Bears have a few early injury situations to watch going into Monday’s game against the Seahawks, and already made one roster move
The Chicago Bears returned to practice on Tuesday and the first injury report won’t be released until Thursday, but we already have a few injury situations to keep an eye on for Week 8.
The Chicago Bears returned to practice on Tuesday and it was a quick session as the team begins the week of preparation leading up to Monday night’s game against the defending Super Bowl champions in Seattle.
While it was a short practice, and the first injury report won’t be released until Thursday, we did get some notable injury news on Tuesday that will be worth paying attention to throughout the rest of the week.
Kyle Monangai, Malik Muhammad II, Tyrique Stevenson not see during Tuesday’s practice
Three players were absent from Tuesday’s practice according to reporters at Halas Hall: RB Kyle Monangai (toe), CB Malik Muhammad II (toe) and CB Tyrique Stevenson (hip).
Monangai has missed each of the last three games for the Bears while he continues dealing with a turf toe injury. Head coach Ben Johnson elected not to use an IR spot on Monangai, with hope that he would return within four weeks. This is the fourth week and not seeing him out there on Tuesday kicks the week off on a bad note.
As for Muhammad, he left the game early last Thursday against the New England Patriots and there’s still no word on the extent of his injury. Stevenson did not play in the team’s Week 6 game and has been battling injuries all season. Being without both left the Bears short-handed at cornerback with Jaylon Johnson, Kyler Gordon, Clark Phillips III, and Josh Blackwell being the other options at the position on the 53-man roster.
It’s worth noting that it’s still very early in the week. And we will have a clearer picture of the team’s injury situations on Thursday-Saturday when the team releases the three injury reports after those practices. But, it’s certainly tough news to start the week.
The good news is that T.J. Edwards (hamstring) was back at practice after missing the last two weeks and D’Marco Jackson was out there as well after being seen in a boot following last Thursday’s game.
One roster move has already been made this week
The Bears also announced one roster move on Tuesday. The team signed running back Zavier Scott off the practice squad and onto the 53-man roster. It’s not a sign of Monangai’s potential availability but more so rewarding a player who has been a standout over the last three weeks on special teams.
“You love Zavier, man,” Bears special teams coordinator Richard Hightower said last week. “First of all, unbelievable human being. He’s a better person than he is a football player. The kid is really driven, Christian kid, really straight-laced kid that has been in my office every day since he’s got here looking at his practice scout team reps. He comes up every day and looks at his practice scout team to see where he can get better even when he wasn’t active. What you see happening is work in the dark that came to the light… It’s always awesome when you see somebody that puts in the work and then they get rewarded for it.”
To make room for Scott on the 53-man roster, the Bears released cornerback Nick McCloud. Chicago has one open practice squad spot following this move.
