Imrem: Making a pitch to address Chicago Bears' QB issue

So, the Chicago Bears' makeover accelerated this week with the dumping of three ineffective defensive players.

Safety Brock Vereen was waived Tuesday, a day after linebackers Jared Allen and Jon Bostic were traded.

Well, as Harry Caray used to say about the Cubs, “What about the pitching?”

In football that translates into, “What about the quarterback?”

Every time one of these moves was teased on radio and TV, I waited breathlessly for news that the Bears sent away a quarterback or brought one in or both.

There's no legitimate makeover until Bears general manager Ryan Pace figures out how to acquire a legitimate franchise quarterback.

Is there a plan to find one? Has Pace browsed the quarterback shelf of upcoming drafts? Or is it simply pot luck?

At many of the Super Bowls I covered, I asked NFL general managers whether there is a proven way to fill the need for a Super Bowl quarterback.

There was Ron Wolf, who traded for Brett Favre. There was Rich McKay, who signed Brad Johnson. There was even Jerry Angelo, who drafted Rex Grossman.

Nobody seemed to have a secret formula for adding a championship quarterback but all acknowledged a team had to have one to sustain success.

The Bears' longtime search to fill the position used to be funny and now it's a joke. The latest punch line was another professional performance by Russell Wilson in Seattle's victory over the Bears.

We have been told that Jay Cutler is the least of the Bears' problems this season, but a problematic quarterback never is the least of a team's problems.

The folly at Seattle in which Cutler was sidelined with an injury punctuated that the Bears can do myriad machinations and still will need a quarterback.

Wilson emerged as a rookie in 2012, when Seattle head coach Pete Carroll turned him loose in Soldier Field.

I cracked on that day that the Bears were beaten by a quarterback shorter than I am.

Not true, of course. Wilson has me by a few inches, which still leaves him a few inches short of the perceived minimum height for a quality NFL quarterback.

On the other side of the field the Bears had Cutler at the highly recommended size of 6-feet-3, 220 pounds.

Since then, Wilson, a third-round draft choice, quarterbacked the Seahawks into two Super Bowls and won one. Cutler, originally an 11th overall draft pick of the Broncos, quarterbacked the Bears into oblivion.

This is maddening: Other teams find players to play the most important position in all of sport and the Bears fill their void with more voids.

While analysts still are waiting for Cutler to fulfill his potential in Chicago. Wilson has exceeded his in Seattle.

Quality NFL quarterbacks come in all sizes, shapes and forms; they come via the draft, trades and free agency.

Yet the Bears haven't been able to stumble upon a perennial Pro Bowl QB in seven decades.

The Bears have tried. They drafted first-round quarterbacks like Jim McMahon and Rex Grossman. They traded for the likes of Cutler and Rick Mirer. They ran QB hopefuls through Halas Hall on a conveyor belt.

Still, the Bears have nobody memorable beyond McMahon's one Super Bowl championship propped up by a dominating defense in 1985.

Watching Russell Wilson surgically dissect the Bears served to magnify the madness.

So, yes, “What about the pitching, uh, quarterback?”

mimrem@dailyherald.com