Hoping the Houston Texans will trade up with the Chicago Bears for the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 NFL Draft?
Don't count on it.
At least according to a pair of front office personnel.
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RELATED: NFL combine notebook: Bears intel on trade price, partners, QB class
One NFL general manager told The Athletic he thinks Texans general manager Nick Caserio "sits on the (No. 2) pick."
And he wasn't the only one.
“I can’t see Houston moving up,” an exec from a team picking in the top 10 told The Athletic. “I see them gambling that there is a quarterback there at 12.”
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Bears fans have hoped the Texans might feel pressure to trade up to prevent the Indianapolis Colts, the Texans' division rival, from leapfrogging them.
Mel Kiper Jr. outlined the Bears' ideal scenario in his latest mock draft, which featured the Bears trading down twice.
The first of those two trades were with the Texans. Then the Bears trade the Texans' No. 2 overall pick to the Colts to move down again.
Speculation about the Bears trading the No. 1 overall pick is all over the board, and there doesn't seem to be a consistent theme from what people are hearing.
In this same piece from The Athletic, a different general manager said he sees the Carolina Panthers or "someone outside the top 10" as more likely trade partners for the Bears' top pick.
The Bears' asking price is reportedly high, and trading that far down might be the way general manager Ryan Poles gets the haul he is looking for.
"The Bears looking for a first- and second-round pick in this year’s draft as well as a first-round pick in 2024 and 2025 to move outside the top five," NBC Sports Chicago's Bears Insider Josh Schrock wrote. "There’s the potential for that price to come down a tick if the trade partner is still in the top five."
It's worth nothing Peter King identified the Panthers as the team most likely to overpay for the No. 1 overall pick.
"Carolina could be more desperate," King wrote. The owner, David Tepper, has made it clear internally he wants a long-term answer at quarterback, and he wants it now. Indianapolis wouldn’t have to trade as much as Carolina for the pick, because it’d be moving up three spots. But the Panthers might be willing to overpay relative to the Colts, and if the Bears have enough “blue” players on the board to ensure they’d get one picking at nine, I could see them taking that deal."
But lots of intel coming out of the combine says multiple teams are "scrambling" to land the No. 1 overall pick.
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