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Health & Fitness

Bear Down: What to do With the Bears Offensive Line?

What to do with the offensive line?

Let me introduce myself. My name is Pete Forberg, a Chicago Bears fan who wants to share my views with other Bear fans.  

So I decided to join the Patch and blog about what I know best: the Bears.

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This will be my first entry so I hope you enjoy. Thank you for your support!  

This week marks the return of Gabe Carimi, which begs the question: what do the Bears do with the offensive line this week?  

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While the protection has improved in recent weeks, this is still not an area of strength for this team. Carimi is the teams best linemen in my view, so you need to get him on the field when he is ready.

This may not be the week for that. Now let me be clear: while I do feel he is the teams best, he still is a rookie and has been out since Week 2. With that being said, he needs time to get back into playing shape and get re-acclimated with his line-mates.  

So for this week, the status quo is what I think we will see. Beyond that, it raises the question of who goes? If beef is what your looking for, the answer is Chris Spencer. Lance Louis moves inside and Carimi back to his right tackle position. I feel that the right answer maybe a move that will be more of a reflection of what's to come in the future with Carimi moving to the left side to protect Jay Cutler's blindside.  

While J'Marcus Webb has played OK, especially for a seventh round draft pick and you could argue that with more time he will improve even more, Carimi most certainly will find his way to that spot at some time before his days with the Bears are done. It is the position he manned in collage and has the footwork to be productive there.  

The reason I see this as the best option is simple: Lance Louis has looked great considering he was the right guard to start the season and moved into the spot because Frank Omiyale was a complete train wreck there. With more time, Louis may become a pretty strong tackle.  

I am not drinking the Kool-Aid to the degree that I would call him a Pro Bowl type tackle, but I don't see a huge drop-off from when Gabe was over there. But the improvement that Carimi has the potential to bring over Webb may be worth a look.  

Now this can work for a couple of reasons if there is any drop off from Lance Louis you can put Webb in that spot (the one he manned all of last season) and put Louis back to the guard.  

The real wild card in this is Chris Williams. If he can solidify himself into the left guard slot and became the player we have seen in small doses on some of the pull-outs springing Matt Forte we may be onto something.  If not, we may see Chris Spencer at his natural center spot and Roberto Garza at the left Guard with Lance Louis and either Carimi or Webb next to him.  

It will be interesting to see how this comes together and if we will be shopping for more linemen in the first round again this year.  

Let me know what you think. What do you think the Bears should do when Carimi returns?

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