There has been a lot of speculation on who the Chicago Bears starting quarterback will be at the start of the 2020 season. Following the team’s acquisition of Nick Foles, many believe that the team is ready to move on from the former second overall pick Mitchell Trubisky. Although the young quarterback has had his ups and downs, his career may have been hurt the most during his rookie season.
When the Bears traded up to draft Trubisky second overall in the 2017 NFL Draft, it was arguably the most controversial pick of the draft. NFL insiders and pundits viewed the North Carolina quarterback as the rawest player at the position. Although he severely lacked experience, Trubisky was seen as the quarterback that could provide the most upside in the draft.
Heading into 2017, the Bears planned to have Trubisky sit as long as possible to develop. Those plans were ruined by a mix of ineffective quarterback play by Mike Glennon and a coaching staff that needed to win. Head coach John Fox named Trubisky the starter after a Week 4 blowout loss against the Green Bay Packers. Despite performing extremely well during the preseason, it was clear that the rookie quarterback was not fully ready to start yet. To make matters worse, Trubisky had no supporting cast to work with.
One of the biggest concerns for the Bears before the start of the 2017 season was the lack of talent at the skill positions. With the departure of Pro-Bowl wide receiver Alshon Jeffery, Cameron Meredith and Kevin White were supposed to be the team’s starting wide receivers. Meredith tore his ACL in the team’s third preseason game while White was lost for the season in the season opener with a broke shoulder-blade.
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When Trubisky was named the starter in week 5, the team’s wide receivers lacked talent, experience, and size. The rookie quarterback had a group of receivers for his first four starts that featured Kendall Wright, Tanner Gentry, Tre McBride, Markus Wheaton, and Josh Bellamy. Bellamy was the only receiver that would be on the team the following season.
General manager Ryan Pace did acquire a receiver to assist Trubisky in the second half of the season in Dontrelle Inman. After one game, opposing defenses quickly took him away. Wright proved effective as the slot receiver, but could rarely ever play in the slot given the issues with the other receivers. Only two of Trubisky’s seven passing touchdowns went to a receiver, and only one time did a receiver record a 100-yard receiving game with the quarterback.
Tight ends Zack Miller and rookie Adam Shaheen were reliable targets for their rookie quarterback, but injuries also disrupted that continuity. Miller was Trubisky’s most trusted target when he became the starter. The tight end would catch a 20-yard pass or longer in three of the quarterback’s first four starts. Chicago’s starting tight end caught the Trubisky’s first touchdown in the NFL and would have caught another one in New Orleans if not for a blown call by the refs.
When Miller went down, Shaheen did step up and showed signs of progression as the season went on. Trubisky and Shaheen’s best game together came against the Bengals in week 14. In a 33-7 win, Chicago’s rookie quarterback passed for 271 yards, recorded a quarterback rating of 112.4 and had both a passing touchdown along with a rushing touchdown. Shaheen would catch four passes for 44 yards and would be on the receiving end of the passing touchdown.
Sadly, the rookie tight end would miss the last three games of the season when his rookie quarterback needed him the most. By season’s end, Trubisky would finish with his top two wide receivers and tight ends on injured reserve. Although he finished with seven touchdown passes and seven interceptions, many believe that he made the most of a bad situation.
The unfortunate aspect is not knowing how much better Trubisky could have been if Meredith, White, Miller, and Shaheen would have stayed healthy. Meredith was nearly a 1,000-yard receiver in 2016, while Miller proved that when healthy, he had the talent to be an explosive tight end. Having a bigger sample size of Trubisky could have persuaded how Pace conducted his coaching search in January of 2018. Had his quarterback been able to do more, maybe Matt Nagy doesn’t get hired, and another offensive coach is the team’s current head coach
It is important to remember how detrimental the 2017 season was for Trubisky. When Nagy took over in 2018, it was almost as if his second-year quarterback was a rookie all over again. The Bears quarterback had to learn a new playbook also with a new cast of wide receivers and tight ends. What Nagy could have learned about Trubisky’s rookie season is important now given the struggles of 2019. The coaching staff and the general manager appear ready to move on from the quarterback that had nothing go right in his rookie season. A season that he needed the most.
