Chicago Bears GM Ryan Poles lauded for an ability again on display

The only fits for traded players regarded as better were five-time Pro Bowl tackle Laremy Tunsil to the Commanders from the Texans (second) and DK Metcalf from the Seahawks to the Steelers.

"If Thuney plays guard and doesn't have to move back to tackle (injury or Braxton Jones performance), this is a massive improvement over what Chicago had last season," Kerr wrote.

If Jones doesn't get back in time from injury, the Bears have another couple of options, anyway. Rookie second-rounder Ozzy Trapilo  2023 third-rounder Kiran Amegadjie have been practicing at this position all offseason.

Thuney should be quite set at left guard.

The Bears have had seven different starters at left guard in the last three seasons since Cody Whitehair started every game there in Matt Nagy's last season as coach, 2021. The others, including Whitehair and often-injured Teven Jenkins were Lucas Patrick, Larry Borom, Michael Schofield III, Ryan Bates and Jake Curhan

It's not easy to get continuity on the line with such shuffling, and this wasn't the only spot where they had this happening. Right guard, left tackle and center were problems at different times. The backups even were injured at those spots.

Thuney has been the highest-graded guard as a pass blocker in every single season since 2020 according to ESPN's pass block win rate. To bring him in to such an unstable situation after he has missed only two games in his career is difficult to match for fits.

There could be a possible catch to all of this. Thuney has been with the Chiefs earning all of these high pass block win rates and it definitely helps having Patrick Mahomes behind him making the line look good by getting rid of the ball.

Then again, even in New England Thuney was thought of as one of the best pass-blocking guards, as he had the league's third-best and fourth-best Pro Football Focus pass blocking grades for 2018 and 2019.

Poles giving up a fourth-round pick for a player of this level looks like a steal.

And he dotted the "I" with a sixth-round pick for Jonah Jackson, a former Pro Bowl guard who has the advantage of returning to play in the Ben Johnson offense he played in during the 2022 season in Detroit.

As for those two higher rated trade situations than Thuney, it's more or less a toss-up with the Tunsil trade because this is another 10th-season lineman going to a team that needs him and has a young QB to protect.

Maybe those two are first and second best trade fits.

Metcalf to the Steelers looks shaky. It depends so much on the geezer quarterback getting him the ball downfield.

Aaron Rodgers' yards per attempt declined to 6.8 and 6.7 his last two seasons of play and if you look at the careers of many aging wonders at this position, the same thing happens at the end. Drew Brees, Philip Rivers, even Tom Brady suffered significant declines in this key stat of yards per attempt.

Ben Roethlisberger should have taught this to the Steelers, already, when he averaged 6.3 and 6.2 yards an attempt his final two years. He should have just handed off and saved himself the trouble of passing.

Rodgers was among the five fastest to get rid of the ball last year among regular starters and this was a significantly higher ranking than in his most recent other seasons. And it was building that direction in Green Bay. He gets rid of it faster and usually to the shorter route.

The same thing happened with Roethlisberger and the others. They don't get the yards per attempt because the older guys lose arm strength, but more importantly they just don't want the ball in their hands long enough to risk taking the beating in their late 30s and 40s.