Written by Will Brinson at CBSSports.com
You don’t get medals in football for trying, you get them for results. And the decision by the Bears to trade up for Mitchell Trubisky will ultimately be judged on the results. If Trubisky is a good quarterback, Chicago general manager Ryan Pace will be applauded for doing what he had to do to get a franchise quarterback. If Trubisky stinks, it won’t really matter, because Pace’s bags will be packed for him.
So it’s easy to just throw your hands in the air and wait to find out whether Pace made the right move. But it’s also important to point out that process matters too in these things. And the process for Pace and the Bears in acquiring Trubisky was severely flawed.
Let’s look at a few reasons why.
The trade itself
The Bears shook up the draft when they moved from No. 3 to No. 2 to take Trubisky . No one saw the trade coming, except the 49ers, and they sure didn’t see the Trubisky pick coming. No one did, not even Trubisky. That’s fine, because you want to make sure your plans aren’t picked up on by other teams.
Spending too much time with Trubisky — and by all accounts the Bears did not do that — might have set off some red flags with teams like the Browns, who were also interested in Trubisky.
But it’s pretty obvious that they negotiated against themselves on this one. An interview with 49ers GM John Lynch last week on ESPN Radio’s “Mike and Mike” sort of solidifies that idea too.
Lynch was asked how the trade went down and said that he heard from Pace ahead of the draft, with Pace talking about staying in touch because the two GMs were picking right next to each other for several days. Then Pace called back the day before the draft.
“The day before the draft, Ryan called back again and I could tell the urgency had heated up and he said ‘There’s a scenario here in the first round where there’s some teams that I understand want to get up to two. Have you had conversations?’ And I said, ‘Yes, indeed we have, with multiple teams,'” Lynch recalled. “At that point, he said ‘We want the opportunity, will you call me if those things heat up.’ And so I said, ‘Yeah, Ryan, we had this discussion, absolutely.’
To continue reading this article, click here.
