Bear Digest

No Excuses for Chase Claypool

When training camp comes it will be time for Chase Claypool to prove it or face an uncertain future.
Gene Chamberlain|
No Excuses for Chase Claypool
No Excuses for Chase Claypool

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Chicago Bears

The constant debate about Chase Claypool rages in social media, for whatever that's worth.

The numbers say Claypool went through a down third season, got traded to the Bears and failed to adjust to a new team at midseason. It's tough to assign him much blame for this, as other players over the years haven't been able to adapt quickly after mid-season trades. In fact, the majority take some time to produce.

In his first two seasons, Claypool had 62 and 59 catches for 873 and 860 yards. As a rookie he came within 51 yards of bettering Diontae Johnson's yardage total to lead Pittsburgh.

Claypool left the Steelers with Pittsburgh fans holding the door open for him and calling him an Uber. They trumpeted the play of George Pickens as his replacement. Pickens had 10 fewer catches (52) for 82 less yards (801) and five for touchdowns (4) than Claypool did as a rookie, so maybe they'd better quit drinking the black and gold Kool-Aid in the Steel City.

What happened in Pittsburgh is in the past and largely irrelevant. So is his 14-catch half-season in Chicago when he didn't pick up the offense quickly, got injured, threw a fit in Detroit and was in only five games with Justin Fields, who also was injured. 

The real issue the Bears face with Claypool now is whether he did enough with the offense in the off-season program to know it well going into his second season in Chicago.

Physically, he obviously is not in the kind of shape someone would be if they went through the entire off-season training program and all the practices. What's probably more important is if he is in tune with what receivers need to know.

Receivers coach Tyke Tolbert described what rookie receiver Tyler Scott needs to know when he gets to the line of scrimmage and it's appropriate to wonder whether Claypool could know all of this after not practicing on the field three out of the four weeks.

"You have to worry about breaking the huddle, there's motions, there's shifts," Tolbert said. "Where's my split? What's the depth of my route? Certain (types of) defenses make a route convert into another route. It's a lot of things going on at wide receiver.

"It's not just lining up on the right side, going 10 yards, going right and catch the ball. There's a lot of things that go on that people don’t realize."

It was Tolbert's view that Scott is ahead of where most rookies would be with all of this. 

Is Claypool?

Sitting out three of the four weeks of OTAs and minicamp with unspecified injuries only paved the way for more rampant unverified speculation and criticism.

An AM-1000 report by program host Mark Silverman said he hears the Bears are disappointed with the way Claypool has approached this offseason, but so far every bit of public commentary from coaches and teammates has been positive about Claypool.

Coach Matt Eberflus said Claypool has progressed enough so, "..second time going around he knows the formations and the motions and knows the route disciplines. He's learning that as we go and you can certainly see him getting more comfortable adjusting too."

Fields added: "I think he grew tremendously from last year until now."

None of this means the report is untrue.

A video of Claypool modeling in France during the offseason also set off a firestorm of commentary. The cries rang out: He could model but wasn't healthy enough to practice three out of four weeks?

"He's not on a time crunch," Bears coach Matt Eberflus said when minicamp ended. "And we can get him fully healthy working into the summer because we have 40 days when we break from here to get ready for training camp. So, that's what we're trying to do."

The bottom line is Claypool will find when he gets to camp that if he really wasn't properly preparing for the season, then it could be his own career absorbing a hit and not necessarily the Bears' chances of improving. 

Their season doesn't hinge on Claypool.

He could find that Velus Jones Jr. wants more catches and can make them—in Year 2, that Scott is more than capable of making an impact as a rookie, that Equanimeous St. Brown knows this offense like the back of his hand because it's all he has ever played in, and that Dante Pettis has the benefit of a full Bears season while being impressive during offseason at catching Fields' passes. For that matter, the Bears now have a second tight end in Robert Tonyan Jr., who is capable of playing a big role in the passing game and could take away targets from wide receivers.

Last year there was a shortage of receivers and players who knew the offense. Moore and overall team familiarity with Getsy's offense changes this.

There will be plenty of competition for the third receiver spot and for targets if Claypool doesn't fulfill expectations. They would have little to no problem leaving him as a game-day inactive during his contract year.

However, before writing off Claypool note the many skills and talents he possesses that can't be taught.

"People forget that he's 230 pounds but he ran a 4.42 (40 time)," Tolbert said. "He's really fast."

It's up to Claypool to make people remember this when training camp begins.

Otherwise, no one will remember.

Chase Claypool at a Glance

Vitals: 6-foot-4, 238 pounds, fourth season.

Career: Has 167 receptions in 293 targets for 2,184 yards and 12 TDs, 13.1 yards per catch and a 57% catch ratio.

2022: Made 46 catches in 79 targets for 451 yards and 9.8 yards per catch with a 58.2% catch ratio. In Chicago, he had 14 catches in seven games and 29 targets for 140 yards, 10 yards per catch and a 48.3% catch ratio. 

The Number: 1. It's the number of times he caught more than two passes in a game with the Bears last season. He had five in six targets for 28 yards and a 5.6-yard average against the Packers i`n a 28-19 loss.

2023 FanNation Projection: 38 receptions, 449 yards, 61 targets, 11.8 yards per catch, 4 TDs, catch percentage 62.2%.

Bottom Line:  The off-season matters, especially when you weren't really part of what was done the previous year. And third receivers can't expect much in this offense when there are two good tight ends and running attack led the NFL in rushing last year. 

Michael Fabiano's SI Fantasy Ranking: No. 71 among all wide receivers.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.

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