Bears name Braxton Jones starting LT, announce captains ahead of opener

Ariana Pensy · Correspondent · 3 hours ago

CHICAGO - After a lot of anticipation and competition, head coach Ben Johnson has named a starting left tackle.

Veteran Braxton Jones will return as Chicago’s starting left tackle. Thus, the Bears are keeping their left and right tackles the same as last year, with new players at left guard, right guard, and center.

“Whenever a guy misses that significant amount of time, you’re very cautious in making sure that that injury doesn’t reoccur again. So, I know he’s feeling significantly better than obviously he was from the start and we’ll see what he looks like moving around and hopefully take it from there. But, I know he’s excited to get back out with his teammates soon,” Johnson said. “He knows what he’s doing. Is it perfect every play? No, it’s not. But, we did see the execution go up over the course (of) the last few weeks and so, there is a trust level in him knowing what to do and we think he’s going to continue to ascend the more reps that he gets.”

Throughout training camp and the preseason, no one stood out as the obvious starter at left tackle, but Jones ultimately did win the job. However, it should be noted that, given the close competition for this job, Jones will likely still have to fight to retain it on a weekly basis.

Rookie Ozzy Trapilo stood out throughout training camp and if Jones struggles, it seems like a very real possibility that Trapilo could step into the starting role at some point.

Ahead of Chicago’s first game of the regular season, the Bears have also named their team captains - two on offense, two on defense, and one on special teams.

It is noteworthy that two of Chicago’s season-long captains for this season were not with the team last season.

“On offense, this year we have Joe Thuney and Caleb Williams. On defense, we have Kevin Byard and Grady Jarrett and then on special teams, we have Cairo (Santos),” Johnson said. “So, we’ll have those five and then we’ll also have one each week. We’ll have a weekly captain as well and so, that’ll be what we’re doing going forward. But, it’s good to see those guys rally around that crew. A lot of respect for that voting process and to be well-respected by your peers like that, it goes a long way.”

As a coach with the Detroit Lions for the past six years and their offensive coordinator for the past three years, Johnson has a lot of experience playing against the Minnesota Vikings’ defense led by defensive coordinator Brian Flores. Even going back to his days with the Miami Dolphins, Johnson’s team went against the New England Patriots when Flores was the linebackers and safeties coach. Thus, Johnson is familiar with how Flores likes to run his defenses.

Nonetheless, he recognized that going against Flores is still tough, especially in the season opener.

“He’s an outstanding coach. All kinds of issues. There’s not a team that pressures more than Minnesota has over the last two years and I go back to what I admired most about New England when I was a young coach in this business and they had the ability to morph week-in and week-out and he does that. He does that as a coordinator,” Johnson said. “You don’t really know what you’re going to get. You have to adjust in the middle of the game. Our guys have to be open-minded and be willing to understand we’re going to get hit in the teeth a couple times. That’s the nature of doing business with this crew. They got some really good players. They’re really well-coached. They’re really ball conscious, going after the ball all the time. I think they were number one in turnovers last year and that’s a credit to how they practice because it shows up on the game tape.”

The Bears start out this season with back-to-back division games, first in primetime against Minnesota on Mon. Sept. 8 (7:15 p.m. / ABC) and then on Sun. Sept. 14 (Noon / FOX) against the reigning NFC North champions, the Detroit Lions.