Arkush: What can Super Bowl QBs Matt Stafford and Joe Burrow teach us about Justin Fields?
Over the past 10 months, no subject involving the Bears has garnered even 10% of the conversation centered around the present and future of Justin Fields, with the obvious exceptions of the job status of Matt Nagy and Ryan Pace.
And unfortunately little or none of it has involved objective evaluation of his performance during his rookie season.
The truth is Fields is still who he was the day he was drafted: a wildly talented athlete with some superstar traits for the position, a bright, natural leader and tough as nails but with questions to answer about his field generalship and ability to process reads and coverages at NFL speed.
The only difference now is in spite of a few flashes of the brilliance Bears Nation hopes for and expects on a regular basis, he's coming off an awful rookie season that almost always happens to rookie QBs forced to play too soon.
Statistically, Fields had one of the worst rookie QB seasons in modern history, made only slightly more palatable by the fact classmates Trevor Lawrence and Zach Wilson were just as bad.
Most important, Fields' dismal first year is not a life sentence. But a lot will have to change, and one place to look for clues as to what those things are is at Sunday's Super Bowl quarterbacks Matthew Stafford and Joe Burrow.
Unlike Fields, who was drafted 11th, both Stafford (2009) and Burrow (2020) were No. 1 overall picks and immediately named day one starters on rebuilding teams.
Stafford struggled every bit as much as Fields as a rookie and like Fields ended up starting just 10 games due to injuries.
Burrow was better but inconsistent with four very solid starts, two excellent ones and four clunkers while also getting just 10 starts due to injury.
From there they took divergent paths, with Stafford missing all but three games due to injury his second season. He truly arrived in Year 3 with 5,038 yards passing, 41 TDs - a career best that he finally tied just this season - and 16 interceptions, and he never looked back.
Since he'll be playing this Sunday, Burrow was obviously a lot better in Year 2, throwing for 4,611 yards, 34 TDs, 14 interceptions - 3 on consecutive attempts vs. the Bears in a Week 2 loss - and a 108.3 passer rating.
What changed for Stafford? He got to spend over a third of his rookie year and 85% of his second season watching and learning while the Lions made significant upgrades to the roster on both sides of the ball, Jim Schwartz matured as a head coach and Calvin Johnson emerged as a superstar.
Burrow, like Fields, spent the last third or so of his rookie campaign watching. And he learned while the Bengals went out and got him one of the guys most responsible for making him a No. 1 overall pick, Ja'Marr Chase, to complete one of the best receiving trios in the league along with Tee Higgins and Tyler Boyd, and turned one of the league's most porous defenses into one of its more stout.
With the tangibles we know, all that separates Fields from these two right now is experience and tutorials. He has arm talent to match Stafford's, better than Burrow if he can rediscover the accuracy at Ohio State that was often missing last season, and he's a better athlete than both.
The difference is that when you watch Stafford and Burrow on Sunday, you'll see that each appears to know exactly what he's looking at by the time he sets his feet and the ball is coming out fast, most often to the most vulnerable part of the defense.
It's what all the great ones have.
Remember though, the only real question mark on the Fields draft report was whether he possessed that skill and was why he fell behind Lawrence, Wilson and Trey Lance in the draft.
If it's there, Ryan Poles can support it with weapons and Matt Eberflus and Luke Getsy can unlock it, perhaps Fields will be playing instead of watching on a Super Sunday soon.