Surprising New Details Emerge About Bears & Patrick Mahomes: Report

Patrick Mahomes Chicago Bears 2017 NFL Draft

Getty Quarterback Patrick Mahomes of the Kansas City Chiefs runs in a touchdown against the Chicago Bears in 2019.

Did the Chicago Bears tell future Super Bowl-winning quarterback Patrick Mahomes they were planning on selecting him in the 2017 NFL Draft? According to Kalyn Kahler of Bleacher Report, they did — and they may have done so to mask their interest in Mitch Trubisky.

Kahler’s sources revealed several eyebrow-raising details about the Bears, general manger Ryan Pace and the way the team navigated the 2017 NFL Draft — and considering the fact that the Bears’ No. 2 overall pick, Mitch Trubisky, just got benched while the draft’s other top quarterbacks Mahomes and Deshaun Watson just got huge contract extensions — these things don’t look good in hindsight for Chicago.

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Kahler Says Bears Gave Mahomes ‘Strong Presumption’ They Were Drafting Him

According to Kahler’s report, which was released Friday morning, the Bears told Mahomes in March of 2017 that he was their top quarterback in a loaded class. They drafted Trubisky a month later, and the rest is history, but Kahler suggests Pace may have had ulterior motives in telling Mahomes about his interest.

“To pile on to the draft regret, league sources say that sometime in early March of that year, the Bears told Mahomes that he was their top quarterback in the class, and gave Mahomes the strong presumption they would take him. This further explains why Mahomes counted to 10 on his fingers after passing for a touchdown at Soldier Field last season. “10” for his draft position, a message to the team who passed on their ‘top quarterback.’ The Bears’ interest in Mahomes was real, but the conversation with Mahomes that he was their top QB may have been a smokescreen to throw people off the scent of their actual top quarterback.”

If Pace really did use Mahomes as a smokescreen to divert attention from the fact that he wanted Trubisky, he and the team have surely been regretting it ever since. But that wasn’t the only bomb dropped in the report.


Ex-Bears Coach John Fox Wanted Jamal Adams, Not a QB

John Fox, who was in the final year of his deal as the Bears’ head coach in 2017, didn’t want Trubisky, and preferred Deshaun Watson — we knew that from Dan Wiederer and Rich Campbell’s excellent 2019 piece dissecting how Pace and company went about picking Trubisky — but we didn’t know just how ridiculously cloak and dagger Pace was about it all:

“Fox, a source said, didn’t even want to take a quarterback at No. 3. Mike Glennon had just signed a generous three-year contract to be the Bears’ starter. Headed into a win-or-get-fired third season as the head coach, Fox wanted the team to select LSU safety Jamal Adams, and most within the organization were under the impression Adams was going to be Pace’s pick … Though Pace finally had looped Fox into the Trubisky plan that morning, many in the organization didn’t find out about it until the Bears traded four picks to move up to No. 2 and the phone call was made to Trubisky. A source familiar with the situation says Fox was not alone in his contrary opinion about the quarterbacks. The love for Trubisky was ‘not unanimous’ among personnel and coaching staff.”

While the Bears certainly missed out on a franchise quarterback as a result of Pace’s actions in 2017, it’s clearly too late to go back now. Still, each new detail that emerges about the way Chicago handled the draft that year has to feel like rubbing sea salt into an open wound for Bears fans.

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