The Bears open their regular season exactly two months from Monday and their offensive line getting exposed right away is being mentioned as a distinct possibility within league circles.
It's left tackle Braxton Jones who would be the source of this potential problem.
Jones would come into training camp the heavy favorite to take back the starting spot he lost last year, largely because he hadn't fully recovered from the previous season's ankle surgery. Jones never got into a groove before being benched, and admitted at Halas Hall this offseason about how weak his play in the second half of games had been because of his lack of strength and conditioning resulting from lack of his normal offseason strength training routine. He was too busy rehabbing to actually get into good playing condition.
NFL.com's Matt Okada has identified the most anticipated debuts of newly acquired players in all of the Week 1 games for 2026, and the player he named for the Bears-Panthers matchup to start the season is Carolina edge rusher Jaelan Phillips, who was highly rated by NFL.com among free agents this year. It's Phillips who is going to be lining up against Joines, yet Okada somehow missed this when he pointed to the former Eagles and Dolphins player as the intriguing player to watch.
