Training camp is here, and we’re setting the scene for the 2026 season. This week I’ll be ranking the Bears who matter most to the season ahead. Veterans reported today, the first practice is tomorrow, and the gates open to the public on Friday. So over the next several days, we’re going to count down the 20 most important Bears of 2026, tier by tier, all the way to No. 1.
But first, a word about what “important” means here, because it’s the whole ballgame.
This is not a list of the best Bears. It’s not a talent ranking, and it’s not a depth chart. If you want to know who the most gifted players on the roster are, that’s a different post. This one is about something more specific, and to me, more interesting.
The Bears won 11 games in 2025. They took the NFC North. They won a playoff game. They did all of that in Ben Johnson’s first year as head coach, with a second-year quarterback who broke the franchise single-season passing record and engineered an absurd number of fourth-quarter comebacks. By any honest measure, it was wildly successful.
© Matt Marton-Imagn ImagesSo the question that defines this offseason isn’t “are the Bears good?” They’re good. The question is: can they take another step? Can 11 wins become 13? Can a divisional-round team become a conference-title team? Can a top-10 offense become a top-3 offense, and can a defense that got them into January hold up once they’re there?
That’s the lens for this entire list. I ranked these 20 players not by how good they are, but by how much the next step forward runs through them. And that distinction matters, because it reshuffles everybody.
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Here’s what I mean. A great veteran who is going to be great again is enormously valuable, and also not really what a step forward is made of. His excellence is already baked into the 11 wins. The team’s ceiling doesn’t move because a known quantity stays known.
The ceiling moves on the variables: the second-year leap that may or may not land, the pass rush that has to materialize from a group the front office pointedly declined to reinforce, the corners coming back from injury, the young weapon who could turn a good offense into an unfair one. Those are the players who decide whether 2026 is a step forward or a step sideways. So those are the players who rank high.
Ranking the 20 Most Important Bears of 2026
If you’ve seen the other “most important” lists floating around, you already know ours will look different in a few places. For instance, we’re doing 20 instead of 30, so we had to be choosier. But most of it is the thesis.
Jun 9, 2026; Lake Forest, IL, USA; Bears Head Coach Ben Johnson walks on the field during minicamp at Halas Hall. Mandatory Credit: Kamil Krzaczynski-Imagn ImagesA lot of lists this summer are built around protecting the quarterback, and they stack the offensive line near the top as a result. That’s a perfectly reasonable way to see it. It’s just not mine. Keeping Caleb Williams upright is a floor thing, and the floor is already high. I’m interested in the ceiling. So when you get down the list and find an elite guard sitting lower than you’d expect, or three pass rushers higher than you’d expect, that’s not me being contrarian for sport. It’s the thesis doing exactly what it’s supposed to do.
Five things have to break right for the Bears to climb, and every ranking on this list traces back to one of them:
1. Caleb Williams makes the leap. The completion percentage has to climb, and the offense has to stop needing a fourth-quarter miracle to win games it should’ve had in hand by the third. This is pillar one, and it isn’t close.
2. The pass rush shows up from within. No meaningful edge help was added this offseason. A deeper January requires more juice than 2025 provided, and it has to come from players already in the building.
3. The second-year pass-catchers pop. With DJ Moore gone, the passing game’s rise depends on young weapons taking the Year-2 jump that turns “good” into “problem for defensive coordinators.”
4. The secondary holds up. Health and cohesion on the back end are the difference between a defense that survives the regular season and one that can close a playoff game.
5. The line protects the step. Continuity up front keeps the whole thing standing. It’s real, and it’s why it’s a pillar, but it protects the step more than it creates it.
One housekeeping note before we continue. You’ll notice a coach on a players-heavy list, and we’re not going to apologize for it or bury the lede. When the entire premise is “who drives the next step,” leaving Ben Johnson off would be dishonest. He’s the reason the step is even on the table. He earns his spot, and we’ll make that case when we get there.
We’ll roll this out in tiers. First up, Nos. 20 through 15. Then 14 through 10, then 9 through 4, and then the top three get posts of their own, with No. 1 landing to close it out.
Let’s get into it.
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