At Least Bears Have Proven Adept at Handling COVID-19

No one sounded the Bear Raid Siren in panic, or vacated Halas Hall on the fly.

The Bears simply dealt with another disruptive COVID-19 positive test and put punt returner DeAndre Carter on the Reserve/COVID-19 list, pushed their practice back to the mid-afternoon until early afternoon, and went on with preparations for the Houston Texans.

These may be unprecedented times but at this point dealing with COVID-19 interruptions is old hat for the Bears and most NFL teams.

"It was about the same as it was in training camp," tackle Charles Leno Jr. said. "I felt like we had a day like that in training camp where we all left and came back. We've already been through this. It was like riding a bike."

Still, it wasn't the same old, same old Thursday of work as they get ready to try and break a six-game losing streak.

"It was definitely very different and interesting, but I guess that just comes with the trade," linebacker Roquan Smith said. "So you can’t really think much else about it, other than you have a job to do and you have to show up to your job and do the work."

There already had been three players this week from the practice squad—LaCale London, Thomas Ives and Manti Te'o—go on Reserve/COVID-19, so Carter made it seem like an outbreak, but coach Matt Nagy immediately said they didn't think this situation had anything to do with the other three.

The return to practice went smoothly and the Bears needed this because earlier they had a smaller outbreak of this type and missed an entire Thursday of work before their 24-17 loss to Tennessee. It's difficult to prove a tie-in when there have been so many slow starts on offense, but they had an exceptionally slow start that game, falling behind 10-0 and 24-3.

So getting to work without any real interruption was big.

The Bears have had a system for this type of thing in place since Day 1 and have handled flawlessly.

"Obviously we're not exempt from this pandemic," Nagy said. "We all know that cases are on the rise. And I just want to credit our players and coaches for adapting and staying flexible.

"It's not easy. But we have the right mindset. I think that our guys showed that this morning with being able to adapt on short notice. This is kinda where we're at right now."

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