30 Most Necessary Bears of 2025: Dennis Allen (No. 4)

The Chicago Bears are gearing up for an thrilling 2025 NFL season, which options some new faces inside the group poised to get the franchise again to its successful methods. That begins with the hiring of Ben Johnson as head coach, in addition to overhauling the inside offensive line, including items on protection and a potenital impactful rookie draft class.

Each day from now proper up by way of coaching camp, we’re counting down our 30 Most Necessary Bears for the 2025 season. We’ll recap their 2024 season, stay up for 2025 and sort out the largest query dealing with them this yr.

Subsequent up at No. 4 is defensive coordinator Dennis Allen, the primary coach to make an look on the record, who’s tasked with getting essentially the most out of a veteran protection.

Background

Place: Defensive coordinator

Age: 52

Expertise: 29 years

2025 cap hit: N/A

2024 recap

Allen’s 2024 season was one to overlook for the veteran coach. He entered his third season as the pinnacle coach for the New Orleans Saints, and the crew appeared to be turning the nook after a 9-8 yr in 2023 that nearly resulted in a division title. New Orleans had a reliable veteran quarterback in Derek Carr and a few gifted playmakers with working again Alvin Kamara and extensive receiver Chris Olave, however Allen could not deliver his crew to have sustained success. After a 2-7 begin to the 2024 season, the Saints fired Allen and turned their consideration in direction of the long run. It was Allen’s second head teaching stint after spending three and a half years with the (then) Oakland Raiders.

2025 outlook

Regardless of his shortcomings as a head coach, Allen was one of many extra extremely regarded defensive minds in the marketplace. Previous to taking on for Sean Payton because the Saints head coach, Allen was a wonderful defensive coordinator. He acquired essentially the most out of quite a lot of Professional Bowl gamers and helped develop stars reminiscent of Trey Hendrickson and Marshon Lattimore. The Bears noticed the potential to pair Allen with new head coach Ben Johnson to offer him a veteran presence to work with, whereas additionally offering the protection with a confirmed coach who can get essentially the most out of the unit.

Huge query: What is going to the protection seem like below Allen?

For the previous few seasons, the Bears deployed a comparatively normal 4-3 protection below former head coach Matt Eberflus with various levels of success. With Allen now main the group, what precisely can be totally different? We all know Allen prefers to work with larger defensive linemen and will choose to maneuver gamers round, reminiscent of Dayo Odeyingbo and Gervon Dexter. At linebacker, the Bears could also be swapping linebackers TJ Edwards and Tremaine Edmunds to combine issues up and disguise coverages, and the secondary will seemingly function extra man protection with Jaylon Johnson shadowing prime receivers as an alternative of sticking at one spot. By way of a number of days of camp, the Bears offense is already feeling Allen’s protection and what they’ll do. Hopefully opposing groups could have the same expertise.