Chicago Bears competing in alternate NFL universe right now

Let's be clear. Our current public-health crisis is an ongoing nightmare for all of us.

It's hard to imagine a riskier or more dangerous activity in the COVID world right now than playing tackle football.

We'd love to talk about nothing but the front-runners for the Bears' quarterback, guard, tight end, cornerback and safety jobs. For the moment, however, those aren't the most pressing issues.

When I asked left tackle Charles Leno this week about his decision to come to work and whether he's had second thoughts since, he said, "Let's start from the top. We got an owner in Virginia McCaskey, chairman George McCaskey, who are committed to make sure our family is safe.

"And then ... Ryan Pace and Matt Nagy, who are all about family and making sure we're safe. And then our ICO, Andre Tucker.

"I think we are one of the best organizations when it comes to mitigating risk, precautions, procedures, all the different steps we take for me to go home to my family, my newborn, and understand we're safe.

"I trust these guys. That's why I'm here."

Still, the last few days have posed risks and required answers no one could have anticipated.

You've likely heard the team's Sunday schedule went out the window when the Bears were informed nine players and or staff had tested positive for the virus.

Nagy explained that hours before sunrise, "We were able to get those players and everybody involved in the positive test retested, and it came back all negative.

"So we had to go to, 'Now, what do we do?' We actually had a Zoom call. I gave about a 15-minute warning and we had 140 people on a Zoom call at 9 o'clock in the morning."

Cornerback Buster Skrine said it all felt seamless.

"One thing Nagy says is, 'This isn't a normal year for the whole NFL and it takes a lot of adjusting,' so that was like the first thing that popped in my head, 'All right, we're not going in early,' " he said.

"They're trying to take care of the players and see what's going on first. For me, it was just, when do we go in and what's safest for my family."

Tuesday's practice brought a whole new challenge.

Forty minutes after practice started, sirens went off signaling a potentially dangerous lightning storm in the area.

The team marched single file into the Walter Payton Center where they might normally have continued work, but it is now in use to provide appropriate social distancing for other team activities.

An hour later all were back on the field, basically starting practice from scratch.

Honestly, the play on the field did appear a bit sloppier than usual, but it's hard to expect less.

There also was the tragic shooting of Jacob Blake, less than an hour's ride from Halas Hall, to deal with and its impact on 80 players, 59 of whom are Black.

Nagy opened his post-practice news conference with a statement, "I want to start off by giving all of our thoughts and prayers to Jacob Blake. It's very disturbing for everybody and it has to stop. We talked about it with our team.

"Being so close to where we are at right now, we're thinking about him and his family and want nothing but the best for him."

Tarik Cohen added, "It's crazy that we still see those same things happening in today's world. It's great to be on a team that openly speaks about that. We have open conversations about everything that happened, and with that being so close, it was definitely a topic today."

How many games will these Bears win? Too soon to guess.

As eager as they all seem to play football, they're far too busy winning a much bigger battle right now.

• Twitter: @Hub_Arkush