CHICAGO (WGN) — Caleb Williams, Ben Johnson and a revamped offensive line headline the Chicago Bears as the 2025 NFL season approaches, but football is a team game. Here are five under-the-radar storylines that could play major roles in the success—or failure—of the Bears next year as we approach training camp.
Will Luther Burden III be the slot receiver Ben Johnson envisions?
Chicago spent a second-round pick on Luther Burden III for a reason, and that’s because wide receivers who play the slot in a Johnson offense are key cogs in both the intermediate pass and outside run game. Just look at what Amon-Ra St. Brown meant to the Detroit Lions offense when Johnson was calling the plays.
Burden was a stud in 2023 at Missouri before his production fell off last year. He hauled in 19 more catches and one more receiving yard than Marvin Harrison Jr., who was the Fred Biletnikoff Award winner as college football’s best wide receiver and the first wideout off the board in last year’s NFL draft.
Among FBS wide receivers with at least 50% of their targets coming in the slot in 2023, Burden finished with the fifth-highest grade for pass routes from Pro Football Focus. 95 of his 120 targets came in the slot, where he caught 67 passes for 1,007 yards and all nine of his TD receptions that season.
The math averages out to roughly five catches for 78 yards a game from the slot when Burden was at his collegiate peak. Johnson and the Bears appear to be betting on being able to get a similar level of production in Chicago’s new offensive scheme.
But what could throw a wrench into Johnson’s ability to scheme slot opportunities for Burden is his rookie wide receiver’s lack of availability early on.
Johnson said he expects Burden to be good to go once training camp rolls around. He suffered what the Bears’ head coach called a “soft tissue injury” during day 2 of rookie minicamp, which held him out of the team’s mandatory minicamp and voluntary offseason OTAs that followed.
“He misses a lot. Any time you’re not out there, if you’re in the training room when the rest of the guys are practicing, you’re losing valuable time; valuable time with your coaches, valuable reps with your teammates, the ability to build the trust that we’re talking about,” Johnson said of Burden’s missed time due to injury.
“It’s not just the coaching staff having trust in you, doing the right thing over and over, but it’s also your teammates. They have to be out there. They have to see you do it. They have to know that the guy to the right and the left of them are going to do the right things, and they’re going to make the plays when called upon.”
There’s still plenty of time for Burden to get acclimated ahead of Chicago’s season opener Sept. 8 against the Minnesota Vikings. But any time a rookie misses opportunities to get acclimated at the NFL level, it compounds and can become a bigger problem faster than it would be for someone with years of experience in the league.
If he isn’t up to snuff, other wideouts like Devin Duvernay and Olamide Zaccheaus could see expanded roles where they’re asked to do more while Burden gets his bearings early on during his rookie season.
How does the offensive tackle equation play out?
Braxton Jones has been an inconsistent pass protector his entire career. Kiran Amegadjie was a long-term project thrown to the wolves as an injured Ivy League rookie last year. Darnell Wright has the size and intangibles to be a skilled and powerful road grater, but he’s also still improving in pass pro.
With three stalwart additions to the interior of the offensive line seemingly set in stone this offseason, who will be the bookends of the Bears’ O-line? Will they be able to take a major step forward after Williams was the most sacked quarterback in football last year?
Wright seems to be a lock at right tackle, where I’m sure Johnson would love to see him turn into shades of Penei Sewell. But the answer at left tackle may very well depend on a piece of Chicago’s latest rookie class—Ozzy Trapilo.
The second-round pick out of Boston College got plenty of reps at left tackle during mandatory minicamp and offseason OTAs, meaning when the pads come on at training camp in late July, he’ll have every opportunity to separate himself from Amegadjie and usurp the starting spot from Jones, even though he’s more familiar with operating on the other end of the offensive line.
“I think it went well,” Trapilo said of how his work at left tackle has gone this offseason. “In a way, it’s a little easier, I’d say because I don’t go flow state like I do if I were to go on the right side. I kind of just get in those habits, whatever I’ve been taught for so long. So, on that sort of foreign side—a little foreign—you’re able to really hone in on the minor differences that these coaches want to see. I think there’s definitely benefits in that.”
Trapilo started 34 games from 2022-24 at Boston College, with the last 24 starts being at right tackle, and the first ten being at left tackle.
In 747 pass blocking snaps at right tackle over his last two seasons at Boston College, Trapilo gave up two sacks and four QB hits on the way to earning a pass blocking grade of 81.7 in 2023, and 80.5 in 2024 from PFF.
In 443 pass blocking snaps as the Golden Eagles’ starting left tackle during his redshirt sophomore season, Trapilo gave up five sacks, five QB hits and earned a 66.0 pass blocking grade from PFF.
Trapilo performed much better at right tackle in college than he did on the other end of Boston College’s line—albeit his time at left tackle came toward the beginning of his college career when he was more inexperienced.
It’ll be interesting to see how Trapilo’s transition to the left side of the line progresses once pads are on and he’s facing off against the best the Bears have to offer at defensive end.
If he can hold his own against the likes of Montez Sweat and Dayo Odeyingbo, Trapilo will be that much closer to becoming the solution at left tackle that Chicago has hoped for over the last several years.
Who becomes the second featured running back?
When Johnson was in Detroit, the Lions’ offense consistently used a two-back system. From 2023-24, it was Jahmyr Gibbs and David Montgomery. Before them, it was D’Andre Swift and Jamaal Williams.
Swift is now the top dog in the Bears’ backfield, but who will become the second running back utilized alongside him?
Kyle Monangai impressed Ben Johnson enough for Chicago’s new head coach to list him as one of four players that have stood out through offseason OTAs and minicamp.
“I appreciate the attention to detail and the pride he takes and how quickly he’s picking things up,” Johnson said.
Aside from Monangai, Roschon Johnson would still appear to be the Bears’ No. 2 back heading into training camp.
The 2024 fourth-round pick out of Texas was Chicago’s featured short-yardage back a year ago, but should health concerns arise around him again—Johnson suffered two concussion during his rookie season—the Bears’ coaching staff may have no other choice than to turn to Monangai, who gained a reputation for tough running at Rutgers after racking up 669 career careers without a single fumble.
How does the third linebacker hold up in new defensive coordinator Dennis Allen’s scheme?
Tremaine Edmunds and T.J. Edwards are entrenched at the Mike and Will linebacker positions, but who lines up at Sam for Chicago is up for grabs between rookie Ruben Hyppolite II and the oft-injured Noah Sewell.
In a 4-3 defense, the Sam linebacker is primarily charged with handling the strong side of the field and lining up over the opposing team’s tight end. They set the edge against the run and force running plays back into the interior of the defense, while also being responsible for covering tight ends in passing situations, which—based purely on speed—would favor Hyppolite over Sewell.
At his Maryland Pro Day, Hyppolite clocked a 4.42 40-yard dash, and that has translated to the practice fields of Halas Hall.
Like Monangai, Hyppolite also impressed head coach Ben Johnson enough to be one of four players he said have performed well thus far this offseason.
“He’s done a great job of adjusting to that speed as we’ve gone through, and that’s going to have to show up once we do get the pads on,” Johnson said. “He has been improving every single day, and, really, we’re hoping that course continues.”
The Sam linebacker position isn’t featured or well-talked-about when it comes to defensive schemes around the NFL, but it’s an important one, especially in the NFC North.
Whether it’s Hyppolite or Sewell lined up at Sam, they will be responsible for covering tight ends like Sam LaPorta and T.J. Hockenson in the pass game, while also winning at the point of attack against running backs like Jahmyr Gibbs, Josh Jacobs and Aaron Jones.
Can the back end of the secondary stay healthy?
Jaquan Brisker and Kevin Byard III are as solid as they come at the safety positions, but health is a bigger concern than their quality of play when it comes to the Bears’ last line of defense in the secondary.
Brisker suffered his third concussion last season in Week 5 against the Carolina Panthers and after spending nearly six weeks in concussion protocol, Chicago pulled the plug and placed Brisker on Injured Reserve for the remainder of the year.
After a challenging road to recovery, he said he’s feeling better than ever heading into training camp.
“I told my coaches not too long ago that mentally, physically, this is the best I ever felt, especially from last season,” Brisker told WGN TV News’ Kaitlin Sharkey in early April. “I definitely feel great and [have] been doing a lot of work on my brain, my nervous system and things like that, just to get back.”
If Brisker is back to being the best version of himself and stays healthy, he and Byard could form one of the better safety duos in the NFC next year.
Byard’s bread and butter is playing the free safety position, where he patrols center field over the top of the Bears’ secondary, while Brisker likes to drift into the box and function as an extra linebacker against the run, or a bigger-bodied blitzer in passing situations.
But if Brisker finds himself on the sideline with more injury issues, it will only serve to multiply the questions Chicago has to face at safety.
Besides going from a position of strength to weakness in Brisker’s absence, all four players in the Bears’ safety room—Brisker, Byard, Elijah Hicks and Jonathan Owens—are in the last year of their contracts.
A poor performance from their safeties could hurt Chicago’s overall performance on defense in 2025, but also lay the groundwork for a completely new group of safeties come 2026 and beyond.