There’s always the chance Fields won’t work out, but we can cross that bridge when it collapses. For now? Go ahead and be excited. After all, you should be.
A day after the Bears traded up to select Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields with the 11th pick in the NFL draft, investigators were still searching for someone — anyone — with a negative word to say about this momentous development. In Chicago and throughout Beardom, meanwhile, the sun shone with unwonted splendor. Birds sang songs of hope. Darkened football hearts soared, strangers embraced (wait, are we allowed to do that yet?) and the Promised Land gleamed on the horizon. Where are the next 10 or 15 Super Bowls being played, anyway? Everyone — and by that we mean literally everyone — loves what the Bears did Thursday night, moving up from No.20 by dealing their 2022 first-round pick, a fourth-rounder and a fifth-rounder to the Giants for the chance to draft Fields and rewrite the franchise’s sick, twisted history at the most important position in sports. Beaten-down fans are suddenly coming to terms with a new feeling that resembles happiness. Embattled general manager Ryan Pace and coach Matt Nagy have new leases on life. Undistinguished veteran quarterback Andy Dalton can forget about being the starter for long. OK, so maybe he’s not as excited as the rest of us. And Fields,22, walks into a situation where he really doesn’t face any pressure at all. All he has to be is the best quarterback the Bears have had since, well, how does ever sound? “The Bears pulled off one of the biggest steals in the modern draft era,” read one national headline.
