One of the favorite battle cries of NFL players cast off by their teams is “how do you like me now?”Yesterday’s cut victim, trash to some team, is another team’s treasure. They can sometimes come back to bite the hand of the team that once fed them.
In some cases, players who have become free agents are not wanted for the money and they go on to do great things for a second team.
There are a handful of players who were Chicago Bears at one time and are on the rosters of the final four teams for the 2023 season, playing for the right to go to the Super Bowl.
“We had a difference in value,” Poles said after.
So the Bears dispatched him for a second-round pick that they later used to draft Jaquan Brisker.
Smith got his cash. Of course, he is doinq quite well for himself and is playing for the right to go to the Super Bowl on Sunday against Kansas City as the Ravens try to stop an offense coached by his former Bears coach, Matt Nagy.
Here are the former Bears who on Sunday can say, “How do you like me now?” to their old team if they wish. Not all of them have tremendous success stories, but their teams are still playing and the Bears have been at home watching the playoffs on TV since they started.
Detroit Lions
RB David Montgomery
The Bears third-round draft pick in 2019, Montomery was definitely a worthwhile signing by the Lions for $6 million a year over three years, although it’s not entirely clear the Bears refused to go this high to retain him. In the end, it seemed Montgomery just wanted to play for a winner and he has. Montgomery gaine 1,015 yards as starting back in 14 of the 17 games. He gained more than that only once with the Bears (1,070). He scored a career-high 13 touchdowns and caught 16 passes for 117 yards as he split time with speedy rookie Jahmyr Gibbs. Always one to break a lot of tackles, he broke only three this year as he may have found it less necessary running behind a dominant Lions offensive line.
CB Kindle Vildor
Talk about someone who stepped into a good bit of fortune, the Bears didn’t want him and neither did Tennessee or Philadelphia. Instead, he wound up with the Lions and has started their last four games, including the two playoff games. He has six postseason tackles for Detroit. The 2020 fifth-round pick had started 22 Bears games in three seasons and played in 44, but once Poles drafted Tyrique Stevenson and Terell Smith it became apparent Vildor wouldn’t have much of a shot in Chicago. He was cut. His first Lions game was off the bench against the Bears at Soldier Field in a 28-13 Detroit defeat and he made three tackles, including one for loss. After the Bears cut Vildor, he was on the Titans roster five games and played in the opener against the Saints, but was cut. In Week 6, the Eagles signed him and he was on the roster three games but didn’t play and was cut. Then the Lions picked him after his Eagles stint.
K Michael Badgley
Bears fans will remember the 2022 game against the Giants when Cairo Santos could not play due to personal reasons. The Bears needed a kicker and they signed Badgley, who had been the Chargers kicker for three seasons, then with the Colts and Titans in 2021. Badgley went 4-for-4 on field goals and accounted for all the Bears points in that game, a loss at New Jersey. Then Santos returned and Badgley was released four days after he signed and kicked for them. He kicked for the Lions later that season, was released at the start of 2023 training camp and brought back this season to the Detroit practice squad after the Titans and Commanders had him briefly in preseason and both cut him. Then the Lions had put him on their practice squad and activated him in December. He’s their current kicker after he performed better during an in-season kicking competition at practice than the regular kicker, Riley Patterson. Badgley hasn’t missed a kick in seven tries since being activated, including one from 50-plus.
San Francisco 49ers
S Tashaun Gipson
The starting Bears safety alongside Eddie Jackson for the 2020 and 2021 seasons, Gipson is with his fifth team and has not faded away as the Poles regime might have suspected when they didn’t seek to bring him back in 2022. Instead, he has started every game the past two years for the 49ers, made six interceptions, 11 pass breakups and 1 1/2 sacks. He had outstanding passer ratings against of 63.8 and 65.4 when targeted the past two seasons and allowed less than 60% completions when targeted both years. At age 33 now, Gipson has been on the field for over 2,000 plays in the last two years. In many ways, he’s done far more for the 49ers at a cap cost for two years of $3.3 million than Jackson has done for the Bears in 2022-23 at a cap cost of $32 million.
Kansas City Chiefs
S Deon Bush
Their 2016 fourth-round pick was left unsigned by Ryan Poles to start the 2022 offseason, so he followed Matt Nagy to the Chiefs and signed a contract for 2022. He played three-quarters of all special teams plays when he was on the roster during the past two seasons and got in for 71 and 74 defensive plays as well. Along the way, he was released at the start of the 2023 season, picked back up for the practice squad and then fought his way back onto the roster. He only played six games this past season after getting into 16 in 2022, and has 18 tackles in two years, including seven on special teams, with one pass breakup.
DT Mike Pennel
The Bears had no need for Pennel back as a backup defensive tackle and didn’t retain the 6-foot-4, 330-pound 32-year-old after 2022. Eventually, injuries had the Chiefs searching for help and Pennel was a good place to turn because they had him on the roster for the 2019 and 2020 seasons, as well. He played in only three games and had 47 total plays after being elevated from the practice squad, but he has been elevated to the regular roster through standard elevation this week to the roster for this AFC Championship Game.
WR Anthony Miller
Technially he doesn’t belong on this list because he’s a player who signed this week to a futures contract and not participating in the conference championships. He is on the Chiefs roster for the future. When last we saw Miller in Chicago, he was being scolded by Nagy for being goaded into fighting by Chauncey Gardner-Johnson of the Saints, and was kicked out of the 2020 playoff game at New Orleans. The Bears didn’t want him back the next year so he was traded with a seventh-round pick to Houston for a fifth-round pick just before training camp. Miller left Chicago with 134 receptions for 1,564 yards and in 2021 for Pittsburgh and Houston made only six receptions. The Colts had him on their practice squad and 49ers had him in training camp but he was released by both teams. He hasn’t played in an NFL game since 2021. What a downward journey it’s been for a receiver who set a Bears rookie receiver record of seven touchdown catches in 2018.
Baltimore Ravens
LB Roquan Smith
Having completed his second straight All-Pro season in Baltimore, Smith has cemented his status as one of the league’s best linebackers after he got the $100 million deal the Bears would not give him before they traded him last year. He’s made All-Pro four straight times now but the last two with Baltimore were first team. Smith had 158 tackles, five for loss, 1 1/2 sacks, eight pass breakups, a forced fumble and an interception this year.
C Sam Mustipher
The starting Bears center from mid-2020 through last season, Mustipher was out of a job when the Bears decided not to trender him a restricted free agent offer. For the Ravens, he has been a reserve who started two games and played in nine but didn’t get into eight games. He started in Week 2 for a 27-24 win over the Bengals and in a Week 3 22-19 loss to the Colts while second-year starter Tyler Linderbaum was out with an ankle injury. He has been on for only 50 plays on offense since the second start he made, and 32 of those plays came when he and a lot of other subs played in the regular-season finale against the Steelers after the Ravens had wrapped up top seed.
DE Brent Urban
The 6-foot-7, 309-pounder played under Matt Nagy for one season with the Bears in 2020. Urban this season is playing the same role he did with the Bears as a tall 3-4 reserve defensive end who is stout against the run and can bat down passes.
Urban left the Bears after 2020, spent a year in Dallas but has played the last two years for the Ravens, his original team as their fourth-round pick. He first played there from 2015-2018.
Urban has achieved career-highs of three sacks and five tackles for loss this year for the league’s No. 1 defense. He also has a career-high six QB hits.
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