Bears must be sellers at the trade deadline

After yesterday’s abysmal performance, the Chicago Bears must be sellers at the trade deadline.

We are less than 24 hours removed from the Chicago Bears absolutely embarrassing themselves once again at home this season. This latest installment saw the Los Angeles Chargers do everything in their power to hand the game to the Bears, but the Bears, as has been their tendency this year, did everything they could to give it right back — and that they did.

Against a 2-5 team, missing a number of key players due to injury (sounds familiar?), who committed key penalty after key penalty, the Bears lost on a missed field goal by Eddy Pineiro. However, the reality is the game should never have been that close. Unfortunately, that’s who the Bears are now.

The loss has fans, and hopefully management, taking stock and reexamining the situation. If they do, and are completely honest with themselves, they will decide to be sellers just ahead of Tuesday’s NFL trade deadline.

There is a small contingent of fans who would like the team to explore a trade for Marcus Mariota, Josh Rosen, or Andy Dalton. Look, the Bears are more than a Mariota away from being a legitimate Super Bowl, or even playoff contender for that matter.

Any waste of draft capital to acquire a quarterback of that ilk would not only fail to make them better, but it would continue to set this team back even more than the wasted pick on Mitchell Trubisky did.

The reality is the Bears should be looking to acquire additional picks ahead of the 2020 NFL Draft in which, at the moment, they have only six picks coming in the second, fifth, sixth, and seventh rounds. They could possibly recoup a fourth-round compensatory pick by releasing Mike Davis, but even still, they should be looking to move anyone who is unlikely to be re-signed after this season for more picks.

Failing to do so would be incredibly stubborn and shortsighted. The Bears are unlikely to sniff a playoff spot this season, so what good does it do to keep some talented players on the team who have value in the trade market and won’t be re-signed next year? The answer is ‘none.’

So it makes all the sense in the world to turn them into much-needed draft capital. The Bears will need to acquire a quarterback in this draft to replace Trubisky. However, without sufficient picks, they are limited in what they can do. If they have any hope of trying to move up into the latter part of the first round to get a guy like Jalen Hurts, Jake Fromm, or Jacob Eason, they’ll need more ammunition to do so.

The Bears have already made countless mistakes this season. Let’s not double down on the stubbornness and make another one.