The Chicago Bears added a familiar face to their practice squad Thursday, bringing back former Green Bay Packers safety Anthony Johnson Jr. three days before they open the regular season in Carolina.
“The Bears have signed DB Anthony Johnson to the club’s Practice Squad,” the team announced.
Johnson, 26, is not a newcomer at Halas Hall. Chicago first signed him in May after a tryout, kept him through training camp and then let him go when the roster was trimmed to 53. He is back now as one of the defensive backs on the 16-man practice squad.
The timing stood out. A day earlier, the Bears reached an injury settlement with cornerback Beanie Bishop Jr. and cut him from injured reserve. Bishop had been one of the brighter stories of the preseason until availability issues piled up.
Bishop signed Aug. 9 knowing he already faced a three-game suspension for a violation of the NFL’s substance-abuse policy. That penalty, handed down in March while he was still with New Orleans, did not stop him from playing in August. Against Cleveland he intercepted two passes, one from Shedeur Sanders and another from Dillon Gabriel, and returned one far enough to set up a field goal.
Coach Ben Johnson liked what he saw that afternoon.
“I think it’s a credit to him. He doesn’t say a whole lot. He’s just learning and trying to absorb the system right now,” Johnson said. “And when you feel that front coming off the ball and affecting the quarterback to the degree that they did, move him off his spot, that’s where you get some overthrows and things of that nature. And Beanie’s in great position and he took advantage of it twice, you know? Thought he had a great return afterwards as well. It was awesome to see.”
A late-camp injury ended the experiment. Chicago waived Bishop with an injury designation at the cutdown, he cleared waivers and reverted to injured reserve, and the settlement Wednesday closed the book. He never played a regular-season snap for the Bears.
Johnson did not simply slide into Bishop’s old spot. League transaction reports showed Chicago also removed safety Marlen Sewell from the practice squad Thursday in a corresponding move.
Johnson’s path to this point has been a grind. Green Bay drafted him in the seventh round in 2023, 242nd overall, out of Iowa State.
As a rookie he played 12 regular-season games and started four, finishing with 24 tackles, three pass breakups and an interception. He also appeared in both of the Packers’ playoff games that winter.
The Packers did not wait for him to polish the rough edges. They signed Xavier McKinney and drafted Javon Bullard and Evan Williams the next spring. Johnson lost the depth job in camp and was waived.
The New York Giants claimed him and used him mostly on special teams in 2024. He played nine games that year, with only 21 snaps on defense.
An injury before the 2025 season wiped out the entire year. The Giants later waived him.
The Bears still needed bodies in the secondary. Injuries have been a theme all summer at safety and in the slot. Johnson gives them a player who has started NFL games, knows special teams and has already been in the building.
Chicago visits the Carolina Panthers on Sunday at Bank of America Stadium. Practice squad players can be elevated for game day, so Johnson is a phone call away if the secondary takes another hit. Whether he sticks beyond that depends on how quickly he picks the scheme back up and whether anyone else on the 53-man roster goes down.
For a seventh-round pick who has already been waived twice and missed a full season, another chance on the practice squad is about as good as it gets in early September. The Bears, for their part, keep shuffling the back end of the roster until the games that count actually start.
