It's rare for a player to spend his entire career with one team, but Taylor Decker was always in line to do so with the Detroit Lions. When he decided to play in 2026, with a chance it would be his final season, that seemed to be confirmed.
Then Decker announced that when contract negotiations (aka he was asked to take a pay cut) didn't go as he had hoped, he had asked for and been given his release.
It was safe to assume there'd be a solid market for a veteran left tackle who had spent his career being underappreciated by the masses. But as is now known, Decker openly acknowledged he would consider retirement before last season ended. He also openly suggested his surgically repaired shoulder might never be 100 percent right again.
One foot possibly out the door and not being totally healthy goes a long way to equaling Decker still being available, as we can now count the number of days before training camps start.
Any viable list of best-available NFL free agents will include Decker right now. So it's no surprise Kristopher Knox of Bleacher Report has the former Lion on his list, as he also offered two top potential landing spots for each of the 10 free agents, which surprisingly included the Chicago Bears.
Taylor Decker and the Bears no longer make sense (and haven't for awhile)
Knox's two logical landing spots for Decker are the NFC North rival Bears and the Los Angeles Rams. Both have been well-covered and analyzed by us here at SideLion Report, as well as elsewhere, with the Rams taking some level of a lead among the two lately.
The Bears, with Decker's tie to head coach Ben Johnson from six seasons of overlap in Detroit and a need at left tackle, easily became the No. 1 potential landing spot the second the Lions released the 2016 first-round pick.
Weeks after he was released by the Lions, Decker revealed to Justin Rogers of Detroit Football Network how Johnson had reached out to him. At that point, current Lions coaches had not reached out similarly.
Rogers did not use a direct quote from Decker on a pertinent topic, but he did pass along — call it a vibe:
"I will tell you that [Decker's] pretty anti-playing for the Bears and Packers. That’s the Lions background. I know Ben Johnson did it and that was the right situation for him, but Taylor feels kinda dirty about the idea. It just isn’t interesting to him.”
The Bears thought they had a long-term answer at left tackle when Ozzy Trapilo emerged as a rookie last year. But a torn patellar tendon in the playoff win over the Green Bay Packers has put that idea on hold, for now.
Entering training camp, Braxton Jones is the favorite to be the Bears' starting left tackle, with Theo Benedet and Jedrick Wills Jr. as the top competitors for the job.
Frankly, it would take an incomprehensible run of injuries to all three, or at least two of the three, to put the Bears in the market to sign any available left tackle option. Let alone someone who ruled out the idea of signing with them months ago, as Decker did.
Decker's situation boils down to this. It seems he asked the Lions for his release without a sense of what the market for his services would be. His agent should absorb a good bit of blame for that, but it also means you cannot eliminate potential suitors with any kind of public sentiment.
It can be argued Rogers did Decker a little bit dirty by passing along that anti-Bears/Packers sentiment. Decker also didn't have to invite a reporter to his offseason home in Arizona to talk. For his part, a good reporter like Rogers surely cleared what he planned to publish and would've changed anything Decker had an issue with.
If the Bears were to find themselves in a situation where they'd have to find a new left tackle, there's a good chance they wouldn't bother with Decker. That says it all and confirms the foolishness of his entire offseason approach.
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