What’s New

The White Sox bullpen wasn’t all it was cracked up to be in the first few weeks of the season but with components like left-hander Garrett Crochet finding a groove since he came off the injured list four weeks ago, the relief corps is shaping up.

The White Sox bullpen wasn’t all it was cracked up to be in the first few weeks of the season but with components like left-hander Garrett Crochet finding a groove since he came off the injured list four weeks ago, the relief corps is shaping up.

Crochet hasn’t allowed a run in his last 11 outings, including eight since returning from the IL with an upper back strain on May 7. It’s a welcome development, especially with prized right-hander Michael Kopech on the IL with a hamstring strain.

“Now I’m just kind of attacking the zone and finding my rhythm from there,” said Crochet, who owns a 0.49 ERA over 17 appearances. “It was really just kind of a mindset change after going on the IL and that’s helped me a good bit.”

Crochet said he’s attacking from the first pitch on and finding his rhythm from there.

“You saw it at the beginning of the season to now, every time he goes out there he’s got more confidence, he looks more like the guy that ended [2020 season with five dominant, scoreless appearances],” manager Tony La Russa said. “Sometimes you’ve got to work on stuff to get it all together and it’s coming at a perfect time for us.”

Still only a year removed from getting drafted 11th overall last June, Crochet pitched a perfect eighth in the Sox’ 6-1 win over the Blue Jays Tuesday and collected a win. He struck out Teoscar Hernandez and Lourdes Gurriel, keeping the score tied at 1.

“That was a big-time assignment and he took care of it,” La Russa said.

Per FanGraphs, the Sox bullpen ranked second in the major leagues at 2.8 wins above replacement. The Mets were first at 3.1. Per FanGraphs, Crochet (0.5) trails only AL Reliever of the Month for May Liam Hendriks (0.9) and Kopech (0.6) among Sox relievers.

Reopening Day Tuesday

As promised, the White Sox will return to 100 percent capacity on June 25 when they host the Mariners at Guaranteed Rate Field.

The official announcement came Wednesday. The event will be called Reopening Night, marking the end of seating ponds and season ticket holders returning to their own seats. Postgame fireworks will go off for the first time since 2019.

Single game tickets to the remainder of home games go on sale to the general public at noon Tuesday on whitesox.com only.

Mobile ticketing, cashless transactions, level restrictions, enhanced cleaning measures as well as the no-bag policy (except for medical bags, small clutch purses that are 9” x 5” or smaller and diaper bags) will remain in place. Fans who are not fully vaccinated are encouraged to wear a face covering or mask.

Mercedes takes a seat

His .291 average at its lowest in 2021 on the heels of a 2-for-32 (.063) slump with two RBI in his last 11 games, designated hitter Yermin Mercedes sat in favor of Jake Lamb Wednesday.

After an historic start and AL Rookie of the Month performance in April, pitchers have adjusted, as expected.

“And he needs to make those adjustments,” La Russa said. “I can see that he is.”

Mercedes might have started if not for Andrew Vaughn’s big game Tuesday, La Russa suggested.

“I do believe it’s a combination of making the adjustment to how he’s being pitched,” La Russa said, “gaining experience and how they’re working him over.”

Read More

Joc Pederson and Sergio Alcantara each homered in the Cubs’ 3-1 win over the Padres on Wednesday.

SAN DIEGO – The Cubs haven’t had their full lineup often recently and Wednesday was no exception. But even without Kris Bryant, Javy Baez and Willson Contreras, they found a way to score enough runs to finish the series with a 3-1 win over the Padres.

The Cubs didn’t have a hit off former ace Yu Darvish going into the fourth inning, but Joc Pederson made the team’s first hit a loud one, crushing a long solo home run tying the game at 1.

“The first at-bat, he didn’t give me,” Pederson said. “It just showed me that he’s kinda nasty. I was just looking to get a pitch that I could put the barrel on. He’s got a lot of pitches and they go a lot of different directions.”

While Darvish was tough throughout the day, the Cubs were able to break through in the seventh inning. Following Ian Happ’s lead-off walk and single by Patrick Wisdom, Anthony Rizzo brought in the go-ahead run on a double play and gave the Cubs a 2-1 lead.

Shortstop Sergio Alcantara, who started in place of Baez, gave the bullpen some breathing room in the eighth inning by hitting his first homer of the season, giving the Cubs a 3-1 lead.

“The walk that started that thing. That was a really good at-bat off Yu,” manager David Ross said. “Rizz doing a nice job there 3-2 putting that ball in play and getting us that go-ahead run is nice. … Then the homer by Sergio was huge. We’ve had little moments like that that can’t be understated all year where guys are just getting big hits.

Happ gets first start at second base since 2019

Ross has had to get creative with his lineups with so many players being banged up and unavailable. Ross added another wrinkle on Wednesday, starting Happ at second base. It was Happ’s first start at second base since Sept. 12, 2019 also in San Diego against the Padres.

Versatility has been the name of the game as Kris Bryant has shown this season while the Cubs try to tread water until they can get back to full strength.

“Last week when a lot of guys were going down, [Ian] just said, ‘Hey, if you need me, I can get back to the infield or I’m willing to do whatever,’” Ross said before the game. “That’s the kind of player he is. We got a lot of those guys. KB we talk about moving around and doing what’s best for the team. Same thing with Happ.

“He took some ground balls just to try to get some work in and make sure it looks clean and with Javy being out and then Sogard, just don’t want to run him in the ground with the off day. We’re just limited to what we got in the middle infield … I know he’ll go out there and give his best and give us a chance to win a play.”

Happ’s first opportunity came in the sixth inning and looked natural, making a sliding stop off a ball that took a sharp hop, fielding it and firing to first for the out.

Read More

A police watchdog agency on Wednesday released videos showing an exchange of gunfire last month during which two Chicago police officers were shot and a suspected gunman was wounded in Lawndale.

A police watchdog agency on Wednesday released videos showing an exchange of gunfire last month during which two Chicago police officers were shot and the suspected gunman was wounded in Lawndale.

Police said the incident unfolded after officers responded to a ShotSpotter alert shortly after 7 a.m. May 16 in the 1400 block of South Lawndale Avenue. There, they came across a man later identified as 45-year-old Bruce Lua, who they followed at a distance for several blocks while shouting verbal commands at him to stop, the videos show.

Video shows Lua continuing to walk away without responding.

Two officers then got out of their marked squad cars as Lua approached one of the cars in an alley behind the 1500 block of South Lawndale Avenue. One of the officers, who was wearing one of the four body-worn cameras that captured the incident, ordered him to stop and yelled, “Show me your hands!”

“Get your hands out of your pocket,” the officer, with his gun drawn, can be heard telling Lua on the video. “Dude, stop … get your hands up.”

Lua, who continues walking, then appears to pull a gun out a pocket of his white sweatshirt and fires a shot at an officer from point-blank range. Multiple officers then returned fire, hitting him, the video shows.

One video shows an officer fall to the ground as he returns fire. The officer can later be heard saying, “I’m hit, I’m hit.”

WARNING: GRAPHIC VIDEO

Lua also dropped to the ground after he was shot and can be heard groaning, video shows.

“They shootin’ me,” he yells, to which an officer responded, “You shot at us.”

Police said they recovered a gun on the scene.

A 26-year-old officer was struck in the hand, and a 28-year-old officer was hit in the hip and shoulder, according to prosecutors. Both received treatment and were released from the hospital later that day.

Lua, a convicted felon, was awaiting trial for a pending misdemeanor assault case when he shot at the police.

Two days after the shooting, Lua was ordered held on $10 million bail for attempted murder, aggravated battery and unlawful use of a weapon charges in connection with the exchange of gunfire with cops.

Lua was also ordered held on $100,000 bail for his pending misdemeanor assault case.

Read More

A reflection on the museum’s storied past and more inclusive future

What do you get when a leather daddy and a librarian walk into a synagogue? Well, apparently, a museum.…Read More

“From music to meatballs and everything in between, Italians have contributed much to what this city and this country is all about,” said Ron Onesti, president of the Joint Civic Committee of Italian-Americans.

Chicago aldermen agreed Wednesday to designate October as “Italian American Heritage and Culture Month,” thanks to a resolution one civic leader said is sorely needed to begin a “healing” process.

Ron Onesti, president of the Joint Civic Committee of Italian-Americans, made no mention of the specific wounds he believes need to be healed.

But members of the City Council’s Committee on Special Events, chaired by Italian-American Ald. Nick Sposato (38th), were well aware of the hurts Italian-Americans say they have suffered in recent years and months.

• Chicago Public Schools’ decision to designate Columbus Day as “Indigenous Peoples Day.”

• A failed proposal to rename Balbo Drive in honor of Ida B. Wells (Congress Parkway was eventually renamed for Wells).

• The midnight removal of two statues of Christopher Columbus.

Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times

Onesti noted Italian-Americans have made countless contributions since their arrival in Chicago in the 19th century.

“Music, culinary arts, science, dance, sports, architecture, paintings, medicine, sculpture, fashion, government. From music to meatballs and everything in between, Italians have contributed much to what this city and this country is all about,” Onesti said.

“But more importantly, I’m here to underscore the important symbolism this resolution would represent. … We truly believe initiatives such as this are part of a larger effort to begin the healing our severely-bruised city so desperately needs.”

The only way to “get back to a more loving, sensitive and productive society” is to recognize every group “woven into the fabric” of Chicago, Onesti said.

“We, the Italian-American community of Chicago, so desperately want to be a part of that healing process,” he said.

Ald. Patrick Daley Thompson (11th) said he is proud to join Sposato in co-sponsoring the resolution.

“It’s not only the festivals. It’s not only the music and the meatballs. We also have Dr. Fermi, Mother Cabrini. So many other Italians that have contributed to society here,” Thompson said.

“As the great-grandson of Italian immigrants who came here from Capistrano, Italy, I’m very proud. I know Grandma … would be very proud of me to be sponsoring this.”

Last summer, Lightfoot ordered two statues of Christopher Columbus “temporarily” removed in the middle of the night based on information that something bad was about to happen.

At the same time, the mayor argued, statues of Columbus in Grant and Arrigo Parks that had been vandalized repeatedly since the death of George Floyd should not be torn down, but rather used to confront the nation’s history and trigger a “reckoning” that’s long-overdue.

City Hall then launched the Monuments Project, and created an advisory committee to conduct a comprehensive review of more than 500 Chicago statues and monuments, with an eye toward identifying those that were offensive, problematic or not representative of city’s values of equity and justice.

To the chagrin of Onesti and other Italian-American civic leaders, the Columbus statutes have yet to be returned to their pedestals.

Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

Read More

It could hardly be more tragic that the violent deaths of children is spiking even after years upon years of one police strategy after another, of one social program after another.

The front page of Tuesday’s Chicago Sun-Times could hardly have been more grim. Our city’s children are losing their lives to gunfire at a rate three times faster than last year.

It could hardly be more tragic that the violent deaths of children in Chicago is spiking even after years upon years of one police strategy after another, of one social program after another, of anti-violence funding that has started and funding that has stopped.

Children keep dying, shot sitting in a car in a McDonald’s drive-thru, shot visiting from out of town, shot at a West Pullman gas station. According to a Chicago Sun-Times analysis of shooting and homicide data, of the more than 1,500 shooting victims in Chicago this year, at least 53 were 15 or younger, compared with 43 last year. Of the 233 shooting victims 18 and younger, 34 died.

Eleven children lost their lives to gunfire in May, eight in April, five in March, two in February and five in January. After the Sun-Times story appeared, a 9-year-old boy was shot in the cheek while playing outside a home in Back of the Yards on Tuesday evening.

The toll rends the heart.

Caught in the crossfire

Many of the children who are being killed are not the intended targets, but are just caught up in crossfire. To protect them will require an all-out — and sustained — effort to reduce shootings in the city.

The higher numbers of shootings, both overall and those of children, should upset anybody. It may be tempting to dismiss urban violence, the shootings and killings, as gang members shooting other gang members. But we can’t fool ourselves. When so many innocent kids are being shot and killed, there is no excuse not to care.

We also would argue that no young person should be written off as irredeemable.

We have written about this many times, to the point that we find it frustrating. But we know there are, in fact, at least partial solutions that work: Summer jobs, jobs in general, summer programs for kids, after-school programs, police strategies of proven effectiveness. And we have to keep pushing. We have no choice.

To give up on all this is to give up on kids like the 14-year-old girl who was gunned down on June 2 after her attackers asked her if she was in a gang.

Things that work

Illinois’ $42.3 billion budget for the upcoming fiscal year includes money for violence prevention programs such as after-school activities, and summer youth employment. It’s not enough — it’s never enough — but the idea is exactly right, which is to give kids something to grab onto, a rope that can lift them out of a life surrounded by violence. We need to offer young people more good choices and not as many bad choices. We need to do a better job of keeping guns out of the hands of those who shouldn’t have them.

As an example of what can work, there is the Heartland Alliance’s Rapid Employment and Development Initiative, which connects Chicago men, most of whom have been shot or arrested, to intensive programming, jobs or job training and trauma-informed supports. Preliminary results of a study of the program, by the University of Chicago Crime Lab, show that participants are 40% less likely to be victims of gun homicides or shootings.

We need to invest in communities and create safe spaces. People who have lived through one shooting after another are traumatized.

In it for the long term

Short-term programs or police crackdowns won’t be sufficient. Better schools, summer jobs, summer programs for kids, after-school programs, violence interruption efforts, jobs programs and other initiatives need to be in place over a long period — years and decades — until their cumulative effect makes a difference.

“You may need to get a generation of people through good programs before you start to get traction,” said Maryann Mason, director of violence and injury research at the Buehler Center for Health Policy and Economics at Northwestern University.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, firearm targets have been a little older on average, Mason said, and the older they are — say 25 to 30 years old — the more likely they are to have children with them.

At the same time, police say, gang members are less concerned about young children getting caught between them and their targets. Partly that’s because gangs have splintered into smaller units and no one is enforcing a street code that says gang members should never shoot a child.

Triumphing over gun violence is a long game. We cannot quit.

Send letters to [email protected].

Read More

Political insiders say former state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias has important early leads in endorsements and fundraising in the secretary of state’s race. Chicago City Clerk Anna Valencia has also won crucial endorsements. But observers agree the race remains anyone’s game.

Though it shares a title with one of the top posts in the U.S. president’s cabinet, the Illinois secretary of state’s office shares none of the prestigious responsibilities of its federal namesake.

Instead of international diplomacy or foreign policy intrigue, the state office deals largely with driver’s licenses and license plates.

Nevertheless, presiding over that state office is one of the most coveted prizes in Illinois politics.

“Next to being governor, that’s the biggest political office statewide,” said former Republican Gov. Jim Edgar.

And winning that political plum typically involves plenty of Illinois domestic intrigue and campaign intelligence — if lesser amounts of diplomacy.

Right now, five Democrats are already waging a pitched battle to succeed retiring Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White — who, despite the rather mundane tasks involved, was regularly one of the Democrats’ top vote getters.

Political insiders say former state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias is leading the pack, racking up crucial endorsements and building the strongest political war chest. He is closely followed by Chicago City Clerk Anna Valencia, who has won her own share of endorsements, but in the money contest has so far been outraised by Giannoulias more than five-to-one.

“Alexi has kind of set the curve and changed the standard for this race,” said Dave Mellet, a political consultant who helped Mayor Lori Lightfoot win office and is not aligned with any candidate in the secretary of state’s race.

“I think Anna Valencia — with the cash on hand she has and the money that she’s raised — she’s doing all the things that you would expect somebody running for a down ballot, statewide office to do and she’s doing it well. It’s just really hard to be in the field against somebody who has that much money and is able to raise that well.”

But while the race is off to “very fast pace,” Mellet said it’s still anyone’s to win.

Rounding out the field are Aldermen Pat Dowell (3rd) and David Moore (17th) and state Sen. Michael Hastings, D-Tinley Park.

So far, no Republicans have entered the race.

One of the allures of the office is its potential to serve as a political stepping stone.

Edgar, a former Illinois secretary of state who parlayed his tenure into a successful gubernatorial bid, said the current crop of candidates may be looking to do the same, since the office offers plenty of the tools to do so, from jobs to fill to publicity to take advantage of.

“You also have respect throughout the state, your name — next to the governor’s — is the most visible name in state government, because you’re on every body’s driver’s license,” Edgar said. “There’s a lot of political advantages.”

Giannoulias already likely has the best statewide name recognition in the field, having served one term as state treasurer and waging an unsuccessful, but high profile, run for U.S. Senate ten years ago.

He’s got the money advantage — roughly $2.4 million, state board of election records show. And he’s bagged early support from the SEIU Illinois State Council, which will mean more money and boots on the ground.

The council includes SEIU Locals 1 and SEIU Healthcare Illinois & Indiana, which have an ownership stake in the Chicago Sun-Times.

Just as important, Giannoulias won the support of U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia.

The Southwest Side Democratic congressman’s endorsement over Valencia, the only Latina in the field so far, could give Giannoulias a boost among Hispanic voters and progressives.

Edgar said getting those larger endorsements is especially important in a Democratic primary, where turnout is likely to be lower and “name recognition is the name of the game here.”

But Giannoulias’ early advantages don’t “guarantee he’s going to win it,” Edgar said, pointing all the “unknowns” that will determine how the race pans out.

“How they campaign and how the turnout is,” the former governor said. “Turnout is so important in a primary, because it’s somewhat sparse.”

In fundraising, Hastings is a distant second to Giannoulias. The state senator had $604,001.46 in the bank at the end of March. Valencia had $428,236.18.

Neither Hastings nor Valencia have reported any new contributions since then.

Dowell had just $67,880.79 on hand on March 31, and has raised $218,500 since then, meaning she likely has nearly $286,380.79 at her disposal. Moore had $73,986.58 on hand on March 31 and has added $2,500 since then.

Moore had $73,986.58 on hand and has added just $1,000 since then.

Giannoulias had $2,104,762 in the bank at the end of March and has raised $303,500 since then.

Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough, who weighed a run for the office herself but opted to support Dowell instead, said the race is “very fluid,” and while Democrats have a “good crop of candidates,” there’s also “a long row to hoe” from now until the primary.

“I think it’s early and I’ve seen lots of things happen over the course of an election cycle, but this one will be a long, drawn out process now,” said Yarbrough, who also represents Proviso Township in the party’s ranks and is a member of their statewide selection committee.

Mellet also stressed it’s too early to tell how the race will shake out. The Democratic consultant said Giannoulias’ stocked war chest means he “doesn’t have to pinch pennies” and will be able to “sprint and force everyone to run as fast as they can behind him.”

That could mean early TV ads from Giannoulias in an effort to cement the lead.

But Valencia’s profile — a Latina from downstate who has City Hall experience, and name recognition, in Chicago — could help her overcome the early money imbalance, Mellet said.

Valencia was endorsed Wednesday by the national group Latino Victory Fund and has also received some union support and the early backing of Democratic U.S. Rep. Lauren Underwood.

Dowell has shown an ability to raise money and a willingness to get around the state and meet local elected officials, a strategy that could see her rise as the race continues, Mellet said.

“Women, especially diverse women, have done really well in recent years, and this is a primary, and women are breaking through,” Mellet said.

Dowell has also taken a page out of White’s playbook — promising not to use the office as a stepping stone.

And she’s shown a willingness to mix it up on the campaign trail. The South Side alderman took a shot at Giannoulias for his 2014 endorsement of Republican Tom Cross for state treasurer.

Giannoulias brushed that off in a Cook County Democratic Party forum Saturday, saying he was just saying “good things” about the Oswego Republican, and “no one should question my commitment to the Democratic party.”

The Cook County Democratic Party is likely to endorse in the race in December, said executive director Jacob Kaplan.

And White, who won all 102 counties in 2002, said in a statement he doesn’t yet have a preferred candidate in the already “strong field.”

But the Near North Side Democrat plans to “keep the option open to making an endorsement at some point.”

Read More

The new details revealed for the first time Wednesday have elements that ring of a movie: a trusted ally of union boss Jimmy Hoffa gunned down after testifying about a corrupt governor selling prison pardons and a gunman who donned a wig and blackface to throw authorities off the scent.

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — A former Tennessee governor’s administration helped fund a contract murder of a key federal witness decades ago while embroiled in the state’s largest political scandal, law enforcement officials announced Wednesday.

The new details revealed for the first time Wednesday have elements that ring of a movie: a trusted ally of union boss Jimmy Hoffa gunned down after testifying about a corrupt governor selling prison pardons and a gunman who donned a wig and blackface to throw authorities off the scent.

Investigators in Hamilton County, which encompasses Chattanooga, have been chipping away at the 42-year-old cold case of Samuel Pettyjohn since they renewed their investigation in 2015. No new charges will be filed because all of the major players involved are now dead, but authorities say closing the case provides closure to one aspect of a complicated piece of Tennessee history.

Pettyjohn, a Chattanooga businessman and close friend of Hoffa, was fatally shot in 1979 in downtown Chattanooga after testifying before a federal grand jury during the early phases of Tennessee’s notorious “cash-for-clemency” scandal.

“Essentially, Mr. Pettyjohn cooperated with authorities and knew too much about what was going on locally, as well as the state level, and individuals didn’t like that and so individuals hired someone to murder him,” Hamilton County District Attorney Neal Pinkston said. “Here we are some 42 years later.”

The scandal ultimately led to the ousting of Democratic Gov. Ray Blanton, who was never indicted in the investigation — but three of his aides were. However, questions have lingered about the extent to which the governor’s administration actively worked to thwart the investigation. Officials say at least five witnesses in the case were murdered or killed themselves.

Pinkston told reporters that Pettyjohn would meet with inmates to indicate that money would help secure an early release from prison starting in 1976. Pettyjohn was joined by William Thompson, who had been involved in Blanton’s election campaign and would later be convicted in the cash-for-clemency scandal.

According to Pinkston, Pettyjohn and Thompson would drop payments off at the governor’s office in the Capitol.

As federal investigators began examining whether the governor’s office was exchanging cash for parole, Pettyjohn was subpoenaed to testify about the ongoing scheme. Pettyjohn eventually agreed to cooperate with FBI agents, even going as far as providing a list of people who made payments to the governor’s office for the early release of certain prisoners.

Shortly after, Pettyjohn was killed in what authorities describe as an “execution style hit.” Witnesses told authorities that they saw a Black man in a trench coat exiting Pettyjohn’s store. Meanwhile, Pettyjohn was found with his pistol nearby, which had not been fired, and more than $100,000 on him.

According to Pinkston, Ed Alley — a known bank robber who died in 2005 in federal prison — was hired by several sources to kill Pettyjohn. Pinkston said those sources included an undisclosed third party who paid some of the contract money on behalf of the Blanton administration. The estimated total murder price was between $25,000 and $50,000.

“I’m very sure. I’m proof positive,” Pinkston said when asked how certain he was that the Blanton administration helped pay for Pettyjohn’s murder.

Officials say Alley, who was white, wore a wig, glasses and covered his skin in heavy brown makeup to deceive any witnesses.

“Cooperating individuals indicated Alley admitted Pettyjohn was murdered for various reasons including he was a source of cooperation for the FBI in investigations of Gov. Ray Blanton,” according to findings from a Hamilton County grand jury.

The grand jury concluded that if Alley were alive today, he would be charged with first-degree premeditated murder of Pettyjohn.

Mike Mathis, supervisor of Hamilton County’s cold case unit, acknowledged that it was highly unusual for a prosecutor’s office to pursue a grand jury when most of the involved parties were dead but said the county chose to do so for the first time it because “it gives you a legal closing.”

Saadiq Pettyjohn, one of Samuel Pettyjohn’s sons, said his mother often described his father as someone with a “heart of gold” and “very generous, giving person,” while acknowledging his father was associated with criminal activity. Authorities say Pettyjohn was part of an organized effort to blow up a building to collect insurance payouts, but he was never brought to trial due to his untimely death.

“It’s a curse and a blessing to grow up in a family that’s connected to crime,” he added. “When that person dies, you can go that route or you can go a different route; all of us chose to try to do better in our lives.”

Blanton, who died in 1996, had sparked outrage after he pardoned and commuted prison terms for more than 50 state inmates in the waning days of his gubernatorial term. Blanton’s fellow Democrats worked with Republicans in the Legislature to move up the inauguration of his Republican successor, Lamar Alexander, by three days.

Blanton was never charged in the scandal, but in 1981, he was convicted of unrelated charges of extortion and conspiracy for selling a liquor license for $23,000 to a friend while in office.

Read More

Chicago White Sox’s third baseman, Yoan Moncada, had a difficult time last season with his performance after contracting the COVID-19 virus but he has reverted to his old ways this season. Moncada had the virus early last season during the shortened stint of the 2020 MLB season. Moncada played 52 games out of the 60 […]

White Sox: Yoan Moncada’s comeback season is because of one thing – Da Windy City – Da Windy City – A Chicago Sports Site – Bears, Bulls, Cubs, White Sox, Blackhawks, Fighting Illini & More

Read More

He’s far more than a gadget player. Williams is talented enough to become an essential piece in Matt Nagy’s offense.

Few players stir as much intrigue in the Bears’ offense as Damien Williams, the newly arrived running back who was last seen turning the field into his own pyrotechnic show as the Chiefs won Super Bowl LIV.

In theory, Williams is exactly the type of threat who can add some punch to an offense that spent the last two seasons sleepwalking. He totaled 1,001 yards from scrimmage in 14 games (playoffs included) in 2019 before opting out of last season amid the pandemic. He runs with power and speed, plus he offers coach Matt Nagy an option in the slot or out wide.

“He’s very well rounded,” Nagy said Wednesday. “It’s just a really good fit. The [Kansas City] coaches spoke really well of him… and Damien’s come in here like a true pro and just digested everything that we’re doing.

“He’s a great complement to what we’re trying to do. It’ll be fun when we get to the preseason to see how all these guys do, but there’s a really good vibe right now.”

Good vibes have been hard to detect from the running back at times over the past two seasons.

David Montgomery didn’t post a 100-yard game until Thanksgiving weekend, and the Cordarrelle Patterson experiment produced just 3.6 yards per carry. Tarik Cohen tore his ACL in Week 3.

Beyond those headliners, the collection of Ryan Nall, Artavis Pierce and Lamar Miller totaled 34 yards for the season.

Enter Williams, highly talented and highly motivated. After stepping away following a career year, he’s on a one-year, $1.1 million contract at 29 — a more prudent move, by the way, than general manager Ryan Pace’s two-year, $10 million commitment to Patterson.

He’s good enough to take some of the load off Montgomery and give Nagy an alternative if a starting wide receiver like Anthony Miller isn’t getting the job done. He’s much more than a gadget player.

Williams made the Dolphins’ roster as an undrafted rookie out of Oklahoma in 2014 and turned a corner when former Bears offensive coordinator Adam Gase came aboard as head coach. He averaged 5.6 yards per touch over the 2016 and ’17 seasons, enticing the Chiefs to scoop him up in free agency.

Here’s a rule of thumb for the Bears: If Andy Reid likes a player, so does Nagy. So when the Chiefs moved on in favor of first-round pick Clyde Edwards-Helaire and cut Williams in March, the Bears were eager to pounce. And Williams was eager to play in a relatively familiar scheme.

“Coming here and having the same system, same plays, it was easy for me,” he said.

Williams worried that taking a year off at this stage could cost him his career, but felt it was necessary because his mother has been battling cancer. He watched last season on TV uneasily as he plotted his return.

He started training again about halfway through last season and was full-speed when the Bears began Organized Team Activities last week. So far, so good. His speed has been evident the last two weeks, and he had several good runs Wednesday.

“That whole year was… man,” he said. “Being home and watching it really made me feel like this was something I wanted to do as long as possible — until the wheels fall off. I wasn’t ready to sit down at home.

“I feel like one of the rookie kids. First day back, new guy in the building — I’m just embracing it all right now.”

Read More