Chicago Bears: 3 Cap casualty candidates for 2021 offseason

1. Anthony Miller, Wide Receiver

This one is more for his actions on the field than for salary cap space. Anthony Miller burst onto the scene in 2018 and had a good rookie season. He led all rookie receivers with seven touchdown receptions. Since then, however, he’s had just four.

Additionally, he’s been very inconsistent with his play in the three seasons he’s been with the Chicago Bears. He’ll make some great plays and have some great games, but then disappear for the next two or three games. He’s had trouble running bad routes as well.

The final straw could be Miller’s ejection from the Bears’ playoff game against the New Orleans Saints. Chicago was already down a receiver because of Darnell Mooney’s injury in the regular-season finale.

Miller got into it with Saints defensive back Chauncey Gardner-Johnson and punched him, earning the ejection. Just getting ejected was a boneheaded move by itself, but this one was an even bigger one.

In addition to him knowing the team was missing a big piece of the offense, all the players on offense were reminded of Gardner-Johnson’s antics. He likes to get under opponents’ skin. He even did it the first time the two teams faced each other in the regular season. Gardner-Johnson got into it with Javon Wims. Wims was also ejected and was suspended.

The coaches reminded the players of what happened earlier and warned them not to give in to the antics. Miller, though, got baited and the Bears lost another piece.

With his immaturity and inconsistent play, the Bears need to part ways with Miller. They save just over $1.2 million, which isn’t much, but with the salary cap hell the Bears are in, any relief they get is important.

These three cuts put the Bears right around the salary cap limit. Then they can restructure some of their bigger contracts and free up a lot of space and they’ll be ready to acquire better talent and compete in 2021.