Bear Digest

Ryan Poles supplies one answer to Bears backup linebacker question

After a season in Chicago as a key player on special teams, linebacker Amen Ogbongbemiga has signed a two-year contract.
Gene Chamberlain|
Lions tight end Sam LaPorta beats Amen Ogbongbemiga for a touchdown last season in Detroit.
Lions tight end Sam LaPorta beats Amen Ogbongbemiga for a touchdown last season in Detroit. | Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

The Bears apparently liked what they saw of linebacker Amen Ogbongbemiga enough as a special teams player to make him part of the Ben Johnson and Dennis Allen coaching era.

The backup Bears linebacker received a two-year contract from the team for what Mike Garafolo of NFL Network reported Thursday was $5 million total.

The Bears used Ogbongbemiga mainly as the fourth linebacker and a key special teams player after he came over from the Rams last year as a free agent who had played college ball at Oklahoma State.

Ogbongbemiga last season tied Daniel Hardy for most special teams tackles with 11, five of them solo tackles. He made 13 total tackles and was only on the field for 15 defensive plays, while participating in 84% of special teams plays (366 total). 

Ogbongbemiga was slated to enter free agency as an unrestricted free agent after playing four seasons. He can play all three linebacker positions but was on the depth chart as a backup weakside linebacker.

The Bears did not tender strongside linebacker Jack Sanborn an offer as a restricted free agent and he will enter the unrestricted market, but the minimum tender was almost $3.5 million.

It's still possible Sanborn could return but he appeared to be ruling this out by saying his good-byes to Chicago when he was told he wouldn't be tendered the minimum.

Linebacker could become an area of minor importance for the Bears in the draft and free agency.

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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.