Rich Eisen: “Where did it go wrong?”
JJ Stankevitz: “A lot of it is ‘fit’. When the Bears drafted Mitch Trubisky in 2017 it was nowhere near the right fit for him. They had a coach in John Fox who was still trying to save his job, so when Mike Glennon was awful for the first four games of the season, Fox put Mitch in earlier than he should have because he was trying to win some games to keep his job. The structure around Mitch in 2017 was absolutely atrocious. Kendall Wright was their leading receiver that year and was out of the league after that year. He had no one to throw to, and he had no sort of offensive system that was conducive to what he needed. But more than anything, he only started 13 games at North Carolina and needed more time to develop, either behind the scenes, or in a good offensive scheme that could have played to his strengths; which the Bears offense of 2017 did not do at all. Then you get into Matt Nagy’s system and they kind of erase a lot of what happened in 2017, but now you’re starting to see the deficiencies that lie only in Mitch, and his ability to process and his ability to read defenses, not lock onto one receiver, go through his progressions, and make checks at the line. Then 2019 was the year of atrophy with him where things started to go REALLY wrong where his footwork got sloppy, he would miss wide open receivers down the field, and make mind-numbing decisions with the football.” (Full Interview Above)
Listen to NBC Sports Chicago Bears insider JJ Stankevitz explain to The Rich Eisen Show why Mitch Trubisky ultimately bombed in Chicago just hours after the news hit that the team was not picking up his fifth-year option.
The Bears infamously traded up to pick Trubisky in the 2017 Draft ahead of superstars Patrick Mahomes and Deshaun Watson in a move that quickly turned into one of the biggest mistakes in sports history.
Check out the video above as Stankevitz details what exactly went haywire with Trubisky's free falling career.