Bears Blitz

Published by Brett Solesky on August 2, 2009
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Chicago Bears

It’s been done before by teams, in fact some coaches prefer it.  Only keeping two QBs on the 53-man regular season roster.  The Arizona Cardinals did it last year and the Patriots and Colts have done it in year’s past.

Second year man Caleb Hanie seems to have a strangle hold on the back-up QB position at this point.  The Bears don’t seem to have any interest in Michael Vick and why should they?  He doesn’t really fit into the mold of a QB the Bears would want to plug into their offense.  

The Bears could also use the roster spot for another player that may be of more importance to the team.  Keeping a Dusty Dvoracek at DT, another WR like Rashied Davis or a Juaquin Iglesias who needs more time to develop.  There is also the high number of linebackers none of which may play a lot, but they are valuable to the Bears’ special teams unit which is among the best in the league.  

All these positions make it highly probable that the Bears could only keep two QBs on the roster.  Plus Jay Cutler is a tough QB having yet to miss a start in his career due to injury.  That type of durability also makes it a safe bet to assume the Bears could be likely to only carry two QBs.  

Now why is this even a discussion in the first place?  Simple. The performance of Brett Basanez up to this point has been awful.  Even for a third string QB he brings nothing to the table that makes an argument for keeping him on the roster ahead of anyone.  The real line of thought is you want your best 53-men on your regular season roster.  Basanez is not among the best 53-men on this team.  You need a back-up QB for obvious reasons, but a third stringer on your active game roster seems unnecessary.  

Basanez does not possess NFL arm strength and he’s been the most intercepted QB on the team to this point.  He is not developing well and overall seems to be here to take up space.  None of his practice to this point in camp makes you feel good about where he is at.  Further more, his performance in OTAs did nothing to solidify his spot on the roster.  

Finally it seems unlikely the Bears will add another player before the start of the season.  There is slim pickings out there on the free agent market.  

Perhaps one player who fits into the mold of a QB the Bears would want on offense is the recently released Andrew Walter.  Walter is tall and strong and he possesses a rifle for an arm.  An accurate deep ball, as accurate as any QB in the league when he launches the ball deep off of play action.  A play-action passer who has some touch on the deep ball and has worked well with TEs (Zach Miller in Oakland and at ASU) would seem like a good idea to plug into the Bears’ offense as a third stringer.  

The chance of this happening though seems pretty slim to none.  The Bears are better off with Cutler and then Hanie backing him up.  Especially if Hanie performs as well or better this year in pre-season games similar to how he performed last year.