Gerald Everett's release by the Bears Friday surprised even less than Matt Eberflus' firing after Thanksgiving.
At least in Eberflus' departure there was intrigue involved in lack of precedent—they had never fired a coach during the season.
DeMarcus Walker's release Friday came as more of a surprise but maybe it shouldn't have.
Everett seemed to sleep-walk through an entire season to eight catches on 13 targets and collected his $4.06 million salary. His cap hit for 2025 of $6.5 million made the $5.5 million in savings for the Bears a no-brainer, horribly low catch total or not.
The importance of this move is it gives the Bears a little more money to devote to signing offensive linemen and maybe even a veteran second tight end replacement.
Johnson used 12-personnel packages, or two tight ends, 32.2% of the time last season according to Sumer Sports analytics. That was third-highest percentage in the league.
The Bears have to get a couple tight ends because the other tight end is free agent Marcedes Lewis, who will be 41 this season. The only other tight ends they have under contract are practice squad types Jordan Murray and Joel Wilson.
To his credit, Everett did depart with a very classy message for Chicago via "X."
None of this flies in the face of what Johnson said when he was hired. Nor does it support what he said.
"It's not going to look like it did in Detroit," Johnson said. "We have a completely different personnel group than what we did in Detroit."
The Bears would have trimmed Everett, Johnson or not. No one produces so little and eats up cap space but survives to the next season unless they're named Velus Jones Jr.
It says nothing about the type of offense Johnson does plan to build, if it looks different than Detroit. They would have needed more and different tight ends no matter what he did. Every team uses 12-personnel packages so they'd need the extra tight ends to complement Cole Kmet, anyway.
The release of Walker is more a statement about what's coming, and they're going to need another edge player with the ability to stop the run as well as rush the passer. They're going to probably need more than one because they've just parted ways with a starter.
Unlike with Everett, Walker produced. He just didn't produce enough. He had seven sacks in two seasons, 45 pressures and 16 tackles for loss. Cutting him doesn't necessarily mean they're going after a superstar end, because those are rather pedestrian numbers. They could pay a nominal amount and get numbers like those.
Walker's status as an edge who stops the run and an interior pass rusher at times was trumpeted by Eberflus, but he never put up the kind of numbers on either count that justified his contract.
The Bears get only a $666,668 helping of dead cap space to eat but save $5.25 million on his contract, freeing up even more space, according to Overthecap.com.
It does suggest they're not going to simply be satisfied by mediocre players and that someone who better fits Dennis Allen's scheme with productivity could be available. Insert your guess here, but saying Myles Garrett is still a reach.
Doing this all so quickly lets Everett and Walker have more of a chance to find a new team, and more importantly it shows the Bears, through Johnson and GM Ryan Poles, can work together well and do have a real vision and plan.
They're quickly implementing this offseason plan. There is no messing around.
Sure, it's only two moves. Yet, it's exactly the type of thing they showed when they went after Johnson a day after the Lions' season ended—there is no hesitation, no wait. They're sharply focused on their plan. They do it and move to the next decision.
This kind of decisiveness hasn't always been apparent in the front office but it's occurring now. It's either the effect of Johnson and Poles collaborating well or Poles with a really clear understanding of Johnson's vision with the team, or both.
It's rapid and calculated, like, dare we say his name, Howie Roseman-like. The Eagles GM always has a plan and quickly goes about putting it in motion every year.
And we all know where that led last season.
