Chicago Bears: Ranking the four major free agents

As the Chicago Bears head into hibernation, they will have some major free agent decisions on their hands. From top to bottom, how do their four major free agents stack up?

Unlike last offseason, when the Chicago Bears spent money on bringing in players from other teams, this offseason, the focus will be on retaining their own players.

This offseason, the Bears have four major free agents that the team will look to retain. Aside from their four major free agents, the Bears will also have some critical depth pieces that they will look to bring back, but at the expense of other players on the roster.

Currently, the Bears are projected to have about $20 million in cap space this offseason. The good news for the Bears is that they can still create additional cap space by restructuring players contracts or releasing more players.

As the Bears head into an offseason where they’ll need to retain their own talent, the goal should be to spend wisely as they will need to ensure that they have money allocated in place to give to other players that may earn contract extensions down the road.

Right off the bat, it’s clear that the Bears will need to be smart with their money if they want to bring in all four free agents back. The reality is that the team may have to let some depth pieces on the roster go in order to ensure bringing back each of their four major free agents.

With the Bears heading into an offseason where they’ll try to reload parts of the roster for a Super Bowl run in 2019, there are four major free agents that Ryan Pace will look to retain. Over the next four slides, we’ll rank each of those.