Chicago Bears: Pace, Nagy confirm heated quarterback competition

Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Pace and head coach Matt Nagy held a teleconference Friday and made a big announcement regarding quarterbacks.

This is all any Chicago Bears fan can talk about right now, and for good reason. The team clearly needs to figure out their quarterback situation, and this offseason has been indicative of achieving that goal in a hurry.

A couple of weeks ago, obviously, the Bears traded for former Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback Nick Foles. In that deal, the Bears gave up their compensatory fourth-round pick.

With Foles’ contract situation and the Bears giving up a very valuable pick, one would assume that this is Foles’ job to lose. General manager Ryan Pace did restructure the contract in an efficient manner, however, which was nice to see.

Friday morning, Pace and head coach Matt Nagy held a teleconference to mainly address the quarterback situation. Right off the bat, Pace didn’t mince words.

Later on the teleconference, Nagy mentioned that Mitchell Trubisky would “go first in the huddle,” but that it will be “equal” in terms of the reps with the first team, according to Adam Jahns of The Athletic.

Nagy also used the words “extremely competitive” when referring to the quarterback competition (again, via Jahns’ Twitter account).

Like most would have assumed, Pace talked about how Foles was a strong candidate to pursue this offseason based on the mutual comfort level he and the coaching staff have together. Foles has worked with Nagy, offensive coordinator Bill Lazor and quarterbacks coach John DeFilippo previously.

How about this tidbit from Jahns:

"“They’re going to play in the preseason.” -Nagy"

One other important note to make from this call was the fact that Pace again reiterated the team would not make a decision on Trubisky’s fifth-year option until May. However, Jahns said he would be surprised if it was picked up.

The entire teleconference was welcomed news for fans. Whether or not we all agree with the trade for Foles and whether or not we believe in Trubisky, this was a welcomed surplus of information from the Bears’ leadership.

The fact that this will be a truly open competition makes the words spoken just a couple months ago look as though Pace was trying to hide his real intentions. Both Pace and Nagy, in fact, had verbally attested to some amount of belief in Trubisky as their guy for 2020.

The majority of the fan base didn’t buy that, though, did they? Let’s be honest — you didn’t believe that for a second. It seemed like it was only a matter of time (March 16th to be exact) before we would hear some real traction on a new Bears quarterback —and that’s exactly what happened.