There seemed to be a greater sense of anticipation when fourth-string quarterback Tyson Bagent stepped into the huddle at Bears practice Wednesday than when Justin Fields did. These must be the dog days of training camp.
Bagent is the undrafted rookie from Division II Shepherd University who has lit one of the few sparks at an otherwise uninspiring, injury-riddled training camp by giving Bears fans and beat reporters what they need most at this time of year — efficient quarterback play and a fairy-tale storyline. Back-up quarterbacks have looked good at Bears training camp many times before, but there’s something about Bagent, who has impressive command and seems to have a bit of the “it” factor — good things just seem to happen when he steps into the huddle.
He definitely has caught our attention. Less than three weeks from the regular-season opener against the Packers — with Fields still an x-factor, the offensive line missing three starters and the offense a huge question mark, the first five questions to offensive coordinator Luke Getsy on Wednesday were about Bagent. Even Getsy had to remind everyone to slow their roll.
“Everybody has a shot,” Getsy said when asked if Bagent could beat out P.J Walker and Nathan Peterman for the No. 2 quarterback job behind Fields. “I know he had a great drive [against the Colts] and that’s exciting for people. But that’s one drive. We’re going to make that part of the evaluation, but we’re going to take the whole training camp evaluation before we make a decision like that.”
As for Fields, his preparedness for the Packers game — and the process of getting there — remain in question heading into the Bears’ preseason finale against the Bills on Saturday at Soldier Field.
There’s no doubt the entire offense needs the work. But with a makeshift offensive line, it’s unlikely that Getsy, coach Matt Eberflus and general manager Ryan Poles will be willing to subject Fields to any game-speed punishment.
“I think Justin and the guys — there’s been a lot of really good things going on,” Getsy said. “The meeting-room conversations have been great … we’ve talked about letting the players take it over.
“I think we’re in a good place. We’ve got a really good practice [Wednesday and Thursday] and then we get another week of it next week. So we feel good regardless whatever coach and Ryan decided to do this weekend.”
If Fields and the rest of the starters don’t play against the Bills, they’ll go into the regular season with just seven snaps in the preseason. With so many other teams also coasting through the preseason, it’s more difficult than ever to tell if it makes a difference anymore.
“I’ve been through both sides of this thing,” Getsy said, “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. We’re going to evaluate who we have available to us and everything like that to make those decisions.”
Last week’s practices against the Colts seemed to confirm Eberflus’ belief that competitive practices where the quarterback cannot be hit are the best preparation for the season.
“I loved it. It was fun,” wide receiver Darnell Mooney said. “I think we did very, very well against those guys in practice. You can understand the way we practice is a lot different from the way other guys practice.
“We practice hard. We practice very hard. We’re moving to the ball at all times whether you’re on offense or defense and you can see some of those guys, when they catch the ball the just stop. When we catch the ball, we finish the route regardless if we got tackled or touched on the play. The defense [has] all their guys flowing to the ball, so there’s something different that [other] guys don’t do.”
