Bear Digest

Tyrique Stevenson Could Face Challenging Week as Defense Regroups

There's little time to worry about the mistake Tyrique Stevenson made on the Hail Mary pass now says Bears safety Kevin Byard, but is the situation history with the Cardinals up next?

Gene Chamberlain

Kevin Byard and other Bears leaders met on Monday with the team and received Tyrique Stevenson's apology. And moved on.
Kevin Byard and other Bears leaders met on Monday with the team and received Tyrique Stevenson's apology. And moved on. / Peter van den Berg-Imagn Images
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As far as the Bears are concerned, they say they've moved on past the Tyrique Stevenson incident as a defense and are going to get ready to face the Arizona Cardinals.

Whether this is actually true remains to be seen but there's no reason to think there will be ramifications from what happened on the game-deciding Hail Mary pass.

Steveenson, after problems earlier in the game, was spotted interacting with fans while the final play started and had to scramble to get back involved. The problem wasn't so much his start but the fact he didn't do his job after the late start on the play as he rushed over to swipe at the ball instead of covering Noah Brown in the end zone to prevent him from catching any deflections.

"He owned up to his mistakes," safety Kevin Byard said. "He's a grown man, we are all grown and we will just move forward.

"We are not going to keep dwelling on the same stuff. He owned up to it and that's all you can hope for."

The Bears held a leadership meeting on Monday when Stevenson apologized to all of them. 

"You get everything out," Byard said. "If there's something that, like something I've discussed with Flus or anything like that, get it out there just put it out there because you don't want to have anything festering within the locker room or yourself that may come out at a later point.

"You get everything out, you say your peace, say what needs to be said and then after that  you look forward. You look forward to Arizona. It's the 24-hour rule, maybe you need 36 hours. We don't have our first day until Wednesday, maybe it's 48, do what you need to do to get it out of your system."

Stevenson also had an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty and got beat on a 61-yard Jayden Daniels pass to Terry McLaurin. He frequently plays with an edge but

Eberflus indicated there would be no announced penalties for this sort of thing as it's kept internal, if there are any.

Instead, wait until practice next week. It's going to be a tough week for Stevenson as he'll be under close scrutiny.

Bears coaches have always held backup Terell Smith high and during their rookie years actually put Smith behind Stevenson at one point in training camp. Smith is healthy after an injury and if Pro Football Focus grades mean anything, he is their lowest graded defensive player this year. He had a meager 38.2 grade on Sunday.

However, Stevenson has been an impact player and it would be difficult to see him losing his starting job over one or two plays in one game.

It wasn't that long ago he was taking back a pick-6 for a game-winning touchdown against Tennessee in the opener.

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"Obviously, this guy probably didn't get no sleep last night," Byard said. "You don't want to beat a dead horse."

The Bears have too much to worry about this week to be concerned about last week's game-ending play.

Kyler Murray plays a great deal like Jayden Daniels and authored a 28-27 comeback win over Miami and Tua Tagovailoa Sunday and that's more impressive than any win the Bears have had this year.

Twitter: BearsOnSI

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

BearDigest.com publisher Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.