Mike Florio Believes Chicago Bears Might Be Planning A Swerve

Everybody seems to know what the Chicago Bears plan to do in the coming weeks. Every conceivable insider thinks GM Ryan Poles will trade Justin Fields and select his preferred quarterback #1 overall in April. It isn't overly surprising. Fields had two years to make an impression. While he did improve, it wasn't enough to justify passing another quarterback with the 1st overall pick. That is especially true given the 2024 class appears strong at the position. However, not everybody is ready to buy into this idea.

Mike Florio is one of them. The Pro Football Talk insider has followed the crumbs of information for weeks like everybody else, maintaining contact with his own sources along the way. One thing he's noticed from the outset is that for all the rumors, there has been zero confirmed information coming out of Halas Hall. Poles and his people have been on silent running. Nobody around the league knows for sure what he's going to do.

This led Florio to state something he feels is a growing possibility on The Rich Eisen Show. He's starting to think this all might be a front to trade the #1 pick again.

All of this leans into how the Chicago Bears operate.

Poles is notorious for keeping things close to the vest. He doesn't want anybody to know his plans until he's ready to enact them. The best way to get other teams desperate is to keep them in the dark about what you're going to do. That raises their hopes that a possibility of a trade exists if only you make a strong enough offer. The idea of Poles trading Fields and the #1 pick is wild, but not unprecedented. Not if it's a minor move down to #2 or #3. He gets a large cache of extra picks and presumably still has a shot to get one of the top quarterbacks. It would be a gamble, but not if he doesn't see much difference between the names involved.

Everybody sees Caleb Williams as the unquestioned top quarterback in this class. Or at least that is the perception of the national media. In reality, plenty of people have differing opinions. Some believe North Carolina's Drake Maye is the top prospect. Others prefer Heisman winner Jayden Daniels. There is a real possibility Poles likes somebody other than Williams. If that is the case, then hatching a plan to work the phones in such a way makes sense.