Ryan Poles was surprised when Jaylon Johnson requested a trade away from the Bears as the NFL trade deadline loomed. Poles and Johnson’s representation met in Los Angeles on Sunday, and Poles thought that the two sides made good progress towards potential contract extension. In fact, he thought there was a chance the Bears could sign Johnson to a new deal in a matter of days.
But when a couple of days rolled by, the correspondence from Johnson’s camp went the other direction. They wanted to explore a trade.
“I’m fine with that,” Poles said. “We brought Jaylon in, we sat down, we talked about it, I granted him permission to do that.”
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Poles said he gave Johnson permission to look for a new home out of respect for him as a person.
“If that’s in your heart and you want to check that out, go check that out and see what comes back,” Poles said. “If everything lines up perfectly, if you want to go somewhere else, then that could happen.”
But the Bears weren’t going to give Johnson to a team for nothing. Even though the team has yet to sign him to a deal, they value him highly. On Wednesday, Poles shared some insight on his asking price for the talent cornerback.
“I don’t want to lose Jaylon Johnson,” Poles said. “If I were to lose Jaylon Johnson, I would like to have a high percentage of hitting on another Jaylon Johnson, which to me, is a late first and into early second (round pick). Really simple there.”
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Obviously, that didn’t happen. Johnson said he was surprised he wasn’t dealt at the deadline. He thought he was going to move on to another team once he asked for the trade. Johnson didn’t rule out returning to the Bears with a new deal, but he is looking forward to a potential bidding war when he hits free agency in the offseason. The Bears want to be in the mix when that time comes, too.
“We are still open to getting a contract done,” Poles said. “I know we’re going to follow Jaylon’s lead on how he wants to go about doing that but we’re still open.”