9 observations from the Chicago Bears’ joint practice, including another elite DT giving the OL fits

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Chicago Bears training camp effectively came to an end on a steamy Thursday afternoon with a joint practice at the Tennessee Titans facility.

The longest practice of the summer — a little more than 2 hours, 20 minutes — also was the most challenging with the combination of heat and humidity. It was the Bears’ 19th practice since camp opened in July and the 10th in full pads as coach Ben Johnson tries to sharpen his team for the regular season.

A handful of players cramped up and there was spirited energy on both fields — one with the Bears offense and the other with the Bears defense. Safety Xavier Woods drew the ire of Titans coach Robert Saleh for a shot on wide receiver Wan’Dale Robinson that drew a flag from officials. On the other field, wide receiver Luther Burden III got in a jawing match with Titans defensive linemen Jeffery Simmons and Jermaine Johnson.

The Bears will hold a walk-through Friday before Saturday’s preseason game at Nissan Stadium (5 p.m., Fox-32). The team’s next full practice won’t come until after Sunday’s 5 p.m. deadline to reduce the roster to 53 players.

Here’s what stood out during the joint practice.

1. In the two-minute drill to end practice, Caleb Williams came up with two clutch throws deep down the middle. The third time was not the charm, however.

First, the good stuff: Facing third-and-27 from the Bears 17-yard line after an 11-yard sack on second down and a subsequent holding penalty, Williams hit Kalif Raymond with a dart across the middle for 24 yards. The Bears moved the chains on fourth down with a Williams scramble.

Rome Odunze dropped a ball thrown slightly behind him on the next snap, and after linebacker Cody Barton broke up a pass for tight end Colston Loveland, Williams went back to Odunze on a deep in-breaker with cornerback Alontae Taylor in tight coverage.

It was the kind of play the Bears want to see more of from the 6-foot-3, 214-pound Odunze this season: the contested catches he won with regularity in college because of his size, length and strength. There has been a shortage of those the last two seasons, but this was a prime example of what he can bring to the offense.

The offense hustled to the line of scrimmage at the Titans 21 to clock the ball. But Williams’ next throw deep down the middle was easily intercepted by safety Tony Adams. Loveland was the intended target and Odunze wasn’t far away.

“Good day, a lot of learning,” Williams said. “At the end, got to trust Coach (Ben Johnson) right there. I kind of was pushing for a play and we were in a weird yardage (from the 21). Just trusting Coach and allow him to be the magician of a play caller he is.

“Trying to get a matchup and we were super far out compared to the play and just trusting him. He’s done it for a while now, so just being able to trust him with the play call, go through our reads and get the ball to the right spot.”

Williams was sharp in the red zone at the outset of practice, connecting with Raymond for a score and then executing a nifty play fake that froze Barton and safety Kevin Winston as tight end Cole Kmet got wide open for a score in the corner of the end zone. Williams also connected with wide receiver Jahdae Walker on an out route for a touchdown.

The improvisational throw of the day came when Williams was fleeing the pocket to his left and Kmet made himself available. Williams pitched the ball underhanded to him for a sizable gain.

After a “halftime” when the teams took a break of more than five minutes to hydrate and cool down, things weren’t as sharp for Williams and Co. as he was flushed out of the pocket on a handful of snaps.

Johnson listed a number of things when assessing how Williams has improved with the season fast approaching.

“The anticipation, the timing, the understanding of where we want to put the football,” Johnson said. “He is not afraid to fit it into tight windows. He trusts his pass catchers. A year ago, I think a lot of the things were foreign to him, and now you can tell he has some banked reps and he’s able to anticipate where he wants to go with the football.”

2. The Bears won’t see defensive tackles like Dexter Lawrence and Jeffery Simmons in consecutive weeks this season. That much is certain.

Lawrence showed during last week’s joint practice in Cincinnati why the Bengals were confident in trading the No. 10 draft pick for him and then signing him to a one-year, $28 million extension. The 6-foot-5, 350-pound nose tackle was a menace.

The Bears got a quick glimpse Thursday of why Simmons is the third-highest-paid defensive tackle in the NFL at $35.2 million annually.

The Tennessee coaches didn’t use Simmons a ton during this practice, but when he was on the field — often in third-down situations — you noticed. Simmons and Co. caved in the left side of the Bears offensive line more than once. He presented real challenges for left guard Joe Thuney.

“This was by design,” Johnson said. “We wanted to challenge our offensive line, and certainly it’s great work for (right guard) Jonah (Jackson) and Joe, but we’ll get (Luke) Newman in there a little bit, Jordan McFadden in there a little bit and see where they’re at as well with their development.

“Completely different style of defense this week than what we just saw. This is an attacking front. They want to meet us on our side of the line of scrimmage and knock us back.”

Simmons, who had a career-high 11 sacks last season and is preparing for his eighth season, looked the part. Just like last week, no specific game planning went into these matchups. Just as the Bears wouldn’t ask center Garrett Bradbury to handle Lawrence alone in a real game, they would have a detailed plan for a player like Simmons, who’s a more disruptive interior rusher.

The Bears will face some good interior players this season. The Eagles’ Jalen Carter and Jordan Davis surely will want to atone for being steamrolled last season in Philadelphia. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Vita Vea is a load. But Simmons is as good as the offensive line will encounter.

3. Ben Johnson isn’t the kind of coach who will deliver a message to a player through the media.

He’ll go straight to the player with whatever he has to say. But while Kyler Gordon’s name was unspoken in Johnson’s comments before practice, it was hard not to wonder if the sidelined nickel cornerback was in the back of his mind.

Johnson was talking about right tackle Darnell Wright, who aggravated the right elbow injury he suffered last season in practice Tuesday. Wright was back on the field for Wednesday’s brief practice at Halas Hall and was a full participant in the joint practice. It appeared he was wearing a slightly larger brace on the arm than before.

“It’s not just Darnell,” Johnson said. “He’s a great example of it, but we have almost the entire roster fighting their tails off to get back out on the field. They do not like missing time. They want to be out there competing. They want to be out there with their teammates, and to me, that’s the sign that we’re moving in the right direction. And I get a lot of positive vibes from that. So it’s good.”

When Johnson said “almost the entire roster,” well, that means a small part of the roster isn’t battling quite as diligently. What hasn’t been asked — and needs to be soon — is how players coming off surgeries and long rehabilitation plans can be seemingly ahead of Gordon, who remains on the physically unable to perform list with a calf injury.

Who knows if Johnson was alluding to Gordon. Draw your own conclusions there.

“We can talk about injuries up here,” Johnson said. “The guys that aren’t out there, they’re not helping us win right now. I want to talk about the guys that are out there helping us right now. I want stories to be written about those guys. We’ve got 90 guys on the roster right now, a lot of which are fighting for their professional lives right now, and their stories are incredible. They should be out there and hearing about that.”

4. With Kyler Gordon sidelined, rookie Malik Muhammad II has seen a lot of reps, particularly at nickel corner.

Muhammad has had some rookie moments in camp and the preseason when the inexperience has shown and he was caught out of position or slightly late to his man.

“It’s like any rookie, there’s always ups and downs,” Johnson said before practice. “There’s bumps in the road.”

Muhammad gave up some plays to the Titans, but he came up with stops in a couple of the biggest showdowns, particularly when playing outside corner.

During a mixed-downs period, Muhammad broke up a deep shot from Cam Ward to Calvin Ridley up the left seam. Muhammad waved his arms to signal an incompletion.

In the final period, a two-minute drill, Muhammad went head to head against fellow rookie Carnell Tate. The 6-foot, 182-pound Muhammad broke up Ward’s pass to the 6-2, 192-pound Tate in the end zone.

“We’re really pleased with the path he’s on right now,” Johnson said before practice. “He’s doing a great job. He’s a competitor.

“Sometimes those young guys, little guys in particular, (the question is) are they willing to tackle to the degree that we want here. I think he’s answered that bell. Really excited about his trajectory right now.”

5. Carnell Tate exposed the Bears secondary.

Ward picked apart the Bears secondary, and Tate in particular played a huge part.

In fact, according to media that cover the Titans, the Marist High School and Ohio State alumnus had his best performance of camp by far — at the Bears’ expense. The No. 4 pick in this year’s draft, Tate was held without a catch on five targets in preseason games against the San Francisco 49ers and Seattle Seahawks.

Early in practice, Ward hit Tate in the end zone after Terell Smith lost his footing.

Ward and Tate picked on Smith again for a connection that went about 25 yards. It was Tate’s 10th target at the time, though it’s arguable that Dayo Odeyingbo might have sacked Ward in a regular-season game.

Tate finished with seven catches and two touchdowns on 12 targets, according to the team’s website.

“We’re not game planning,” Saleh said, “and sometimes whatever we’re calling works out and sometimes it doesn’t, but it’s fortunate to get him going again. But Carnell’s a really good football player.”

Said Tate: “You never know how practice is going to go, you never know how the game’s going to go. You’ve just always got to be ready. And today the ball just came my way.”

6. The learning curve for rookie tight end Sam Roush remains steep, but he showed up often in the passing game.

Roush easily caught a touchdown pass from Case Keenum over safety Bishop Fitzgerald. It was a back-shoulder throw and Fitzgerald didn’t have a chance. That came after a deep ball to Roush. The third-round pick got a little run with the starters earlier and caught a short out route from Caleb Williams.

Roush has a lot on his plate, and rookie tight ends can face an uphill battle because they’re asked to be part of the passing game, part of pass blocking and a major part of the running game.

Roush is replacing a trusted veteran in Durham Smythe, who spent time with Ben Johnson in Miami at the start of his career. Smythe played 293 snaps during the regular season and another 42 in the two playoff games, an indication of how important the third tight end was.

“He’s building that trust,” Johnson said of Roush. “There’s flashes where he gets you really, really excited. Is it at the level of consistency that we want yet? No. And I’m not surprised by that either. Yet I think he’s going to be a phenomenal football player for a long time in this league.

“It’s just there’s a lot of thinking. There’s a lot on the plate for a rookie tight end. It’s right up there with quarterback, just in terms of the amount of mental strain that we put on these guys — run game, pass pro, route running — and the faster we can get him to play, the better off he’s going to be in the long run. But it’s by design very challenging for him right now. We’re very hard on him, and he’s answering that call.”

7. Xavier Woods’ controversial hit knocked Wan’Dale Robinson out of practice.

Coaches generally agree on rules of engagement when signing off on joint practices — chiefly, don’t try to take anyone’s head off.

Apparently that memo didn’t trickle down to Woods.

The Bears safety, who played for the Titans last season, flattened Robinson on a middle route, drawing an immediate flag. Titans center Austin Schlottman ran down and shoved Woods, setting off a benches-clearing scuffle.

One Titans player could be heard over the scrum saying, “He came in on that (expletive), though,” perhaps protesting to a referee or a Bears player.

Robinson was attended to while lying on the ground before leaving practice. He was evaluated for a concussion, said Saleh, who called Woods’ hit “cheap.”

Titans guard and Park Ridge native Peter Skoronski said Woods’ play was “unacceptable.”

“You can’t have that,” he said. “You can’t have guys like Wan’Dale going down like that. It’s not necessary. I get we’re being competitive, I get DBs are physical, but that’s totally uncalled for.”

Since signing with the Bears on Aug. 7, Woods has walked the edge between physicality and dirty play, ticking off even some teammates.

“Nothing is done with malice, but we’ve got to play our style of defense the way we want to at all times,” Bears defensive tackle Grady Jarrett said Thursday. “And sometimes things happen. It’s just one of those things that happened.”

8. One of the biggest plays of the day for the Bears offense involved some trickery.

Running back D’Andre Swift executed a double pass with Williams, who found Loveland running all alone. The play gained at least 35 yards.

“That was a pretty good toss too,” Williams said of Swift’s throw back to him. “Colston and Rome (Odunze) did a good job. I believe it was Rome over there on the left side at X. He did a good job just being really patient, letting the play develop and then just shooting down the field, taking the deep coverage out, and Colston lost his guy. It was real cool.”

9. The Bears are down two defensive linemen as Austin Booker and Gervon Dexter Sr. are dealing with soft-tissue injuries.

Booker suffered a groin injury during the joint practice in Cincinnati, and Dexter exited practice early Tuesday with a hamstring injury. Dexter didn’t make the trip to Nashville, and Booker is “week to week.”

But the list of injured players has gotten a little smaller with players such as Burden, safety Elijah Hicks and cornerbacks Jaylon Jones and Terell Smith working their way back.

Braxton Jones got the vast majority of work with the starters at left tackle Thursday. Jedrick Wills Jr. was working with the second team before exiting early with athletic trainer Andre Tucker. Ozzy Trapilo continued to do individual drills only.

Given the taxing nature of the practice, it would be surprising if Bears starters played Saturday, but Johnson won’t tip his hand early. The starters got the bulk of work in practice, leaving Saturday’s exhibition as a chance for reserves to work more.

“A lot of time and energy goes into figuring out the schedule for training camp and it takes a lot of input from a number of people in the building, so we’ve set this thing up with the big picture in mind,” Johnson said. “How do we get best prepared not only for Week 1 but for the first half of the season through the bye week, and so when you have that in mind, you do have to make some adjustments. Guys get injured. The workload changes over the course of practice, so there are some fluctuations that you can’t really predict.

“We knew that we wanted a Week 2 and a Week 3 joint practice. We thought that was the best way to get our team prepared for not just Week 1 but the first four games of the season, and we’re executing that plan right now. We reassess it every single day. Brent Salazar (director of high performance is) part of our staff meetings at night. He always is hitting us with workload (data): who has the heavy volume, the high-speed yardage, the accels, decels. He’s got all that mumbo jumbo, if you will. And we try our best as coaches just to make sure we are taking care of our guys.”