The Bears Secondary Facing Early Injury Concerns
The Bears' secondary depth is sure to be tested early on this season. Kyler Gordon and Jaylon Johnson both missed Week One against Minnesota. The depth may have been solid, but they were certainly missed. While the experience is valuable for the backups, the Bears need their stars healthy if they want to compete for the division. The team is hoping these injuries are on a smaller scale and do not impact the rest of the season, as the team hopes to turn the corner and start a new era.
One of the key reasons the team blew the lead against the Vikings was their inability to stop the offense late in the game. The passing game started to show signs of growth, and the Bears were powerless to stop anything Minnesota did. These effects of the injuries are sure to be a cause of concern in the next few weeks. The team next turns its attention to Detroit and then Dallas, which are two teams that can seriously hurt you in the air.
The positive side of this is that the injuries seem to be short-term. Johnson was missing practices for a while due to his groin injury. However, he did make a serious push to play and was not scratched out until a few hours before game time. Similarly, Gordon was also a late scratch with his hamstring injury. Less was known about him, as he was not added to the injury report until later in the week. The bright side of that is that sometimes, no news is good news when it comes to injuries.
Another indication that these two had a chance to play this past week is that the Bears did not call up anyone from the practice squad. While there is certainly still time this week, as the team does not play until Sunday, there has been no news yet about the team bringing anyone else onto the roster. The game against Detroit is enormous as the team hopes to avoid starting with two losses, especially with the fact that they would come against divisional opponents. The health of the secondary is crucial to this and is certainly an important thing to monitor throughout the week.
