List of Missing Bears Gets Longer

With most of Justin Fields' offensive line now among the injured, it almost seemed appropriate the tight ends would be the next up.

They're almost like offensive linemen at times, and they were next.

Tight end Cole Kmet left Wednesday's indoor practice and didn't return. There is no word yet from the Bears on his status. He walked to a cart and was driven from the Payton Center.

Coach Matt Eberflus' next availability is Thursday, when he is expected to announce whether starters will play and if so how much. He'll have to address the injury status of Kmet as well as right tackle Darnell Wright, who suffered a lower leg injury near the end of Tuesday's practice.

"He's doing great," offensive line coach Chris Morgan said of Wright. "We'll see how everything goes, where everything's at. One day at a time."

Fields lined up behind a makeshift offensive line on Wednesday with the only healthy starters left tackle Braxton Jones and left guard Cody Whitehair. And Whitehair is working in after being injured.

Right guard Nate Davis was replaced by Ja'Tyre Carter. Doug Kramer was at center with Lucas Patrick unavailable. And Larry Borom played right tackle because of the injury suffered by Wright.

"It's always a challenge," Morgan said. "You're always going to have moving parts in this league. Very seldom do you have the same five guys all the time. It's pro football and it's next man up and all the guys that are having to fill in or have filled in, they've been training for this moment."

At question is whether Fields should play Saturday against Buffalo if many of his starting linemen, as well as Kmet, are unable to go. In fact, they have to determine how many starters will go, period.

"I've been through both sides of this thing in the sense of where you want guys to play to get the familiarity, the chemistry, and I've been on the other side of it where we felt like we didn't need to do that, it wasn't what was best," Bears offensive coordinator Luke Getsy said. "Obviously we're going to evaluate who we have available to us and everything like that to make those decisions and then Ryan (Pace) and Matt (Eberflus) will figure that out exactly how much or how long those guys will play."

The injuries to the offensive line do complicate things.

"I don’t know if it's the most complicated, but it's something that you do factor in for sure," Getsy said.

Without Kmet the Bears would rely on former Packers tight end Robert Tonyan Jr. but also Marcedes Lewis and Stephen Carlson.

The injuries don't apply only to the offensive line.

Besides Kmet, Jenkins, Patrick and Wright Wednesday, they were missing:

Safety Eddie Jackson

Safety Jaquan Brisker

Wide Receiver Chase Claypool

Wide Receiver Velus Jones Jr.

Cornerback Josh Blackwell

Linebacker Dylan Cole

Running Back Trestan Ebner

Linebacker DeMarquis Gates

Defensive End DeMarcus Walker

Tight End Marcedes Lewis

Wide Receiver Dante Pettis

Defensive End Yannick Ngakoue

Defensive End Rasheem Green

"I think that it'll be fine," running back D'Onta Foreman said. "Around the teams I've been on, I've seen these types of things happen, but they always roll back around and things are going to end up being fine."

Even though they're not on the field, Foreman sees them being involved in season preparations.

"I see the hard work that they're doing off the field," Foreman said. "Very hopeful that those guys will be ready to go when it's time to go."

Whether all the absences should lead to not starting Fields or other starters seems somewhat questionable.

The Bears have had above-average pass blocking throughout preseason even with their back up line. Even though they gave up 58 sacks each of the last two years, the website Pro Football Focus has given them the third-best overall pass blocking grade through two preseason games.

Borom, at a grade of 85.1 has been No. 1 as a pass blocker among all linemen/

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