The Tough Break for Bears and Chase Claypool
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Chase Claypool's progress within the Bears offense had only drawn positive reactions from coaches for one week on the field.
There's the problem.
As happened last season upon his arrival in Chicago, Claypool seems to be a guy who can't catch a break.
Claypool's injury, strongly hinted at as soft tissue by coach Matt Eberflus, is a blow to his progress within the offense after it was suggested he would improve greatly with an offseason of work in this offense.
"So you know he just felt something like a lot of guys have so we just let him sit out for the day and see where they're going from there and then we'll see what we do," Eberflus said after the injury almost two weeks ago.
This is why the Tuesday-through-Thursday minicamp will be big for Claypool.
Will the Bears bring him back out and let him work with the group?
Last year the narrative from coaches and the team, as well as GM Ryan Poles, was Claypool just needed to build that connection with Justin Fields and also to simply learn the offense because he hadn't really had time to learn it by coming in at midseason of 2022 from Pittsburgh.
When he did play, his time spent practicing and playing with Fields was minimal. He was on the field in games 200 total Bears snaps last year and 126 came with Fields at quarterback, a good portion of which were running plays. In his first two games, he had 26 and 19 plays and obviously didn't know the offense because he had just arrived.
So it probably is little wonder the Fields and Claypool didn't get anything going last year, and had 14 catches in seven games for 140 yards without catching a touchdown pass.
"To say where he is now, obviously, he's definitely in a much better place," offensive coordinator Luke Getsy said this past week about Claypool. "That's what's most important. Like coach Flus and those guys have said, I think that his positivity, his optimism coming into this thing, and his attack and his approach to how he’s trying to learn this thing is really cool to see."
The Bears insisted they saw a lot from Claypool.
“Chase has improved tremendously from the end of last year to now," Fields said after the first week of practice. "That’s one thing I’m truly proud to say, seeing his work ethic, his attitude change.
"You can just see he’s taking another step, so definitely excited for that."
Getsy agreed.
"I think comfortability within the building, whether that's being around the head coach, being around us on the offensive staff, his teammates," Getsy said. "And then, most importantly, Justin. I think that relationship is always the most important—the quarterback/receiver relationship. I think all of that's improving.
"As far as his knowledge of what's going on around him, that's improving. Because we demand a lot of that position, as we've talked about here plenty of times. That's a big part of what we do with that role. It's been good to see him be able to take a step there."
It's easy to wonder if this isn't all just coachspeak and offseason optimism.
The Bears weren't doing on-field work against defenses early in their team conditioning work. The on-field work for Claypool at OTAs consisted of only one week out of three.
Receivers coach Tyke Tolbert admitted the obvious trouble at this point when asked what he would like to see from the former Notre Dame receiver.
"Just be healthy," Tolbert said. "He's a little banged up right now. The time he was out there he made a lot of good plays for us. I'm excited where he is. He's more into what we're doing offensively. He asks a lot of good questions.
"He's here extra too—when he doesn't have to be here, he's here doing a lot of extra things, trying to get better, watching tape on his own, that kinda thing."
Those are all fine, but there is no work being done on the field now and the injury kept Claypool from building the necessary rapport with Fields in the passing game the way it first appeared would be done in Week 1, the way DJ Moore is doing now.
For that matter, they haven't had Darnell Mooney as he recovers from ankle surgery, and so the great step forward the passing game needs to make this offseason so far is on shaky ground. It's Fields and Moore. That's it. The passing game is going to have some catching up to do in training camp.
Again.
The Bears expect much from Claypool, it's true.
"He's a big target, as we know," Tolbert said. "People forget that he's 230 pounds but he ran a 4.42 (in the 40). He's really fast.
"He was out here and he was getting behind the defense a few times. We're excited to have him."
Or at least they were.
It would be better to offer the high praise when Claypool has been working for the majority of the offseason and training camp.
They are allowed to be a lot more excited if they have him on the field at minicamp.
Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven
