It took more than one Chicago Bears blunder to go from one of the best teams in the NFL to one of the worst over the past 10 years. It seems oddly fitting that they went 13-3 in 2006 and bottomed out at 3-13 in 2016. There is an eerie sense of going full circle with that. What people would like in such situations is to blame it all on one gigantic mistake made during the interim time.
Bleacher Report columnist Sean Tomlinson believes he found it recently. In breaking down his biggest mistakes by every team in the past 10 years, his choice for Chicago is almost certain to rile up fans. It is the team trading tight end Greg Olsen in 2011 to the Carolina Panthers for a third round draft pick.
“Greg Olsen’s career, meanwhile, was instead delayed in a sense by the Bears. He wasn’t properly utilized on a defense- and run-oriented team, and therefore he didn’t get the chance to blossom into the dominant tight end at the top of his position we know he is now.
But Olsen still produced even with a lid on his usage, and even with the likes of Rex Grossman, Kyle Orton and Brian Griese as his quarterbacks in 2007 and 2008. He averaged a solid 495.3 receiving yards per season over four years with the Bears, and he scored 20 times.
Yet despite his steady development, the Bears still decided to send away a player who was worth their first-round pick in 2007, and get a third-rounder from the Carolina Panthers in return. Olsen has since logged five 800-plus-yard seasons and been named to the Pro Bowl in each of the past three years.”
Biggest Chicago Bears blunder was firing Lovie Smith for Marc Trestman
Now there is no denying this was an all-time gaffe by former GM Jerry Angelo. The best excuse he could come up with for trading a playmaking tight end was he didn’t fit the offensive scheme well. Schemes aren’t supposed to be that rigid. They should be able to absorb good football players. Olsen landed softly Carolina and has since reached three Pro Bowls. Chicago did use that draft pick as part of their trade for Brandon Marshall, but it doesn’t make up for it. Not nearly enough.
Amazing as it sounds though, the Olsen trade isn’t the biggest mistake this organization made in the previous decade. That was reserved for two years later when they fired longtime head coach Lovie Smith in favor of Marc Trestman. The logic behind the decision was sound. Former GM Phil Emery wanted an offensive head coach who could get more out of Jay Cutler at quarterback. That wasn’t the problem. The man he hired was.
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Trestman was known as a quarterback guru, but that had been almost a decade before. He hadn’t been on an NFL sideline since 2004. The game can evolve a lot in nine years. During that time he’d had brief stints in college before heading up to Canada. Some were afraid the Bears were getting too cute with the hire. That they should’ve gone with a more proven NFL commodity.
They were right.
Things got off to a well enough start. Over time though it became apparent that Trestman had serious problems establishing his authority over the locker room. Once some of the more outspoken players realized this, things went downhill fast. After a crushing loss to the Packers at the end of 2013, it got a lot worse in 2014. There were reports of infighting between the players and even the coaching staff.
It got so bad at one point that the Bears gave up 50 points in back-to-back games against the Packers and Patriots. That combined with a controversial rift between his coaching staff and Cutler only made things worse. Chicago went from a 10-6 team in 2012 to a 5-11 dumpster fire two years later. That falls at the feet of the head coach.
With all due respect, having Greg Olsen at that point would’ve changed nothing. Don’t forget that Martellus Bennett went to the Pro Bowl that same year. Proof positive that hiring Marc Trestman was the single, biggest faux pas this organization committed in the past decade.
End of story.
