Roster Moves Set Bears Up with Depth on Both Lines
The Bears made a few promotions Saturday designed to make sure they have players available who can play on the offensive line, and defensive line.
They brought up guard Dieter Eiselen and Badara Traore from the practice squad. Both are undrafted rookies, Eiselen is the former Yale player who came to the U.S. from South Africa, where he had been a rugby player and weight lifter. He taught himself about football after seeing the Super Bowl.
Traore has actually snapped the ball briefly before in college so the Bears would have an extra center and it's presumed they'll start Alex Bars at center, although he hasn't been announced as a starter.
Last week before the Saints game coaches were working with him in pregame on snapping the ball in the end zone so that they had an extra center in case of emergency, an injury to Sam Mustipher. And this week is the emergency.
They made a few other non-offensive line moves. Punt returner Dwayne Harris was brought up again this week to the 53-man roster.
Also, quarterback Tyler Bray was promoted to the 53-man roster along with nose tackle Daniel McCullers officially as COVID-19 replacements.
McCullers is needed because starting right defensive end Roy Robertson-Harris is out with a shoulder injury and backup nose tackle John Jenkins has an anke injury and both will miss the game.
McCullers, who is 6-foot-7, 352 pounds, has started three NFL games and played in 73 over a seven-year career, mostly with the Steelers. He had 41 career tackles and 2 1/2 sacks as well as four tackles for loss in the games he's played. The Bears signed McCullers originally off of the Steelers practice squad.
Bray was promoted as backup because of Mitchell Trubisky's right shoulder injury but coach Matt Nagy said Trubusiky's injury wasn't a season-ender.
"He's obviously out for Sunday and there's not going to be IR for him," Nagy said. "I don't think it seems as severe as 2018."
This is Trubisky's third straight year with a shoulder injury. His injury last year was the left shoulder.
"As far as where he's at mentally and sympathizing with him, this is a kid that's obviously been through a lot," Nagy said.
Trubisky injured it trying to run the ball on his only play since Week 3, a gimmick play which was a read-option.
"For one play, for him to come in and try to help the team and unfortunately have that happen, there's a lot of different ways you can look at it," Nagy said. "I’'m gonna continue to go back to this and say this about Mitchell: He is a kid that does everything he possibly can and cares a lot about this game and about his teammates. For him, when you have somebody like that, you really, really care about him as a player and a person.
"And so, just for him to continue to stay positive, for us to help him stay positive and be there to support is all we can really do. That's really where we're at."
Twitter: BearDigest@BearOnMaven
