Ben Johnson announced some starters would not play Saturday, including starting quarterback Caleb Williams.
What Johnson didn't answer was the bigger question. He seemed to dodge the issue Thursday of whether the Bears would even use Williams in the preseason. In fact, the tone of his answer sounded almost as if he leaned toward keeping him out of preseason games.
“I don't know that I need to see game snaps," Johnson said. "What we're trying to assess is the volume throughout the week and making sure we're hitting our benchmarks to make sure our team is ready to go for a 17-plus game season. That's what we're looking to do. Each individual is a little bit different.
"I get it. We work closely with our sports science department. We get feedback after every practice. Where we stand, guys that have high workloads, things of that nature. Next week we can address when it gets there, but we have a plan in place of the reps, the workload we want to get as a team between the joint practice with Cincinnati and the game reps as well. That all plays a part together, and everything's really, really fluid on how we're handling that."
Then he turned even more away from the idea of letting Williams get some plays.
