Staley Da Bear
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- Mar 16, 2019
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Trevathan got positive coverage during the offseason for changing his diet, shaving off five points off his body fat percentage to gain speed and agility. The Vikings game will be one where that could make the biggest difference.
"That'll help Danny," said defensive coordinator Chuck Pagano. "You could see as soon as he came back to training camp, the quickness and the suddenness, the change of direction, the burst, the twitch. You know, you need all that to be available to cover a guy like Dalvin."
The Bears have held opposing running backs, of all shapes and sizes, to 3.4 yards per carry. Teams that utilize multiple backs have tended to find more success using the bigger one. Against the Broncos, for example, the team was able to bottle the smaller, shiftier Phillip Lindsay (5-8, 190), while struggling a bit against the bigger, more powerful Royce Freeman (6-0, 238).
Cook is in the middle of those two in terms of size (5-10, 210), but his style is closer to Lindsay. On his 75-yard touchdown against the Packers, he hit an open hole and was just too fast for anyone to lay a hand on him.
Running back-linebacker is not a mano-a-mano matchup the way it is for cornerback-receiver or defensive end-left tackle. The whole defense, including All-Pros Khalil Mack and Akiem Hicks (if healthy), will play a role in stopping Cook. But as an inside linebacker, and the team's leading tackler, the veteran Trevathan will perform the most significant part in the Bears' quest to prevent a game-breaking play by Cook.