Ex-Cal Star Keenan Allen Fuels Chicago Bears' Optimism

Playing with a new NFL team, the veteran wide receiver is within striking distance of 1,000 career receptions

Keenan Allen signs autographs for Bears' fans / David Banks-USA TODAY Sports

With 96 pass receptions this season, former Cal wide receiver Keenan Allen would join a select club — just 14 current — of NFL players with 1,000 catches.

It’s hardly far-fetched. Allen, 32, boasts five seasons of at least 100 receptions and over the past seven years has averaged nearly 98 catches.

Allen is beginning his first season with the Chicago Bears after 11 with the San Diego/Los Angeles Chargers, the team that selected him 76th in the third round of the 2013 NFL draft.

Allen has turned out to be a draft steal. The eighth of 27 wide receivers chosen that year, Allen has sculpted a career that clearly exceeds that of six of the seven wideouts taken before him.

Only DeAndre Hopkins, drafted 27th in the first round by the Houston Texans, has assembled a comparable NFL resume He has 928 receptions — 24 more than Allen — and he has a 78 to 59 edge in touchdown catches.

Keenan Allen / Orlando Ramirez-USA TODAY Sports

To be sure, the Bears are thrilled to have obtained Allen when the Chargers dumped his $23.1 million salary-cap hit in a trade for Chicago’s 2024 fourth-round draft pick.

Allen will be well-motivated by playing for a new team in a contract year. 

“It’s just one of those go-get-her seasons,” Allen told the Chicago Tribune in a length story published Sunday. “You’ve got to go make the things happen in order to solidify a contract extension. At this point, it’s contract time, so that’s usually when it’s time to really buckle down and get to it.”

He arrives in Chicago at a time when Bears fans have reason to hope for a change after decades of mostly bad offense. No. 1 draft pick Caleb Williams of USC has been named the team’s starting quarterback, and the receiving corps added not only Allen but also ex-Washington Huskies star Rome Odunze, also a first-round draft pick.

The key for Allen will be staying healthy. He missed 11 games the past two seasons with hamstring and heel injuries and is currently is trying to move past foot pain caused by an issue with his cleats, general manager Ryan Poles told the Tribune.

Poles believes Allen should be ready by Sunday’s opener against the Tennessee Titans.

On a team that has ranked better than 16th in the NFL in offense just twice in the past 15 seasons, Allen is the grownup in the room. His teammates have watched in wonder as he showed in fall camp the attributes that have made him so consistently effective.

In interviews with Bears players and coaches, the Tribune said words such as crafty, intricate, unpredictable and fascinating were used to describe him. “Like painting the edges on Picasso,” one of them told the newspaper.

Second-year wide receiver Tyler Scott said Allen had “like 15 catches, probably like 300 yards on the defense,” during a single practice session last month.

“This dude goes out and he’s routing the first defense up,” Scott said. “It was like they couldn’t guard him. Just watching him, all the different route combinations, the way he would just get open. 

“He’s not the fastest guy in the world, but he’s just really good with his change of pace,” Scott continued. “The way he uses sudden quickness, change of tempo at the line, in the route. The way he sets different routes up, mirrors them up with different motions and concepts. He’s able to make everything feel and look the same when needed.”

“Sometimes I look and I’m like: ‘Man, how do you even think to do that? Wow, that was creative.’ ”

Keenan Allen / Photo by Gary A. Vasquez, USA Today

Allen calls it “mind manipulation,” and says it’s a skill he began using during his three seasons (2010-12) at Cal, when he caught 205 passes for 2,570 yards, 17 touchdowns.

“Making him think he sees something that’s really not there, just setting him up through the course of the game,” Allen explained. “You have those moments where your body just takes over because you did it so many times. It’s being quick twitchy, and everything is in unison.

“So when you’re making moves, the bottom part of the body is matching up with the head and the shoulders. So it all looks like what it looks like on film to him, but it’s an illusion at the end of the day. You’re creating a presentation for him to think (you’re doing) something else.”

2013 NFL Wide Receiver Draft Class

Here are Allen's career NFL stats and those of the seven players chosen in front of him in the 2013 draft:

DeAndre Hopkins (27th to Texans): 11 years, 928 receptions, 12,355 yards, 78 touchdowns

Keenan Allen (76th to Chargers): 11 years, 904 receptions, 10,530 yards, 59 touchdowns

Robert Woods (41st to Bills): 11 years, 663 receptions, 8,030 yards, 38 touchdowns

Cordarrelle Patterson (29th to Vikings): 11 years, 298 receptions, 2,795 yards, 16 touchdowns

Tavon Austin (8th to Rams): 9 years, 244 receptions, 2,239 yards, 16 touchdowns

Terrance Williams (74th to Cowboys): 6 years, 232 receptions, 3,377 yards, 20 touchdowns

Justin Hunter (34th to Titans): 6 years, 85 reception, 1,349 yards, 13 touchdowns

Aaron Dobson (59th to Patriots): 3 years, 53 receptions, 698 yards, 4 touchdowns