The NFL trade deadline is heard and one of the first big trades has happened, since the McCaffrey trade. The Chicago Bears have had a decent start to the season, mostly due to their defense which was run by Smith mostly. Smith has been wanting a new contract from the Bears since the offseason, but the Bears did not want to pay it. So he decided to prove himself with his play on the field, when he did that the Bears had no choice but to pay him or trade him. Then the Ravens decided to swoop in and improve their team greatly. How does this affect both parties and who won the trade?
How Does This Trade Affect The Bears?
Smith has been one of the best defensive players in the league this year, leading the league in tackles and being one of the most disruptive players this year. The Bears’ defense has been the only thing keeping them afloat this year and they just lost their best player on it. Without a doubt, the Bears will take a major step back no longer having their best player. Smith’s presence on the field disrupted so many plays and made opportunities for other players that it may be easy to say the Bears lost the trade, but there is a silver lining to this for the Bears.
The Bears are nowhere near close to contenders and extending Smith to the contract he wanted likely would’ve slowed the rebuilding process. The Bears would’ve needed to pay Smith upwards of 17 million dollars a year when they weren’t going anywhere far for a long time and would need that money for their future franchise pieces. Plus this way the Bears add a second and fifth round pick in this year’s draft to help build their future. With this new money and draft picks the future of their team looks much brighter.
How Does Smith Affect The Ravens?
Smith Brings a disruptive presence across the middle that the Ravens have lacked all season, due to injuries and scheme fit. Now with Smith across the middle the Ravens’ defense is ready to take the next step to potentially make the Ravens contenders. They can now run Roquan Smith as a pass-rushing linebacker and drop Patrick Queen back into coverage more, or vice versa. These two linebackers will likely be able to fix the Ravens’ defensive problems for the rest of the year, and only at the cost of a second and fifth round pick.
However, this also strikes a lot of controversies about what the Ravens are going to do in the offseason with these contract situations. Roquan Smith and Lamar Jackson are both set to be free agents this offseason and the Ravens barely have money for one of them. The expectation was for them to just franchise tag Lamar Jackson and use the rest of their money to resign their depth players, but they can’t do that now. They will have to choose to either franchise tag one of the two and let the other walk or franchise tag one resign the other and lose all their depth pieces.
Who Won The Smith Trade?
This trade was fairly even due to what each team benefited from it and how they lost from it. The Bears gained a decent bit of draft capital and cap room to set up the future of their franchise. While the Ravens got one of the best defensive players in the league to try and compete for a championship this year if they are afraid of losing Lamar Jackson.
