Why it's past time for the Bears to move on from Chase Claypool (2024)

Less than a year after trading a second-round pick for him, the Chicago Bears have told Chase Claypool to stay home.

The receiver was inactive for the Week 4 loss to the Denver Broncos. He wasn’t at Soldier Field on Sunday as directed by the team. And now general manager Ryan Poles and head coach Matt Eberflus have decided it’s “best for the team” if Claypool doesn’t return to Halas Hall this week.

It’s likely that Claypool has played his final game as a Bear.

How did we get here, and how has the team handled it?

Fishbain: Let’s start with the football element of this. If this is it for Claypool, he finished his 2023 season with four catches on 14 targets for 51 yards and a touchdown while playing more than 80 percent of the snaps in Weeks 1-3. He was simply not productive considering his talent and what the Bears gave up for him in a trade with the Pittsburgh Steelers last year. There were glimpses last season in his first few games showing how he could be a weapon, but then after a full offseason, he still couldn’t contribute consistently. Even without the drama, this wasn’t working for the offense. Heck, look how well they played Sunday without him!

Jahns: Right. The Bears didn’t look like they missed him against the Broncos whatsoever. It helped that Denver’s defense is one of the league’s worst. But quarterback Justin Fields still had a career day without Claypool. The Bears clearly think they’re better off without him.

In my opinion, these were Eberflus’ most telling comments from Monday: “When I came here Day 1, I talked about being on time, being respectful and working hard. That to me is important for every individual — if it’s a staff member, a player or a coach. That’s where we are. We feel right now this is the best decision for us.”

It doesn’t take much sniffing around to learn that Claypool wasn’t doing what’s expected of him and other players, whether it’s arriving on time at Halas Hall in the morning and at his meetings to learning everything that he needs from the Bears’ playbook. Then on game days, you get plays like his offensive pass-interference penalty that preceded Fields’ game-sealing pick-six against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. That gaffe wasn’t discussed enough.

Fishbain: It took only four weeks for the situation to become untenable. It started with the opener against the Green Bay Packers. We saw the effort. We saw the lack of production. It wasn’t pretty. I was also told that Claypool didn’t handle things well on the sideline that game, either, which included some heated exchanges with offensive coordinator Luke Getsy. Things seemed better in Tampa the next week when Claypool scored his lone touchdown as a Bear. But that was the best we saw from Claypool. And as you said, and Eberflus alluded to, what we didn’t see ultimately bubbled up to last weekend’s decision.

I’m in full support of the team holding a player accountable, especially in the building when it’s hard enough to be competitive on the field. We don’t really know if the Bears did what they could to avoid a point of no return, but they knew what they were getting when they traded for Claypool. How could they not make it work? How much of that is on them versus him?

Jahns: Well, it’s on them — being Poles and Eberflus — that he’s here. Beyond the actual draft compensation that was required for a trade, there was some risk involved with his acquisition. The fact that Mike Tomlin and the Steelers were willing to trade him was a warning in itself.

But I still understand why Poles acquired him. The trade was made not long after Fields’ breakout game against the New England Patriots. Fields needed help for his development. The analysis at the time — including our own — was that it was a thin year for receivers in free agency and the draft. Poles was proactive. Of course, things changed once Claypool struggled and the draft compensation turned into the No. 32 pick.

Fishbain: In the moment, the risk of adding Claypool was known, but DJ Moore wasn’t in the picture. At the time, the Bears weren’t necessarily expecting to lose every game the rest of the way, making that pick No. 32. There were no other veteran receivers Poles could add in free agency who had the potential to be an impact player. But if this team is all about building a foundation and living by a philosophy, why wasn’t a better structure in place to avoid getting to this place with Claypool? However, it’s possible that there was nothing the Bears could do. As his college teammate Cole Kmet alluded to, the losing got to Claypool in a way that sent him down this path. I don’t think the Bears didn’t try. It’s just a disappointment on all ends how much this trade failed.

Jahns: Which brings us to the final part of this: how the Bears handled everything over the weekend and on Monday. Eberflus tried to clarify things on Monday. In general, these situations are difficult for coaches and players to discuss publicly. Wires always seem to get crossed somewhere. We’ve covered our fair share of these stories with the Bears, too. It’s a problem that they keep happening, but that’s a larger story. If you’re trying to trade a player, you don’t want to disparage him through the media. But I’d argue the book is also out on Claypool and has been for some time. Scouts talk. Coaches talk. Everyone talks in the NFL.

Fishbain: The last thing an 0-4 Bears team needed, especially after blowing a 21-point lead at home and wasting a career day from their quarterback, was for the head coach to seem unprepared to discuss Claypool, leading to two separate clarifications. A bad record matters most, but the public perception of this team is awful right now, and the mixed messages on Claypool only added to that.

Jahns: The Bears are the worst team in the league right now. Situations like this make them look even worse, too. The Bears missed on Claypool. It is what it is. They want to move on. And Claypool should want to at this point, too. He’s still in a contract year. He still has plenty to prove and potentially earn in the NFL. He’ll get that third chance somewhere. But Claypool’s second chance with his second NFL team didn’t go well at all.

(Top photo: Armando L. Sanchez / Chicago Tribune / Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

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