Bear Digest

Bears play it safe at receiver and offensive line with inactives

Risking injured players in a season finale with only a playoff seed on the line isn't what Ben Johnson has decided to pursue.
Gene Chamberlain|
Rome Odunze is missing his fifth straight game because of a foot injury.
Rome Odunze is missing his fifth straight game because of a foot injury. | David Banks-Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

While the Bears are not treating the regular season finale as an exhibition game like Green Bay did, they took the safe route with injured players.

Wide receiver Rome Odunze and left tackle Ozzy Trapilo are inactive for the game with Detroit. Both were questionable.

Odunze will miss his fifth straight game with a foot injury but had practiced Friday on a limited basis. Trapilo came out of last week's loss at San Francisco with knee and quad injuries and was able to practice all week on a limited basis, but the Bears have something much bigger ahead next week with a Soldier Field playoff game.

Without Trapilo, the Bears will start Theo Benedet at left tackle. Benedet hasn't started since Nov. 16 and played no more than four plays of offense in any games since then, but did start seven straight games prior to Trapilo taking over as starter.

The other inactives are third QB Case Keenum, defensive back Nick McCloud, linebacker Ruben Hyppolite II and defensive end Joe Tryon-Shoyinka. McCloud is getting over an illness and Tryon-Shoyinka is still in the concussion protocol.

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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.