Lincicome: With nary a competitor in sight, all eyes on Justin Fields

Like Sandburg's fog, the Bears creep in on little cat feet; that is to say, it is training camp again, a time when optimism is free, yet requires a ticket and a shuttle bus.

Not since their first season have the Bears been newer than this, on the field, in the front office, on the sidelines. So much inexperience means no bad memories, so forgetting recent agonies is not as great a chore for the Bears as for their fans.

The Bears may be starting from scratch, but Bears fans are starting from numb.

I believe it was I who said that training camp is the NFL's refrigerator magnet season, a replica of the real thing, but entirely decorative and of limited use. I stand by that.

Training camp means that nothing important has happened yet, not the first missed tackle, the first dropped pass, not the unfortunate custom of Justin Fields foiling expectations.

Looking too hard at the meager evidence of Fields is like staring at an oyster. Are you sure about this? Best not to chew but simply swallow.

All young quarterbacks disappoint, all young quarterbacks fail. Wishing is not the same as doing, and reality is the spoiler of dreams.

Seldom, if ever before, has one season been surrendered as meekly as was last season in order to get on with the next one. And now here it is. This is what all that was about, the pressing of Fields so that from the first snap of this training camp the job is his.

Now Fields is without real challenge, other than his own ambition and a skeptics' demands. This is no longer about competition. It is about realization.

Quick, a carrot muffin to anyone who can name the other quarterbacks. Nathan, uh, and Trevor, uh. Well, it may become necessary, like trying to remember your phone number when you've left your cell at home.

But back to the grim and important business of football training camp - how bleak and constricting a term compared to the hopeful phrase "spring training." All training camp requires is sun block and blind faith. Better to spend the coming season wearing a sleep mask.

The Bears will be better, you say. I do not see how, but some reports are encouraging, proclaiming that the Bears have had a great offseason, which is not the same, after all, as a great on-season, but this is where we are.

The fresh coach of Halas Hall, the guy they call "Flus" - that'll take some getting used to - offered a first glimpse synopsis. "Great energy," Matt Eberflus said. "Timing really good. Loved the individual work. I feel like our team is forming together."

Ding. Ding. Give that man a carrot muffin.

The necessary business of assessing blame for a 6-11 season, for not improving, for wimping out to Aaron Rodgers, all of that has been taken care of. We know that the Bears' failure was Ryan Pace's fault. And Matt Nagy's. And Khalil Mack's. And Akiem Hicks' and Allen Robinson's, all the no-longer-wanted Bears, gone without blessing.

What the Bears are left with are castoffs, last chance free agents and picked over draft choices, described accurately elsewhere as "table scraps."

Looking at the additions and subtractions on paper, the defense seems no better than it was, possibly worse considering the secondary is raw, although the defensive line is restored to four across instead of three, allowing for the signature position of Bears' football, the middle linebacker.

The offensive line is made of interns, the receivers are dubious and the special teams are ordinary, leaving competence in the hands of Robert Quinn, Roquan Smith and David Montgomery, which is exactly where we left it.

This Bears training camp does have a definite clarity: nothing matters. Not if the new Ryan is any smarter, the new Matt is any better or that the name McCaskey is not a brand but a curse. None of it matters.

So it is that the Bears must again be taken on faith, not unusual nor unexpected for Bears fans, still inhaling the fumes of '85.

Whether what happens next is worth the upheaval, or works well enough fast enough, the special comfort is that it is not expected to.

Until next season's training camp, time to make the doughnuts.