The Bears won their 2023 trade with the Panthers.
The only question remaining is by how wide a margin — and whether they can parlay that windfall into consistent success. Winning a trade, after all, means nothing unless you win a championship.
That will be decided by quarterback Caleb Williams, whom the Bears need to make another leap in Year 3 before they commit to giving him the largest contract extension in team history. If he does, then general manager Ryan Poles’ decision to flip the franchise’s first modern-era No.1 pick for receiver DJ Moore and four draft picks could go down as the most impactful trade in franchise history.
Even if Williams never reaches that point, there’s no question the deal pointed the Bears in the right direction. Bryce Young, the quarterback the Panthers took with the first pick, is 14-30 in his first three seasons. He’s eligible now for the same contract extension Williams may get next offseason — and the Panthers have made zero effort to secure a deal before the Panthers host the Bears in Sunday’s season opener.
By contrast, Bears’ return in the trade — and the small trades they spun off of it — is the foundation of a roster that won the NFC North last year:
• Williams, the first pick in 2024, has already won more playoff games than the last major Bears trade acquisition, Khalil Mack, ever did. After a year in which he led the NFL in fourth-quarter comebacks Bears want him to improve his completion percentage and get off to faster starts.
• Darnell Wright, whom the Bears drafted 10th overall in 2023 — after trading back from the Panthers’ original No. 9 spot so the Eagles could take star Jalen Carter — just
earned the largest contract extension ever for a right tackle.
• Moore averaged 1,008 receiving yards in three seasons with the Bears before being traded to the Bills for a second-round pick, which the Bears traded down from, eventually picking tight end Sam Roush in Round 3.
• Luther Burden, whom the Bears drafted in Round 2 last year, was dynamic enough that the Bears could afford to trade Moore.
• Cornerback Tyrique Stevenson has been a starter — though an inconsistent one — for three years.
• Punter Tory Taylor is entering his third season with the Bears.
The Panthers were the first team to approach Poles about a trade in February 2023. He chose their offer after trying to keep them at bay for weeks. While negotiating with Carolina, he tried to loop in the Texans, who were picking second and would eventually take C.J. Stroud. Poles was trying to trade down to No. 2, and then flip that pick to the Panthers. Eventually, the Texans disengaged.
There are times when Poles lays in bed and wonders where the Bears would be had he not swung the trade. In the moment, though, he wasn’t positive the deal would work. There were too many unknowns — from which quarterback the Panthers would take to where they’d finish the following year when the Bears held their draft selection — to make a clean evaluation.
It took nerve. He was the general manager of the Bears, who are synonymous with quarterback failure, declining to draft a quarterback first overall — and choosing to give Justin Fields another year. Fields proved he wasn’t the answer. Had the Panthers not finished with the worst record in the NFL in 2024, the whole gambit might not have worked.
“You don’t want to be the person that misses on the quarterback, and there’s no guarantee where you’re going to be the following year,” Poles said. “Just the pressure of putting everything together, from your gut instinct to the data to projections. … All of this is really high-end educated guesses. You don’t know. But you just have to put all the information that you do know together to make the best decision.”
What he did know, though, was that the Bears needed a talent infusion before selfish established in the Bears’ 3-14 season took root permanently. That’s why Poles insisted on an established veteran — the two sides settled on Moore — being included in the deal.
“You’re in this rush of really trying to have some success because the guys that are fighting every year, … their career is going only so long, and you need some positive outcomes to keep everyone’s heads up,” he said. “There is a side effect of being bad for a long time. Usually it’s, everyone just focuses on their own career rather than the team.”
That’s what happened in Carolina — and, eventually, at Halas Hall.
The Panthers fired head coach Frank Reich after going 1-10 through the first 11 games of Young’s rookie year. Young lost his starting job in 2024 and didn’t get it back until Andy Dalton, his replacement, injured his thumb in a car accident.
During Williams’ rookie year, the Bears fired offensive coordinator and then, after a 4-8 start, head coach Matt Eberflus. Ben Johnson picked the Bears — and vice versa — in part because the team had Williams.
“How we’re constructed, obviously, it was a huge deal for when we go to the head coaching search,” Poles said. “Obviously, Ben being the top candidate around the league. You want to be in position to have a guy like that be interested and want to come on board and put his fingerprints on the team.”