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Bear Digest

How Bears Hope to Avoid a Cowboys and Saints Fiasco in Cincinnati

Keeping the peace at joint practices with the Bengals is always a concern when what happened between Dallas and New Orleans is fresh in everyone's minds.
Gene Chamberlain|
Chicago Bears tight end Colston Loveland is off to the races against the Bengals last year for the winning TD.
Chicago Bears tight end Colston Loveland is off to the races against the Bengals last year for the winning TD. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

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Chicago Bears

The Bears are heading to Cincinnati for Thursday practice with the Bengals, along with all of the benefits and potential for bad blood.

You would think they should be able to contain any possible joint practice fights or shoving scrums between the teams because the Bengals' head coach, Zac Taylor, is the brother of Bears offensive coordinator Press Taylor. There will be plenty of orchestrated work to keep people in line.

"Zac and I had really good conversations in the springtime," Bears coach Ben Johnson said. "They're really organized over there, so it was probably in May that he sent over what he wanted the practice to look like. There were field diagrams and all that and so it's really detailed. I know they put a lot of time into what we want this to look like.

"I think we're going to get, call it, just under 2 1/2 hours of really good work. I'm excited about that. Press has certainly helped out just in regards to, he knows a lot of those guys on that staff. There's a lot of coordination going on between the coordinators."

Johnson is confident this can benefit both sides in advance of Saturday's preseason game. wide receiver Rome Odunze talked about benefiting by watching the great Bengals receivers chasing throws from Joe Burrow. There's no doubt the Bears defense can benefit from pursuing those receivers.

“I think it's going to be a heck of a test for us," defensive coordinator Dennis Allen said. "They've got a really good offense, MVP caliber quarterback, offensive player of the year, MVP caliber wide receiver, Tee Higgins is a heck of a player, Chase Brown's a hell of a running back, Mike Gesicki at the tight end position. So, they've got a lot of weapons and a lot of things that they can do on offense.

"All five of their offensive linemen are returning, so it'll be a great test for us, and I'm just looking for usto go out there and compete and see where we stack up against what, I think, is probably going to be one of the better offenses in our league.”

The best laid plans of coaches

All of this sounds well and good, very thoroughly thought out, but then there's what so often happens at these joint practices. It's what happened at the Saints-Cowboys joint practices on Tuesday. There were seven skirmishes of varying severity.

Reports from the scene said Dallas' defensive end Donovan Ezeiruaku threw more than one punch. Saints center Erik McCoy was spotted throwing a Cowboys player’s helmet at one point

Last year the Bears practiced against the Dolphins at Halas Hall and although it was fairly peaceful, there were still a few minor scuffles.

One involved Jahdae Walker on special teams.

The best one was a fight on the sideline between two Miami players. Dolphins reporters said former coach Mike McDaniel helped end it but the Bears were actually involved in trying to break up the fight between teammates. It should have all been an indication which way things were going to go for Miami last year. In the end, the Dolphins were mad at the Bears for hitting them too hard in practice.

The Bears' attitude now might be positive, but Odunze's thoughts on going to Cincinnati might typify what all the Bears starters are thinking.

"Man, I'm looking forward to going against somebody else, you know?" he said.

What that so often winds up turning into is they're glad to face someone else and now let's get after it. It's not a game situation strictly controlled by officials, even if there are refs for the practice. It's the informality of it that helps breed the violence.

Then the fists begin flying. Football fighting always has been one of the most futile efforts in all of sports because the equipment can cause more damage to the person punching than they're going to generate by throwing it.

There already is a bit of a catalyst for bad feelings from the Bengals side. Remember how they lost last year's game to the Bears on a late 57-yard TD pass by Caleb Williams to Colston Loveland?

Johnson is planning to use the practice to gauge whether he needs to use starters on Saturday in the game. If they get enough positive work, they might be able to keep starters fresh. But it means lots of practice exposure for starters.

"A lot is going into it, but I think we're on the same page with what we want this to look like, what we want to get out of it," Johnson said. "I think both sides are going to come away pretty pleased with the work we get in.”

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Either that or they'll come away with a lot of bad feelings like the Cowboys and Saints. It doesn't matter that brothers are coaching on each side because they're not the ones who would be throwing the punches, wrestling, gouging and biting, or whatever else happens.

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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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