After the Steelers officially signed Super Bowl winner and Pro Bowler Russell Wilson and traded away 2022 first-round pick Kenny Pickett, they kept making moves by trading for Chicago Bears quarterback Justin Fields on Saturday.
The Steelers sent the Bears a 2025 conditional sixth-round pick. If Fields plays more than 51 percent of the snaps this season, it will turn into a fourth-round pick.
ESPN’s Brooke Pryor reported from a team source that Fields would be the second-string quarterback and learn from Wilson to help him improve.
The trade is good for the Steelers because they had moved on from their three quarterbacks from last season: Mitch Trubusky signed with the Buffalo Bills, Mason Rudolph signed with the Tennessee Titans, and Pickett was traded to the Philadelphia Eagles.
The Pickett trade consisted of him and a 2024 fourth-round pick to the Eagles, with the Steelers receiving two 2025 seventh-round picks and a 2024 third-round pick.
In more Steelers free agency news, Wilson and Fields will have former Los Angeles Rams wide receiver Van Jefferson as a target due to the Steelers signing him. Jefferson can help the team make plays down the field due to his speed. The signing with Jefferson is good, and the team can expect to score more easily than they did last year.
The team will need at least one or two more receivers, so they should try to sign someone else in free agency and draft one in the second or third round.
The trade now shakes up the NFL’s draft. When Fields was still on the Bears, mock draft experts wondered if the team would draft the Heisman finalist and wide receiver standout from Ohio State, Marvin Harrison Jr., or USC standout quarterback Caleb Williams. Because of the trade and their recent signing of former Los Angeles Chargers standout wide receiver Keenan Allen, the Bears will likely draft Caleb Williams.
Regardless of how people look at the trade, the Steelers get their future quarterbacks, and the Bears get their future in the draft. Both can hope to become Super Bowl contenders in the future.
