Brad Biggs at the Chicago Tribune answers your questions:
Do you think the Bears are waiting till camp to sign a defensive end? We don’t know when Dayo Odeyingbo or Shemar Turner are coming back. Only have three healthy defensive ends from the 53-man roster last season. Putting lots of confidence in two guys coming off major injury seems like a big gamble. — @bears_dubz
The front office is keeping tabs on potential options. It’s my understanding the Bears brought in A.J. Epenesa for a workout last week. The free agent had 2½ sacks in 16 games for the Buffalo Bills last season after totaling 18½ sacks over three seasons from 2022-24.
Would adding Epenesa or a player like him move the needle for you? Epenesa had an agreement with the Cleveland Browns on a one-year, $5 million contract, but that deal fell apart in late March after the 27-year-old Iowa product failed a physical. What specifically led the Browns to pull their offer is unknown.
That’s evidence that the Bears aren’t sitting around simply wondering how the players on the roster will perform. I’d probably classify the visit by Epenesa somewhere between interest in adding to the position and performing due diligence on an emergency list.
The Bears are optimistic about Austin Booker’s performance this season, and coach Ben Johnson has been very positive about what they got from Montez Sweat last season. When Odeyingbo and Turner are healthy, they’ll have players to fit into a rotation. It would not surprise me if they add a defensive end for competition at some point, but right now the Bears clearly are more confident in Odeyingbo and Turner returning healthy and adding to the mix than the public is.
It frustrates me to read questions like this. What are the Bears supposed to do? Produce a pass rusher out of mid-air?
The Bears obviously wanted to improve the pass rush in the offseason, but the opportunity and/or the value weren’t there. So, like many, even most, of the teams in the NFL, they had to go with what they have. Get over it.
The Bears don’t think that they got everything they could out of Odeyingbo last year. They think that with better health and another season, Turner will be better.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is it. This is your team. They may be good enough with a renewed and concentrated effort by the coaching staff to embed better fundamentals and use the players in different ways. Or they may not be. But as Bears fans, these are our guys. Time to accept that and move on to see what happens.