The Chicago Bears are getting healthier at the perfect time. Coming out of their bye, the Bears will have Kyler Gordon make his season debut on Monday night against the Commanders, and the latest injury update reveals a relatively clean bill of health for the team. Even though we won't see an official injury report until Thursday, The Athletic's Kevin Fishbain provided an update on Wednesday. Per the insider, only Jaquan Brisker and Grady Jarrett were unavailable. This means that Colston Loveland and Cairo Santos, who had their own injury concerns, took the field for the first time this week.
The Santos update is particularly promising. Before the bye week, Santos was on fire against the Raiders, going 4/4 in field goals, including two 50+ makes. Later in the game, however, the Brazilian kicker was taken off kickoff duty for the rest of the game after suffering a quad injury. He had missed Tuesday's practice, and Ben Johnson was unclear about when Santos would return to the field.
Cairo Santos Is On His Way to Suit Up in Week 6 vs. Commanders
Fast forward to Wednesday, and all concerns about Santos may have blown over. This is a big sigh of relief for Bears fans, who would have had to watch Jake Moody in a Bears uniform for the first time in the case of Santos' absence. Once a promising kicker prospect, Moody's time in the NFL has been a disaster, leading to his eventual release by the 49ers. Considering that the last time Moody kicked in an NFL game, he missed a 27-yarder and had a 36-yarder blocked, it wasn't instilling too much confidence in the fanbase.
Santos, on the other hand, is a perfect 11/11 in extra points and 6/7 in field goals through four games. He has been one of the most reliable kickers in the NFL throughout his Chicago tenure, making 89.2% of his 157 field goal attempts as a Bear.
There is still a chance the Bears could consider elevating Moody to the active roster for Week 6 in case Santos re-aggravates his quad injury. Wasting a roster spot on a backup kicker may not seem like the smartest idea, but that will depend on how Santos feels for the rest of the week. While it may be risky to have Santos go out there if he is not 100%, Bears fans will certainly feel much more confident seeing him kick a ball than Moody.