Chicago Bears: WR Position Could Be Totally New In 2018

The Chicago Bears were implored by multiple sources to make some kind of move at wide receiver before the NFL trade deadline on October 31st.

It seems GM Ryan Pace was biding his time, waiting for the deal he wanted. At last it came. The Los Angeles Chargers are a team in transition. A new head coach has arrived in Anthony Lynn who brings his own ideas of personnel. As a result certain players who were valued in 2016 aren’t so much in 2017. That was the case for Dontrelle Inman. The 28-year old had over 800 yards last season and seemed poised for a breakout year. Then the coaches changed and he was moved to the bench.

Since then he’s been buried on the depth chart. Pace saw an opportunity to get a motivated player from a team that no longer needed or wanted him. As a result the Bears got him for a conditional 7th round pick. If Inman plays like he did in 2016, Chicago may have gotten a steal. Inman is still young and plenty motivated. Not just by the Chargers’ slight either. He’s also a pending free agent.

Bears face a fascinating free agency situation going into 2018

The wide receiver position is set up in a strange way from a contract standpoint. Inman is not the only notable name who’s playing out the final year of his deal. Cameron Meredith, who went on injured reserve with a torn ACL, is also a pending free agent. Joining them will be Kendall Wright who signed a one-year deal with the Bears in March. If that weren’t enough, the same goes for Tre McBride and Josh Bellamy. In truth only rookie Tanner Gentry is signed beyond the 2017 season.

These are incredible rare circumstances for any position group, and it presents two possible courses of action. Either Pace will likely look to extend two or three of the current players on the depth chart and then grab a couple new pieces in free agency and the draft next spring. Or he could do something unprecedented and completely overhaul the position from top to bottom.

That means four or five new faces in one offseason. The odds of that happening are remote. Pace isn’t one to make sweeping changes like that. He has an incremental style. More likely he’ll retain two of Meredith, Inman and Wright. Then he’ll go hunting for another receiver to bring the group together. It’s similar to how he operated on the secondary a few months ago. Everybody is seeing the fruits of that.