Bears fans erupt at Ryan Poles despite Jerry Jones' trade explanation

There was absolutely no way the Bears were going to trade for Parsons and this was right there in front of people if they had bothered to read. It was in the salary cap numbers. It was the CBA.

There is this general belief among those who care to follow how NFL teams actually operate that you can do pretty much whatever you want to with the cap.

It's a gross generalization. There are ways to bend and twist and circumvent and shape-shift, but in the end, when there is nothing in the cupboard and you've got someone demanding $188 million over four years, you have a better chance of winning by going down to 7-11 and buying a Powerball ticket than you do of landing Parsons or whatever player is unhappy at the moment.

The Bears didn't even have $1 million available under the cap. They were among the five worst equipped teams in the league to add anyone this season and they have to make sure to be under the cap by the start of the season.

Any bonus for a player acquired by trade and signed to an extension was going to be prorated over the length of the contract. The Bears aren't even equipped for prorating right now because they're operating at $8 million over the projected cap for 2026, per Overthecap.com.

This part is tenable but only if they started cutting key players next year. That's plural. Big-time cash expenditures would need to go, like Montez Sweat, DJ Moore, Joe Thuney, people of this ilk.

The other way they would afford it in the future would have been to forget about paying Caleb Williams an extension and reboot the quarterback clock.

Again.

Williams' extension eventually will probably get to around $60 million a year.

The Bears have chosen to build this as a team and not fish around for the big strike, like with Khalil Mack. That failed, in the end. The Packers made the move and the people chastising Poles for getting to Green Bay are comical. He didn't have control of Green Bay's roster and doesn't have money to pay a contract to someone like Parsons. Case closed.

Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated reported six teams were in the running initially for this deal. No one said who it was but the Bears couldn't have been in it if Jones' comments are taken at face value.

Here's what Jones said about how they chose the team for a trade.

"We only picked teams that had room on their cap that could pay Micah and we only picked teams that had top tackles, interior tackles, that we wanted to have any dialogue with at all about a trade," Jones said.

He was talking defensive tackles, not offensive. The top tackle was Kenny Clark, the three-time Pro Bowl player.

"That was the criteria of trading–top existing tackle that could come in here and play for us right now this year," Jones said.

The only top Bears defensive tackle who fit this category was Grady Jarrett. He's older than Clark by 2 1/2 years and two years ago had an ACL tear. If Jones felt he was an answer they could have signed Jarrett by outbidding the Bears back in March.

Clark is more what Dallas wanted because he can play either one of the defensive tackle spots. He's a bigger body to team with three-technique type Osa Odighizuwa.

The Bears have nothing to offer them at defensive tackle that they would want, no Pro Bowl type beyond Jarrett, and his Pro Bowls are probably in his past. Other people don't view Gervon Dexter as anything more than a player with potential. Andrew Billings is a part-time player coming off injury.

Also, as mentioned, they had no cap space. However, the Packers and Lions both were among teams with plenty of cap space. It wouldn't be surprising to find out Detroit was also interested.

Either way, Poles was not going to get Parsons no matter what he did.

The Bears did not possess the proper compensation and why would they want to make a deal when the last GM gave away the future for an edge rusher to put on a team that wasn't quite ready to go anywhere, and then didn't because of Parkey's double-doinked.

Bears fans angry at Poles should have been so back when the team made Sweat their highest-paid defensive player after trading for him, or gave Moore a contract extension.

The cap began forming around those deals for the Bears and now the cap cupboard is empty.