The Chicago Bears spent the weekend trimming their roster and watching the waiver wire, and they now have a chance to quietly add pass-rush depth that Green Bay just decided it could live without.
Undrafted edge rusher Nyjalik Kelly, who spent camp with the Packers after coming out of UCF, was released Sunday after a preseason that turned heads in Green Bay.
Chicago did not put in a claim Monday, which means Kelly is free to sign anywhere, including a possible return to the Packers’ practice squad. That does not mean the Bears should ignore him, as Max Dible of Heavy.com notes.
Kelly finished the exhibition slate tied for the team lead in pressures with four and produced a strip-sack against Denver. Those are modest numbers in a small sample, but they arrived from a player who was never expected to make the 53-man roster in the first place.
For a Bears team that already cut veteran Marcus Davenport after just 13 days and is waiting on Austin Booker to recover from a groin injury, that kind of production is worth a closer look.
Booker’s availability remains week-to-week. He already missed the first seven games of last season with a knee injury, so the front office cannot treat him as a sure thing in September.
Dayo Odeyingbo is expected to start opposite Montez Sweat and slide inside on obvious passing downs after the trade of Gervon Dexter to Atlanta. Jamree Kromah earned a roster spot with three preseason sacks, and Daniel Hardy is also on the depth chart. That is a plan, not a surplus.
Odeyingbo is coming off an Achilles tear of his own. One more injury or a slow start from the rotation would leave Chicago thin on the edge.
Adding Kelly to the practice squad would not require a roster move or a large financial commitment. It would simply give the Bears another young rusher to develop while they evaluate whether Davenport belongs back on the practice squad as he works his way back from injury.
Davenport’s recent history is cautionary: 14 games over three seasons with Detroit and Minnesota. Kelly is unproven in the regular season, but he is also cheaper, younger, and coming off a summer in which he actually produced.
The NFC North rivalry makes the idea even more appealing. Green Bay went thin at the position by cutting Kelly. If Chicago can stash him and keep him off the Packers’ practice squad, it is a small but useful piece of roster management.
The Bears are not likely to chase the remaining veteran free agents at this stage. Leonard Floyd, Kyle Van Noy and Haason Reddick are the names still circulating, and none of them fit the current timeline or budget as cleanly as a developmental addition.
Kelly will not transform the defense overnight. He might not even make the active roster in Week 1. What he offers is a low-risk way to address a clear depth concern after a weekend of cuts and injuries.
For a team that just watched its interior pass-rush options shrink and is still waiting on Booker, that is a landing spot worth considering.
