Brown not pleased he's behind Anderson at DE

BOURBONNAIS -- Defensive end Alex Brown has started 64 straight games, the second-longest stretch on the Bears behind Olin Kreutz's 70, but that streak could end soon.

Brown is No. 2 on the depth chart at right end behind Mark Anderson, who led the team with 12 sacks as a rookie fifth-round pick in 2006, and he isn't happy about it.

"I feel like I'm a starter. I don't feel like I'm a third defensive end on any team," said the sixth-year veteran. "But I guess on this team I am; I don't know."

Brown, who had a career-best 7 sacks last season, has more than a month before the regular season starts to win back the job, which he believes is possible but unnecessary.

"I don't think I should have lost it in the first place," he said. "But that's my opinion; that's one man's opinion. It's not about Alex, it's about the Chicago Bears, so that's what we've got to do, and if that makes our team better, then I guess that was the best thing."

Another chance: After seven years of ups and downs with the Bears, safety Mike Brown was left on the outside looking in when they reached a 21-year pinnacle by playing in Super Bowl XLI.

Brown suffered a season-ending foot injury Oct. 16. It was the third straight year that his season was cut short by injury, and he's missed 28 of the Bears' last 48 regular-season games, with a ruptured Achilles' tendon and strained calf prior to the foot injury.

But Brown enters camp with a clean bill of health and an optimistic outlook.

"It gives me another opportunity to prove that I can still play football," he said. "That's what motivates me. We'll find out these next coming weeks if I still have anything left in the tank -- and I'm sure that I do, so it's going to be fun.

"I think it's the best team that we're going to have since I've been here, and we're going to make another run."

Brown, a Pro Bowl pick in 2005, said he's confident he can still play, but he knows he has doubters.

"I don't have any questions, but everyone else does," he said. "So that's my job -- to prove to those people that I still have it."

End of story: Even though he's suspended by the NFL for at least the first six games of this season, Tank Johnson would have been able to participate in the Bears' training camp if he hadn't been released by the team following his latest incident with police a month ago. He was stopped at 3:30 a.m. in Arizona on suspicion of DUI. Coach Lovie Smith said he's had "a little contact" with Johnson since his release, but that it's time to move on.

"It's disappointing whenever you lose someone who has been part of your team for the amount of time Tank was," Smith said. "That's a chapter in our life. We've closed that page, and we've moved on. I'll always care what happens to Tank, and hopefully Tank can get a few things straightened out and go from there."

Smith said he doesn't second-guess his decision to give the talented defensive tackle repeated chances to clean up his off-the-field act.

"I believed that Tank would make some changes in his life," Smith said. "It didn't work out, but that's how life is sometimes."