A Scout’s Take: How I see the Chicago Bears working 2024’s free agency
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Greg Gabriel with the first part in his look at what he thinks the Bears will do in free agency. The next big event on the League's calendar is the NFL Combine, which gets started in less than two weeks, with the first group of players reporting on Sunday, February 15. Just eight days after the Combine ends, the NFL opens the negotiating period for 2024 free agency on Monday, March 11.
While technically, no negotiations can happen with Unrestricted Free Agents at the Combine, you can be assured that many General Managers are getting a good idea of what the market value will be for several players.
As is often the case, what the Chicago Bears do in Free Agency will have a lot to do with how they approach the NFL Draft. Last year, for example, Bears General Manager Ryan Poles was hoping to get a starting right tackle during the free-agent period. There was really only one player the Bears targeted at tackle, and that was former 49er right tackle Mike McGlinchey. According to sources, the average salary that McGlinchey was paid was not too much for the Bears, but the guarantees were. When the deal for McGlinchey didn't go through, that set-in motion the drafting of Darnell Wright. If we have learned anything in the two years Poles has been the GM, it's that he has a philosophy and won't deviate from it.
What is that philosophy? Part of it is the sum of money the Bears offer players. The Bears put a market value on the players they are interested in, and they won't go above that value. The market value is really a two-part thing. The first is the average salary paid, with the second being the amount of guaranteed money paid to the player. It's the guaranteed money that can get a club in salary cap trouble if the player doesn't work out. This is because if the team signs a player to a five-year contract and in year two or three they see he isn't going to work out, they will get hit with the remaining amortized money on the contract if they trade or cut the player. This is what happened so often during the Ryan Pace years. Older players were paid huge contracts with huge guarantees, and it caught up with the Bears when they had to get rid of the players.
In the NFL, a player has to give back to the club in production what he is getting paid in salary. When production doesn't equal salary, the team and player have to part ways, which can be costly to the team in terms of dead money. It's because of this and some of the bad contracts done by Poles' predecessor that he is on the conservative side when it comes to giving out big contracts.
In 2022, the Bears had big salary cap problems, so they weren't big players in free agency. Still, the players signed were young players who the team felt had good years left in their careers. That same philosophy was followed last year. The players who received large multi-year contracts were relatively young and had been mostly injury-free in their careers. Durability is important to Poles as players with tough injuries in the past generally will have more injuries in the future. I'm not referring to soft tissue injuries but rather severe knee or shoulder-type injuries.
What we haven't seen yet from Poles is signing a player on the wrong side of 30 to a long-term deal. The reasoning is he doesn't want the team to get hit with dead cap money when and if the player's production starts to go down as he gets older.
There were reports that the Bears were involved with defensive tackle Javon Hargrave last year. Hargrave was 30 when free agency began, and he ended up signing with San Francisco. The contract he got was in the area of $84 Million over five years, which means he will be 34 in the final year of that deal. The big question is, will he be a viable player at that point in his career? The analytics say no, and analytics between that and the price of the contract had the Bears bowing out of the competition to sign Hargarve. Instead, they signed Andrew Billings to a one-year deal, got a very strong year out of him, and then extended him during the season. Billings was 28 when he signed with the Bears and was relatively injury-free. His play was arguably as good as Hargraves was in San Francisco at less than a tenth of the cost!
This year, there are some big names that the media has said the Bears will be interested in. The one name that jumps out is Minnesota defensive end Danielle Hunter. Hunter had a great year in 2023 with 16.5 sacks on the season. He has had double-digit sacks in four of the last five seasons, with 2021 being the only season where he didn't because he missed nine games due to injury.
Hunter, based on his production, deserves a contract similar to what the Bears gave Montez Sweat. Sweat's deal was for four years at an average of $24.5M per year. The total value of the contract was $98 Million. One of the unique parts of that contract was the signing bonus was paid shortly after the Bears acquired Sweat which gave him more money in the 2023 season even though the first full year of the deal isn't until this 2024 season.
Hunter is 29 right now but will turn 30 in October, meaning if the Bears did the same deal, he would be 33 at the end of it. To date, Poles has not done a deal like that with a player of Hunter's age, so it would be a first. When we look at Hunter's injury history, except for the 2021, he's been good. The injury Hunter suffered was a torn pec, so he still has been free of the more serious knee or shoulder injuries that can have lasting effects due to arthritic conditions as the player gets older. The Bears can certainly afford the deal, but the question is, do they want to tie up nearly $50M in cap space on one position? That is a question we will find out the answer to in short order. One thing is certain, if the Bears don't find a top edge in free agency, it becomes a huge priority in the Draft.
Other edge players could be available and will cost in the same area but are much younger. Brian Burns, who is currently with Carolina, will be 26 when the 2024 season begins, so he's four years younger than Hunter. Another option is Jacksonville's Josh Allen, who will be 27 when the season starts. The problem with both players is that their teams will try hard to keep them, so there is no certainty that either will hit the market next month.
Because Jacksonville must extend quarterback Trevor Lawrence soon their ability to keep Allen may be more difficult than Carolina keeping Burns.
Another need position the Bears could very well fill in free agency is center. The best center on the market is Miami's Connor Williams, but we can be sure the Bears won't be trying to sign him. Williams tore his ACL in a late-season game and won't be available until most likely the last third of the '24 season, if that. Two players the Bears could very well go after are Seattle's Evan Brown and Tennessee's Aaron Brewer. Both have ties to members of the Bears coaching staff and are fits in the Bears offensive scheme.
Brown played for the Bears' new Offensive Coordinator last year and has been a starter in the League for the last three years. At close to 320 pounds, he would give the Bears another big body in the middle of the Oline. Brewer played in a similar scheme to what the Bears play, and his coach in Tennessee was Jason Houghtaling. Houghtaling is now the Bears' new assistant offensive line coach this year. Brewer also played with Bears guard Nate Davis for three seasons, so there is already a familiarity with each other. Brewer is a lot smaller than Brown, as he played at about 290 last year, but he is very strong and explosive. Olin Kreutz played in the 285-290 pound range when he was a Bear, and recently retired Jason Kelce also played in the 285 – 290 pound range, so Brewer is not too small for the Bears. There could be other centers the Bears are interested in, but those two stand out right now.
The last two positions the Bears could address in free agency are wide receiver and safety. If starting safety Eddie Jackson is released as anticipated, it opens a huge need in Chicago's secondary.
I'll get into some of the best players who may be available at these positions later this week.
