Chicago Bears roster bubble: Who’s in and who’s out?
By Erik Lambert
The Chicago Bears roster is coming into focus. With just over a day left before final cuts are required from all teams, they have tough choices ahead.
There are plenty of names on the bubble at present. Players who have reasonable claims to be on the roster for one reason or another but aren’t locked due to various circumstances. The difficult part is sorting out which among them deserve to be kept and which would be considered more luxuries than necessities at this point.
So perhaps this is a good time to run through the depth chart once more, sorting out the names who are on the fringe and then determining who is in and who is out. Believe it or not some of them actually came down to the final game of the preseason. That’s how competitive things have been since training camp.
IN: Ryan Nall (RB)
There was a buzz around the undrafted rookie from Oregon State right from the start. While not a freak athlete, his unique mixture of size and sneaky speed made him an intriguing depth option. For most of the preseason, he had some nice running moments but not enough to overcome Benny Cunningham for the third spot. That may have changed after a strong showing in the finale against Buffalo, not just as a runner but also as a blocker and on special teams.
OUT: Bennie Fowler (WR)
Fowler waited too long to have one of this better games of the preseason. He looked good on both offense and special teams. However, his poor start combined with the fact that Josh Bellamy didn’t even play in the finale pretty much put the writing on the wall. Bennie Fowler will be that tough cut that gets squeezed out by the sudden numbers game for Chicago at wide receiver. The rise of rookie Javon Wims likely played a big role in his decline.