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Ryan Poles and Ben Johnson’s 2026 roster is a very fluid situation. The Bears are still over the 2026 salary cap, and while it won’t be too difficult for them to get under the cap for next year, exactly how far under they determine will affect exactly how they can approach this offseason and how they can improve the roster.
Poles and Johnson spoke highly of QB2 Tyson Bagent from the NFL Combine, but they also spoke of him almost like he had already been traded, which obviously had not been the case.
The Bears may have been speaking in such terms to one, drive up the price on Bagent, and two, make other teams wonder if the market for Bagent is larger than it might be.
A lot of fans wonder why the Bears might be pushing to trade Bagent this offseason when he has two years left under contract, but if you pull back and look at the big picture, it starts to make more sense.
Johnson thinks highly of Bagent, and I would suspect that when Bagent’s contract expires after the 2027 season, Johnson may believe that he will want a starting opportunity somewhere else, and the Bears won’t be able to retain him. If that’s the case, they won’t want to lose a quarterback for nothing, so trying to get some draft capital makes sense.
The reason to push for a trade this offseason is that the Bears believe that Bagent’s stock is currently strong. Some teams were reportedly impressed with how he commanded an offense during the preseason in 2025, but also because the quarterback market is troublesome for teams in need of a QB this offseason.
Kyler Murray is available via trade, as is Tua, but Tua is expected not have much of a market, especially at his salary. Malik Willis is rumored to get as much as $30 million per year, so teams that need a potential bridge quarterback or a QB1 competition don’t have a lot of options, and Bagent is an affordable one if a team is willing to part with a day two pick.
The price on Bagent has been reported to be a second-round pick, but most around the league think the Bears would do it for a third-round pick if it were offered. If it were only a day 3 pick, the Bears may choose to keep their UDFA success story.
If the Bears decide to keep Bagent and work on something for 2027, the QB market might look a lot different.
First of all, in the 2026 draft, we know Fernando Mendoza is the presumptive first overall pick, but there is a possibility at this point that no other QBs go in round 1. Perhaps another may sneak into the back end of the round, like Jaxson Dart did last year, but there isn’t much in terms of rookie quarterbacks this season.
Next season is a different story.
The way Arch Manning finished the 2025 season, many assume he will surge to the top pick in the 2027 draft. Oregon’s Dante Moore will also be a very high pick, and some scouts are saying that 2027 could be one of those drafts where as many as 5 QBs are littered throughout the top 15 picks, much like they were in 2024.
When there are that many rookie QBs available, the market takes a hit. There’s also a lot up in the air with some previously highly regarded veteran QBs. Bryce Young could become available if he doesn’t convince the Carolina Panthers he is worth a major contract extension. It’s also not out of the realm of possibilities that the Houston Texans might decide to go another direction if CJ Stroud has a third consecutive disappointing season.
Plus, there are always wild cards like Joe Burrow, who has made it clear he isn’t happy in Cincinnati. A long shot? Sure, but stranger things have happened.
If there are veteran QBs with decent resumes and a high number of first-round quarterbacks, if Caleb Williams has another healthy season, Bagent’s stock may actually decline in 2027 due to a lack of playing time and a flooded market.
It makes sense for the Bears to utilize a poor quarterback market to look for a team to overpay for Bagent, who has only thrown 149 career passes and whose market is currently being created by an offensive-minded coach who has spoken highly of him and some strong preseason tape. Bagent has only thrown 6 regular-season passes since Caleb Williams arrived two years ago.
Trading Bagent this season won’t give them significant cap relief, but the Bears are in desperate need of adding affordable bodies to their defense via the draft, and adding another day two pick into the mix, if they can land one, would be highly valuable for the 2026 roster.