The Chicago Bears will weigh the possibility of signing a former top-50 draft pick to their edge rusher room before next Monday’s 2025 regular-season opener.
According to CBS Sports’ Matt Zenitz, the Bears will host former New Orleans Saints defensive end Isaiah Foskey — a 2023 second-round selection — for a roster tryout this week before hosting the Minnesota Vikings for Monday Night Football in Week 1.
“Former #Saints defensive end Isaiah Foskey is expected to work out with the #Bears this week and the #Eagles next week, sources tell @CBSSports,” Zenitz wrote Tuesday on X. “The former Notre Dame All-American was a second-round draft pick of the Saints in 2023. Posted 16 tackles for New Orleans last season.”
The Saints picked Foskey with the 40th overall pick in the 2023 draft to bolster their trenches after the departure of Marcus Davenport, but he struggled to earn a consistent role in the rotation, playing just 147 defensive snaps in 27 games during his first two seasons. The 24-year-old has also yet to record a sack or quarterback hit in his career.
Ultimately, the Saints cut their losses and waived Foskey at the 53-man roster cutdown last week. He became an unrestricted free agent after passing unclaimed on waivers.
The Bears could have designs on signing another pass rusher to their roster before their first game after placing Austin Booker — a preseason standout — on the injured reserve list, ensuring he will miss at least the first four games of the regular season. Foskey also has ties to defensive coordinator Dennis Allen, who served as his first NFL head coach.
Isaiah Foskey Had High Potential Coming into NFL
Foskey’s NFL career has been a dud through his first two seasons, but it is easy to see why the Bears — or any other team — might be curious about his untapped potential, considering he walked away from Notre Dame as the program’s all-time sacks leader.
Foskey was a nightmare for opposing quarterbacks with the Fighting Irish, registering 11 sacks in back-to-back seasons to close out his collegiate career. He finished tied for the sixth-most sacks in the FBS in 2022 and also managed to surpass former NFL All-Pro Justin Tuck (24.5) on Notre Dame’s all-time sacks leaders list, ending up at 26.5.
The biggest knock against Foskey, however, was his lack of polish as a pass rusher. He deployed an aggressive, bull-rushing style that worked well enough for him to remain productive for Notre Dame’s defense, but he needed to hone his technique and find more fluidity as a rusher, as an NFC personnel executive said in the pre-draft process.
“He’s a really productive rusher and he’s still learning how to do it, so I think his upside is really high,” the NFC personnel executive told NFL.com’s Lance Zierlein in 2023.
Clearly, Foskey hasn’t figured it out yet, but the Bears are right to at least evaluate him as a potential addition to either their active roster or practice squad, especially as they prepare to brave the start of the 2025 season with questionable edge-rushing depth.
Are Bears Deep Enough at DE Without Austin Booker?
Regardless of whether the Bears decide to sign Foskey, the team will have some huge questions about its edge-rushing depth heading into the first game of the new season.
The Bears have veterans Montez Sweat and Dayo Odeyingbo atop their depth chart as their starting defensive ends, but they lost their expected No. 3 pass rusher when they placed Booker on IR. Instead, they must now count on Dominique Robinson — a 2022 fifth-rounder with two career sacks — and special teams Daniel Hardy to pick up the slack in the rotation and help keep their starters fresh against the Vikings offense.
Chicago is also gambling on both Sweat and Odeyingbo having bounce-back seasons. Sweat slumped to just 5.5 sacks in 2024 after playing at a Pro Bowl level the year prior, while Odeyingbo failed to match his rotational production as a full-time Colts starter. If either one fails to deliver for them in 2025, it could end poorly for the Bears defense.
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