a fractured ankle in time for training camp. He battled in an effort to get stronger, and I don’t think he ever got there before he was benched just before halftime of the Week 4 game in Las Vegas. Then a minor knee injury during a practice in October led to an IR stint.
Jones didn’t have the kind of season he was hoping for in a contract year. A one-year deal to return to the Bears healthy and play in place of Trapilo could give him the opportunity to restore his market value.
I don’t know how the front office and coaching staff view Jones. I don’t even know if this is something that would be on the table. The team surely will consider a series of options — and not all of them will be great. Kicking around the possibility of a reunion with Jones makes sense because, again, finding left tackles you like can be an expensive proposition. At least they know Jones and how he fits in their locker room.
7. Discourse surrounding wide receiver DJ Moore’s future spun out of control after the playoff loss to the Rams.
Bears wide receiver DJ Moore makes the game-winning touchdown catch in overtime against the Packers on Dec. 20, 2025, at Soldier Field. (Chris Sweda/Chicago Tribune)
The optics weren’t great. Moore, who wasn’t 100%, didn’t look like he was running his hardest on the deep-over route in overtime when Caleb Williams expected him to flatten it off, and Rams safety Kam Curl came up with a really nice interception.
Overlooked were the 34-yard reception Moore made on the first play from scrimmage, the touchdown he scored and the one-handed catch he made against the Rams. And maybe the Bears don’t beat the Packers in either the wild-card round or the regular-season game at Soldier Field without Moore. He had a fourth-down grab and the go-ahead 25-yard touchdown in the playoff game. He made a contested catch with cornerback Keisean Nixon draped all over him in overtime of the regular-season game on the precision deep ball from Williams.
The production doesn’t match the four-year, $110 million contract extension Moore signed early in 2024 training camp, but production for all of the skill-position players has been down a bit the last two years, and the Bears had a lot of guys to spread the ball around to this season.
Releasing Moore isn’t an option. Trading him would create $16.5 million in cap savings if it happened before June 1. If a deal were done after June 1, it would free up $24.5 million in cap space. The after-June-1 figure sounds more appealing, but the Bears could be more in need of cap space in March and April than June and July.
I don’t believe the Bears view trading Moore as addition by subtraction. Given that his $23,485,000 base salary for 2026 is fully guaranteed, I don’t see them being able to get a lot back in terms of a draft pick. You can’t look at Moore’s production the last two seasons and say the Bears should trade him and then turn around and expect a haul in return.
For what it’s worth, $15.5 million of Moore’s $23,485,000 base salary in 2027 becomes guaranteed if he’s on the roster March 13. So he effectively has $38,985,000 guaranteed for the next two seasons.
What has been lost in the Moore discussion is he’s the anti-diva receiver. He didn’t peep once about Justin Fields when the passing game was a complete mess. He hasn’t complained about a lack of targets the last two seasons. He answers the bell almost every Sunday. He plays through minor injuries.
If the Bears become hard-pressed for cap space, maybe trading Moore would emerge as a possibility. But I think that’s what would precipitate a deal, not any desire to dump him. The best-case scenario might be that the final offensive play against the Rams is a good learning experience, a play Ben Johnson said he needed to coach better.
8. Reconnecting with folks I’ve known for a long time in Mobile, commentary regarding the Bears season was overwhelming.
Bears coach Ben Johnson walks in the tunnel before an NFC divisional-round playoff game against the Rams on Jan. 18, 2026, at Soldier Field. (Eileen T. Meslar/Chicago Tribune)
“It’s amazing what kind of difference a coach can make,” said a senior scout for another team who spent time with the Bears long ago.
“Ben Johnson is always looking for the knockout blow,” said a national scout for another team who also used to work for the Bears. “He’s in that special group of play callers, the guys that want to put you away.”
What I found really interesting is how one scouting director, late in the regular season, lauded Johnson’s ability to set things up throughout a game.
“It’s jab, jab, jab and then — boom,” he said.
It got me thinking how Johnson devised game plans to build plays off of each other, marrying runs to passes and constantly creating conflict for the defense.
“Part of that is even pregame planning,” Bears passing game coordinator Press Taylor said before the Rams game. “His game-planning process of, ‘I am going to show you this in the first half to be able to get to this other thing in the second half.’
“Or maybe sometimes we don’t want you to be able to adjust to something we’re going to do. So maybe Ben holds something to throw at the defense in the second half that we have kind of a series off of or a package off of. If we do it in the first half, they’ve got time to adjust and they can talk about it. Where, if you wait and you spring it on them in the second half, the defense is just trying to handle an offense drive to drive at that point.”
Veteran tight end Durham Smythe described it as an art, with the play caller preparing a strategy but then having the vision and flexibility to adjust with material the players can easily handle.
“The thing with very talented play callers, which he obviously is, is they go into the game with a plan, maybe not intentionally trying to throw jabs,” Smythe said. “You’re going in with your plan. The difference is some guys calling plays are just going to stay with what they have that day. Ben will come in with a plan. Sometimes it’s working great and the plan is the plan.
“If not, he knows how to switch it up and what to call. He knows how to make adjustments on the fly. People overrate halftime in the NFL. You hear all these guys saying, ‘They changed everything at halftime.’ As players, you don’t really know anything is changing. But the coaches throughout the game, specifically play callers, do make adjustments.
“It happened multiple times this season. The Packers, the second time we played them, did some things with six down (linemen) and stuff with their front that we knew they had in their arsenal but we were not necessarily expecting them to do as much. The run game for a while was struggling and we never really hit our stride, but the flow started to come in the second half. That’s one recently.”
9. A couple of weeks ago, I underestimated how wild the NFL coaching cycle would get.
Steelers coach Mike Tomlin, right, stands on the sideline during an AFC wild-card playoff game against the Texans on Jan. 12, 2026, in Pittsburgh. (Gene J. Puskar/AP)
In a conversation with a personnel man for another team, we agreed there probably wouldn’t be as many openings this year as there were in the recent past — seven in 2025, eight in 2024, five in 2023 and 10 in 2022. Six seemed like a pretty safe number.
“But it’s not going to be too long before the number is double digits most years,” I said. “It’s crazy how fast things turn over now.”
The personnel man didn’t disagree. Little did we know the league would have 10 openings this offseason with Mike Tomlin stepping down in Pittsburgh after a wild-card loss and the Buffalo Bills firing Sean McDermott after a loss in the divisional round. That ties the most in NFL history after 10 in 2022 (when the Bears hired Matt Eberflus), 2006, 1997 and 1978. Of the 10 hires made in 2022, only the Minnesota Vikings’ Kevin O’Connell and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Todd Bowles remain on the job.
Owners are becoming more and more like fans. They’re impatient and they want a turnaround to start yesterday. The volume of change is head-spinning, and there’s a trickle-down effect as changes mean new coordinators, new position coaches, etc.
That’s what makes the Bears’ fortuitous hiring of Ben Johnson last year such a big deal. If Year 1 is a sign of success to come, the powers that be at Halas Hall are in great shape moving forward as more and more teams have a quick trigger with their head coaches. There wasn’t a red-hot candidate in this hiring cycle like Johnson was a year ago. A couple of them might shine as great hires come 2027 or 2028. Inevitably, six or seven of those 10 teams will have a new coach by 2029 — if not sooner.
Now the question is when there will be 11 or 12 head coaching changes in one offseason. It’s trending in that direction. Makes for good business for the agents who represent coaches, that’s for sure.
10. Houston tight end Tanner Koziol is a Bears fan for another three months or so until he gets drafted.
Central Florida defensive back Phillip Dunnam returns an interception on a pass intended for Houston tight end Tanner Koziol, right, on Nov. 7, 2025, in Orlando, Fla. (AP Photo/Phelan M. Ebenhack)
A transfer from Ball State, Koziol began his high school career at Lake Park before transferring to Nazareth, where he played with Vikings quarterback J.J. McCarthy. When COVID-19 hit, Koziol moved to Fortville, Ind., to play at Mt. Vernon High School. He had drawn interest from North Dakota, Valparaiso and San Diego and was hopeful a senior season of high school action would get him more attention. It worked as Ball State stepped forward with an offer.
Koziol, who measured 6-6½ and 245 pounds this week, played three seasons for the Cardinals and caught 94 passes for 839 yards and eight touchdowns as a junior before transferring to Houston for his senior season.
“I loved my time at Ball State and was with really good coaches, really good people,” Koziol said. “I also wanted to prove to myself that I know I can play with these guys (from larger programs). Obviously, we played out-of-conference games and that’s where you know: ‘This is the same guy. Just a different name on their chest.’ Houston is where I really learned not to fear anybody. It’s the same sport. Same ball.”
Koziol performed well for the Cougars with 74 catches for 727 yards and six touchdowns, and now he’s part of a deep and talented class of tight ends. He marveled at the season the Bears had and said he enjoyed following Colston Loveland, whom he had watched closely at Michigan because of his relationship with McCarthy.
10a. The Ravens put in a request to interview Bears offensive coordinator Declan Doyle for the same role on new coach Jesse Minter’s staff. It sounds like there’s a chance Doyle will pass on the opportunity and most likely stay put with the Bears for at least one more season.
Doyle withdrew from consideration for the same role with the Eagles, with whom he did interview. At least one other team with a new head coach had some interest in Doyle, but the word that team got was that he planned to stay where he is.
Defensive backs coach/passing game coordinator Al Harris is also likely to remain with the Bears. He interviewed for the defensive coordinator jobs in Green Bay and Washington. New staffs still are being formed around the league, so there’s still a possibility for movement, but it looks like the vast majority of Bears coaches will return.
Keep an eye on Eric Studesville and Duce Staley as possibilities for the running backs coach vacancy on Ben Johnson’s staff. Studesville was an assistant for the Bears from 1997-2000 and worked with Johnson in Miami. Some wondered if the Dolphins would look to keep Studesville on new coach Jeff Hafley’s staff, but they hired Ladell Betts as their running backs coach.
Staley has been with the Cleveland Browns the last two seasons. He worked with Johnson in Detroit in 2021 and 2022.
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With assistant GM Ian Cunningham departing to become the general manager of the Atlanta Falcons, the Bears have an opening. Cunningham traveled to Mobile with Ryan Poles and vice president of football administration Matt Feinstein before his final interview with the Falcons.
We’ll see what happens at Halas Hall. It would be natural for director of player personnel Jeff King to be elevated to the assistant GM role. King, who joined the organization as a scouting intern in 2015, interviewed for the Los Angeles Chargers GM job in 2024.
Bears offensive tackle Darnell Wright clears out his locker Jan. 19, 2026, at Halas Hall after the season ended with a loss to the Rams in an NFC divisional playoff game. (Brian Cassella/Chicago Tribune)
10b. It’s a big offseason for right tackle Darnell Wright, who was a second-team All-Pro pick.
The Bears likely will exercise the fifth-year option in his contract and then would be expected to sign him to a multiyear extension. Wright’s third season was easily his best despite playing most of the year with a torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow, missing only the Week 4 game in Las Vegas.
Wright is uncertain if he will undergo surgery during the offseason.
“We’re doing some stuff,” he said on locker-room cleanout day. “We’re looking at it. We’ll just have to go and see. I don’t know if it’s a maybe or not. Just depends on what they see.”
Wright played with a large brace on his right arm and gradually got a little bit stronger as the season wore on.
“It healed up a little bit,” he said. “That was good.”
Wright took well to the coaching provided by Dan Roushar and showed more consistency than he did during his first two seasons.
“His football IQ has really grown, and that’s a credit to those guys in the room and how he’s gone about his business,” Roushar said. “He has matured as a person over my first encounter. He used to probably not ask questions when he should have asked questions. Now in the meeting room when things are presented to him, if he doesn’t understand, there’s no inhibition. He’s like: ‘Hey, Coach, explain that. Why are we doing that?’
“The other thing is his practice habits, although they can become better, they’ve grown over the course of the season. He’s a competitive guy. He wants to do things well. He’s very prideful. I see a guy that’s still ascending. He’s had a nice year but there’s a lot of good football left in that kid.”
Wright agreed he’s probably more assertive in the meeting room, perhaps easier with the strong veteran additions the Bears made.
“Dan makes it very easy to ask him a question,” Wright said. “People say there is no question that is stupid or whatever. He will explain the smallest of anything I have or the biggest of any question I have.
“Me and him have some of the same traits, I would say. He’s been great for me. At least for me, I know what it takes to win, to give yourself a chance. There’s stuff I can build on for sure.”
10c. Terell Smith has a five-month head start on Ozzy Trapilo in recovering from a torn patellar tendon in his left knee.
The cornerback, who is entering the final year of his rookie contract, missed the entire season after suffering his injury in the second preseason game Aug. 17 against the Bills. Ryan Poles indicated in his news conference last week that the target is for Smith to return to full strength at some point during the offseason. It’s fair to wonder if that date will fall closer to the start of training camp in July than the opening of the voluntary offseason program on April 20.
“I am back running on the field,” Smith said Jan. 19 when players were cleaning out their lockers. “Doing deceleration work, acceleration work. I am getting back right. It’s going to be a big offseason and season coming up for me.”
Smith was in the mix for playing time — although Nahshon Wright was getting the bulk of snaps with the starters during the offseason and the start of camp — when he was injured. He was coming on, though, with four pass breakups in the joint practice with the Dolphins and another in the first preseason game versus Miami.
Smith said he had gotten Trapilo’s cellphone number that day and planned to reach out to offer insight into what’s ahead for the offensive tackle.
“Hopefully his rehab is smooth too,” Smith said.
10d. The league could release the salary cap for 2026 before the Super Bowl. The target figure most have discussed is right around $300 million.
10e. One reaction to Bill Belichick reportedly being snubbed by the Pro Football Hall of Fame selection committee in his first year of eligibility, besides the fact it’s ridiculous: The NFL is fortunate this story has some space to breathe. Had the bomb dropped next week, it would have hijacked multiple news cycles when the league wants the focus squarely on the Super Bowl.
10f. What kind of travel challenges can lower-level scouts have at this time of year? Those who were in the Dallas area for the East-West Shrine Bowl practices that began last weekend faced a dilemma when many flights out were canceled. What normally would be about an 8½-hour drive to Mobile was 13 hours because of the road conditions in Texas.
10g. Some shops have opened futures wagers for Super Bowl XLI in 2027. At Westgate SuperBook in Las Vegas, the Bears were 25-1 along with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Fourteen teams had shorter odds, with the Bills, Rams and Seahawks all 10-1. At DraftKings, the Bears were +2200 (22-1), also with 14 teams having shorter odds. The Rams and Seahawks were +950, the Bills +1000.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/2026/01/30/chicago-bears-senior-bowl-brad-biggs-10-thoughts/
