Baltimore Ravens coach John Harbaugh said Tuesday he doesn’t believe the botched draft-day trade with the Bears was the result of an “honest” mistake, as Bears general manager Jerry Angelo has claimed.
“It was disappointing,” Harbaugh said on the “Waddle and Silvy Show” on WMVP (AM-1000). “They can get mad at me if they want, but I’m not buying the mistake thing. It wasn’t a mistake. They knew what they were doing.
“They put their guy on the phone. They agreed to a pick. They got their guy on the phone. They recognized he wasn’t getting calls from the team behind them, and they basically stalled for over a minute, telling us they had called the trade in. They hadn’t called the trade in. They said it was a mistake. Those guys have been doing it for a long time, c’mon.”
The Bears and Ravens agreed to swap first-round picks in the April NFL Draft, with Angelo giving up a fourth-round selection to move up three slots to No. 26, but the Bears did not confirm the trade with the league office, as rules require. The Ravens ended up drafting Colorado cornerback Jimmy Smith while the Bears grabbed Wisconsin tackle Gabe Carimi, who they were afraid would be gone if they didn’t move up to get him. Both teams getting the player they ultimately wanted is one reason why the Bears didn’t feel they had to compensate the Ravens for a mistake they admit they made.
The Bears spokesperson said the team has “moved on.”
Harbaugh said he would be hesitant to deal with the Bears in the future.
“They basically just stole [three] spots from us, and that’s not OK. That’s not something … it’s not ethical, it’s not right. And I personally agree with our owner Steve Bisciotti that they should have been held accountable for it. But also it is what it is, they didn’t do anything illegal. We were just disappointed with it.”
