CHICAGO, Ill., — After wrapping up minicamp practices and organized team activities over the past few weeks, the Chicago Bears are set for their summer break with training camp coming up later in July. While the team may be away from on-field activities, the front office will have the opportunity to make some headway on extending key players in need of a long-term deal over the next month or so.
One such player is franchise right tackle Darnell Wright. Drafted with the 10th overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft, Wright has been everything that the Bears could possibly hope for from a first-round pick. Wright immediately established himself as a franchise building block over the first two years of his career and was recognized for his outstanding play in 2025 with a Second-Team All-Pro designation from the Associated Press.
Heading into his fourth season as a pro, this is the first year that Wright is extension-eligible on his rookie contract. Earlier in the offseason, the Bears showed their commitment to Wright by exercising his fifth-year option, locking him in through the 2027 season while both sides work on a long-term extension. The fifth-year option gives the Bears some security with Wright to not have to rush a deal, but it may be beneficial for the Bears to lock in an extension sooner rather than later, with the salary cap set to increase substantially over the next few years.
With the assumption that the Bears are trying to extend Wright this offseason, I will take a look at what a potential extension could look like should the team go in that direction. To do so, I will compare Wright's performance to his peers and give an outlook on what the offensive tackle market looks like as a whole to determine his market value. Future articles in this series will cover other extension-eligible Bears as the offseason progresses.
With that said, here is my take on what a potential contract extension for Wright could look like this year.
(NOTE: All contract information in this article comes from overthecap.com. Additionally, statistical comparison tools come from Pro Football Focus)
Second Contract Offensive Tackle Comparisons
In order to come up with Wright's market value, it's important to first determine his peers that we can best compare him to. Draft status does matter here, so with that in mind, we will be comparing Wright to recent first-round tackles who have garnered second contracts after their rookie deals. Wright's Second-Team All-Pro selection also should be considered when determining his value as well, expanding the comparison to other tackles with similar accolades over the first three years of their careers. When factoring in those two components of criteria, the four tackles that we will be comparing Wright to are Charles Cross, Penei Sewell, Rashawn Slater and Tristan Wirfs.
From a production standpoint, here is how Wright's first three seasons compare to this group's respective first three seasons in the NFL:
Darnell Wright Production Comparison
There are a few key takeaways when looking at how Wright compares to his peers.
From a grading standpoint, Wright compares favorably to this group in some areas, but lags behind in others. From a run blocking standpoint, Wright has produced like one of the best young first-round tackles to enter the NFL since 2020, with only Penei Sewell grading better than him over his first three seasons. In pass protection, Wright also holds up well when compared to his peers on true pass sets. True pass sets are one-on-one pass-blocking snaps of over 2.5 seconds that don't involve screens, RPO's or play action. Essentially, true pass set grade attempts to contextualize how well an offensive lineman holds up in pass protection when left on an island. In this regard, Wright is in a similar cluster as his first-round peers, with Wirfs standing out as an outlier over his first three seasons in the NFL. Lastly, Wright's durability also helps set a high floor for his market value as he played over 3,000 snaps over his first three seasons, which ranks third amongst this group.
While Wright generally compares favorably to his peers, there are some areas where he hasn't performed quite to the same level as those we are comparing him to. This is particularly the case when compared to Sewell, Slater and Wirfs, who have all established themselves as elite of the elite amongst tackles in the NFL. We can see this when it comes to pass protection. Over his first three years, Wright allowed 105 total pressures for a pressure rate of 5.13%. These are good numbers, but fail to match Sewell, Slater and Wirfs, who were able to hold up better in pass protection overall. Once again, Wirfs is an outlier in particular, as his 1.92% pressure rate allowed over his first three seasons is an absurd mark to replicate. Some of this can be attributed to quarterback play, as Wright had to block for Justin Fields and Caleb Williams, two quarterbacks who notoriously hold the ball for a long time. With that said, it's fair to say that Wright is closer to being in the same tier as Cross when stacking him up to former first-round picks at tackle.
Moving on from statistical comparisons, here are the contract situations for the four tackles we are comparing Wright to:
Darnell Wright Contract Comparisons
It's important to note that all four contracts shown above are at or near the top of the offensive tackle market today. Slater and Cross rank second and third among current left tackle contracts, respectively, while Wirfs and Sewell have the two highest value contracts at right tackle (Wirfs made the switch to left tackle before signing his contract, but played right tackle over his first three seasons).
The most current contract signed for this group was Cross, who signed his deal earlier in 2026 while the Seahawks were in the midst of their Super Bowl run. Given that Wright's performance over his first three years compares closer to Cross than his other three peers, it's fair to use Cross's contract as a floor for negotiations. With that said, it's important to take into account salary cap inflation when understanding these contracts. Wirfs and Sewell signed their contracts during the 2024 offseason, while Slater signed his in 2025. The salary cap has increased by about $50 million since 2024, an almost 20% increase in a short amount of time and the expectation is that the cap will continue to skyrocket in future years. So, while Cross represents a solid starting point for a Wright contract, there has to be considerations for what the salary cap will be in future years when making an early extension.
Based on Wright's performance as well as the current tackle market and salary cap inflation, I see his next contract coming in closer to the $28 million per year value range than $26 million per year that Cross got. With young first-round tackles such as Paris Johnson, Joe Alt and Olu Fashanu expected to get big second contracts over the next few offseasons, the tackle market is likely going to see another increase at the top soon. Paying Wright top of the market money may seem like a slight overpay right now, but it should become a bargain if the Bears are able to get ahead of the next wave of tackles set to hit the market.
Darnell Wright Early Extension Projection
Now it's time to put together a contract structure for Wright given his market value. Here are the details of the contract and how it would look on a year-to-year basis:
Darnell Wright Projected Contract
In this projection, Wright gets a four-year, $114 million contract for a per-year average of $28.5 million per year. As part of the extension, Wright gets $66 million in new guaranteed money, with $43 million being fully guaranteed at signing. Wright receives a $22,464,309 signing bonus in 2026, of which $2,464,309 was originally a roster bonus set to be paid on August 1st as part of his original rookie contract. Wright's 2027 salary is his fifth-year option that is already guaranteed, while his 2028 salary is the first official year of the extension and is fully guaranteed at signing. If Wright is on the roster on the first day of the 2027 league year, his 2029 salary becomes fully guaranteed. Additionally, Wright gets $500,000 per year in workout bonuses starting in 2028. Similar to other Ryan Poles negotiated extensions, Wright's cash flow would be flat across his four extension years, with the same salary and workout bonus structure every year starting in 2028-2031.
This contract would make Wright the highest-paid right tackle in the NFL in average per-year value. When factoring in his fifth-year option money, this would also give Wright the most guaranteed money among all right tackles in the NFL, just above Sewell's $85 million in total guaranteed money.
There would be many positives to getting this contract extension done early for Wright this offseason. For starters, the Bears can beat other teams to the offensive tackle market, which is set to expand in future years with other young players set to get big extensions in future years. Giving Wright a top-of-the-market deal may seem like an overpay in the short term, but it would become a valuable bargain over time as other players get bigger contracts. From a structure standpoint, extending Wright early also allows the Bears to keep his cap hits relatively lower compared to the value of the contract. In this structure, while Wright's contract value is $28.5 million, he would not have a cap hit above $28 million in any year due to his signing bonus being spread out over the last two years of his rookie contract in 2026 and 2027. Due to this structure, the Bears would have Wright locked in through 2029 with essentially two team option years in 2030 and 2031, where they could get out of the deal with very little dead money if he underperforms or could negotiate an extension if he outperforms the contract.
While there are many positives to getting a deal like this done early, there are also some negatives as well. The first potential negative is that by signing Wright to this extension, you are projecting that he will take another step forward in future years to establish himself as one of the best tackles in the game. As established earlier, while Wright has certainly been very good and worthy of a big-money extension, he has still been a step below some of the NFL's elite at his position. That doesn't mean that Wright can't eventually get to that point in future years, but there is always the risk that stalled development or injuries could come back to bite the Bears by giving him an extension too early. It's worth keeping in mind that the Bears have the looming Caleb Williams extension to budget in for future years, which makes every dollar count moving forward.
All things considered, it is my opinion that it is in the best interest of the Bears to sign Wright to an extension as soon as possible. Wright has been everything you want in a franchise tackle to start his career. Wright is young, dependable and has been mostly durable over his first three years while showing consistent growth and improvement as a player. Wright may be a step down from the elite tackles in the NFL, but getting him locked into a long-term deal will solidify a premium position for a team looking to contend and allow the Bears to have a more coherent plan to build the roster moving forward, with Williams and other big extensions looming in future years. Overall, getting a Wright extension done before the season starts should be a top priority for the Bears as we look ahead to training camp in a little over a month.