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Bears' Risk With Garrett Bradbury Looks Low Based on Top 2025 Teams

Center Garrett Bradbury succeeded in a role last year like what he'll have in Chicago, and similar situations have worked out fine for the best teams.
Gene Chamberlain|
Garrett Bradbury talks with reporters at Halas Hall after offseason practice.
Garrett Bradbury talks with reporters at Halas Hall after offseason practice. | Chicago Bears On SI Photo: Chicago Bears video

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Chicago Bears

The great uncertainty about this Bears offensive line heading into training camp is not how they'll replace injured left tackle Ozzy Trapilo.

They already have a candidate who started at the position for them over three-plus seasons in Braxton Jones.

Assuming continued good health, nothing about Jones should bother the Bears. His strength was blocking the run before his 2024 ankle injury, and that would fit in nicely with what coach Ben Johnson wants to do on offense. Fully healed there now, should be no issues until or if Trapilo is ready to return. Then they would have a decision.

He'll have plenty of time to blend into the offensive line as a starter and do it after he started out as one of them at the beginning of last year.

Rather, the unknown in the mix is Garrett Bradbury's fit as the veteran leader of the group at center, and how long he will stave off the starting bid by second-round pick Logan Jones. Beyond this, it's whether either can fill in as well as Drew Dalman fit the group last year as a Pro Bowl player before his sudden, unexpected retirement. Also, whether there is enough time for him to blend in with a cohesive group before the regular season starts.

A switch so huge at center can be catastrophic. After all, the center handles the ball every play, usually plays a big role in determining presnap blocking adjustments and is a leader. The Detroit Lions lost Frank Ragnow last year and even with a capable replacement they looked less of the blocking force they'd been in the past.

It's a key position.

If ever a team needed proof it can make changes at center or even play someone regarded lightly at the position but still succeed, they only needed to look one season ago.

What 2025 proved

The Bears went out and brought in one of the game's better centers last year but playoff success didn't necessarily require one of the league's best centers.

In fact, the final four teams last year are proof no one needs an All-Pro or Pro Bowl types manning the spot. They don't even need an early draft pick doing it, and the Bears will actually have this once Jones is ready to play or forced to play due to injury. Someone like Bradbury should be able to play a bridge role help the team win at the same time.

Bradbury stepped in last year for the Patriots to do exactly what they Bears are asking him to do this year. He has always been graded by Pro Football Focus in the bottom half of the league except for 2022 with the Vikings, yet he has been a dependable starter. And last year he anchored an offensive line that won the AFC championship while the Patriots broke in his replacement.

He'll be doing the exact same thing by stepping into an unfamiliar situation, except he at least has familiarity in former college teammate Joe Thuney lining up at guard alongside.

Center formula for last year's sucess

Beyond any of this, the top four teams in the league last year did not boast elite level talent at center and/or had similar situations to what the Bears face this season.

Besides Bradbury leading New England's line in his only year there, former Bears center Coleman Shelton started for the Rams all year and did get graded as a top 10 center in the NFL but not as high as Dalman.

Of the starting centers for the final four NFL teams last year, Shelton was easily the highest graded by Pro Football Focus. It was Shelton's best year in the NFL and he was initially an undrafted player. He was inserted into that starting lineup last year after playing for the Rams prior to being in Chicago. So, he was technically a new starting center to that line.

Like Bradbury, Seahawks starting center Jalen Sundell was graded in the bottom half of the league by PFF last season during a run to the Lombardi Trophy. It was his first year starting for Seattle and he was only a second-year center. He hadn't started a game before last year and, like Shelton, he was undrafted.

Unlike Shelton or Sundell, Broncos starting center Luke Wattenberg did get drafted. He was not taken until Round 5. While he had started on Denver's line before last season, it was only for one season. He had a solid season, although not spectacular. He was graded 13th among the 32 starters, a year after he had been 18th as a first-time starter.

None of the top five centers in the league last year by PFF grades was starting for a winning team.

The position is important, but having success at it doesn't guarantee anything and the most effective centers still blend in as faceless parts of the line and are part of its overall effectiveness. It's not an individual position requiring a top level talent like Creed Humphrey. Rather, it's someone who can lead and fit the scheme.

Bradbury has already proven he can do this much, and do it with the next starting center waiting to take his job. Johnson saw no reason during the offseason work why they couldn't pull a line together by the season's start even with a new center.

"Well, I mean, we had several new offensive linemen last year at this time as well," Johnson said. "I think that's one of the bigger challenges in our sport is getting five guys to play as one. And that's regardless of how long they've been together all new faces.

"But like I said before, I think we got a couple of the best offensive line coaches in the business running that operation. A lot of experience, a lot of wealth of knowledge, so that helped make that transition a little bit better. A guy like OL Garrett Bradbury impressed us day one with just the level of communication that he brings to the table. He's loud, he's demonstrative. I know that he's going to be able to get all five guys on the same page. But it is a race, it's a race for us to get to know each other a little bit more. And you saw a year ago, it took us a minute before that run game started to get going and clicking."

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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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