Chicago Bears gearing up for Philadelphia Eagles without QB Caleb Williams or backup Tyson Bagent

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LAKE FOREST, Ill. (AP) — Backup Chicago Bears quarterback Tyson Bagent returned to Halas Hall without practicing on Friday, and starter Caleb Williams also remains out.

The Bears will likely play the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday night with third-string quarterback Case Keenum taking the snaps. Williams has a hamstring injury and Bagent is out with a concussion.

“Case threw me my first touchdown in camp here actually,” tight end Colston Loveland said. “It was a fade ball, so we got a little connection.

“He’s a great quarterback though, he is, and the way he commands and his knowledge of the game, it’s very cool to be a part of something like that.”

Keenum is also a quarterback who hasn’t played in an NFL game since 2023, when he was third-string for Houston, and has started only four times in the 2020s. Receivers are all well acquainted with Keenum because the Bears mixed their receiver groups with each QB during the offseason and during parts of training camp.

“Kind of having that next-man-up mentality and just trying to go to work with the people that we’re going to have available in the game,” wide receiver Rome Odunze said. “Obviously that’s kind of a question of who that’s going be right now, but that doesn’t change our work ethic out there on the practice field or our confidence in anybody in this locker room.

“We’re going to go and play our brand of football and dice it up.”

Bears offensive coordinator Press Taylor, a former Eagles assistant, called Keenum an appropriate answer for going against defensive coordinator Vic Fangio’s zone-based Eagles coverage schemes.

“You’re going to have to be patient,” Taylor said. “You’re not going to get these big, long explosives the way they play in the shell, the way everything starts playing out of the shell. And then they just do a great job of playing a variety of different fronts and techniques ultimately to try to do the same idea at the end of the day — limit the explosives and make you go the long, hard way.”

It’s a bit different approach than the one Williams normally takes. The Bears had four completions 22 yards or longer in their opener, a 59-37 win over a Carolina team using a variation of Fangio’s defense.

Taylor said Williams can benefit from watching if he misses a game for the first time.

“I think it’s a very new situation for him, obviously,” Taylor said. “But I do think you can sit there and you can watch a veteran quarterback or Tyson if Tyson gets the opportunity, how they handle the huddle, how they handle the sidelines, what you can provide as an extra set of eyes on the sidelines potentially if that’s where he is. And we’ll see how that goes.”

The Bears do have an extra day to prepare because of the Monday night kickoff, but it’s not much time to get either Williams or Bagent ready to face one of the league's better defenses and defensive coordinators.

“It’s all to be determined,” Taylor said.

At least the Bears see things trending in the right direction for another aspect of their offense. Running back Kyle Monangai returned for a full practice Friday for the first time this week after two missed practices because of a knee injury. The Bears relied heavily on their running attack for 281 yards in a 24-15 win over the Eagles last season when Williams was healthy.

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