Chicago Bears: 3 story lines to watch out for this offseason

In the wildly successful 2018-19 regular season, the Bears had a pretty good two half back set between Jordan Howard and Tarik Cohen. Howard is more of the north-south back while Cohen is more of the play playmaking east-west guy. Cohen is also the teams kick returner, and a very good one at that. He helped make it easy for Trubisky to get them into field goal range on wild card weekend vs the Eagles before, well you know.

Howard’s contract runs through 2019 while Cohen’s runs through 2020. With Cohen taking some snaps away from Howard this past season, it is unlikely that the Bears see Howard as a part of their future long term. He could easily just stick it out and play with the team in 2019 but if the Bears explored trading him for assets or a different position player it would surprise no one.

The Bears could handle a Howard replacement in a few different ways. They could go the free agent route? There are two intriguing names to look at as we stand right now. Le’Veon Bell sat out the entire season after playing chicken with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

He agreed to sign a one year deal with them but with the condition that they don’t place a franchise tag on him after the season, and Pittsburgh let him sit out and ultimately lose him for nothing. A questionable move, but that is what happened. This one is probably unlikely, but Bell is probably the best running back in the NFL and is so explosive that he would make any offense better.

The more intriguing option in free agency is former Kansas City Chiefs running back, Kareem Hunt. Hunt made a name for himself by having a fantastic start to his career. He hit the ground running coming out of the University of Toledo. Whenever a player comes out of the MAC and becomes a star in the NFL, it is always a nice story and something to be proud of. But of course, there is an elephant in the room that cannot be ignored when discussing Kareem Hunt. He is currently on the commissioner’s exempt list as the league looks into possible violations of the personal misconduct policy.

Coach Matt Nagy did not dismiss the possibility of bringing in Hunt during his season-ending presser last week. Nagy was the offensive coordinator for the Chiefs before becoming the head coach of the Bears, so he knows him well. He did say that he spoke to him about personal level but not about football. Bears fans and football fans in general will probably have mixed emotions about him returning to the field, so it will be interesting to see how the Bears and other organizations handle him.

There is always the option to draft a running back, but the Bears do not currently hold a first or second round pick. That does not mean they cannot find value in that round or later, as Howard was a fifth round pick and Cohen a fourth. Anything can happen, but it is looking like there will be an upgrade potentially the running back position this off season.