Tyrique Stevenson is not in the starting lineup for the Chicago Bears on Sunday, seven days after his costly blunder last weekend. He was not thrilled about the decision and ultimately decided to make matters worse with a questionable decision during practice.
The 24-year-old dug himself an even deeper hole.
Stevenson went viral for all of the wrong reasons during the fourth quarter of a demoralizing loss to the Commanders. Washington threw a Hail Mary as time expired that ultimately resulted in a game-winning touchdown. Jayden Daniels’ pass tipped off of Stevenson’s hand and bounced right into the arms of Noah Brown, who was standing in the end zone.
The play by itself was bad. A video of the unfortunate sequence made it even worse.
Not only was Stevenson tasked with guarding Brown, he lost track of his defensive assignment because he was actively talking trash to fans in the crowd.
It was a fireable offense. Nobody would’ve blamed the Bears if they cut him loose.
However, Stevenson took full accountability for his mistake and Chicago gave him another opportunity. In doing so, head coach Matt Eberflus decided to demote the young corner as punishment for his behavior.
That reportedly did not go over well with Steveson.
According to Jay Glazer, he actually took himself out of practice because he was frustrated with the demotion. Other players on the team did not appreciate the self-substitution.
Bears DB Tyrique Stevenson, the player seen talking to fans right before the Commanders' Hail Mary TD last week, pulled himself out of practice after learning of his demotion for his role in the game-losing play. @JayGlazer explains: pic.twitter.com/FEUA2tZ4tM
— FOX Sports: NFL (@NFLonFOX) November 3, 2024
Courtney Cronin of ESPN provided further context.
Bears coaches/execs arrived at the decision to not start Stevenson on Tuesday and relayed that to the cornerback before Wednesday’s practice, which was a walk thru. I’m told that Stevenson did leave practice after the stretching period to gather himself after learning of his demotion from the starting lineup but returned to practice after a couple minutes inside the locker room and came back out for the team periods during walk thru. While Stevenson’s teammates have expressed frustrations over how things went down in Washington, there wasn’t anything confrontational due to the cornerback leaving walk thru before returning.
The plan for Stevenson today will be to rotate in, similar to how the Bears used Terell Smith in Washington (23 snaps) last week. This isn’t a permanent benching by any means. Sources I spoke with this morning and this week have indicated to me that the Bears have strong belief in Stevenson and want to help hold him accountable and allow him to move past his actions that took away his focus from the Commanders game.
— Courtney Cronin
Tyrique Stevenson is a second-year guy with a promising future. One singular incident will not define his career… unless he chooses to let it define his career. The more he pushes back on his head coach and the organization, the less opportunities he will receive.
To get benched as punishment for an all-time embarrassing lack of judgement is one thing. To pull yourself out of practice because you are frustrated by the punishment is another…