Bears safety Kevin Byard was covering Keenan Allen on a wheel route up the left sideline earlier this month when he had a decision to make. Quarterback Caleb Williams had floated a ball into the end zone that was arcing toward Allen’s hands in the corner of the end zone.
Byard did the calculus quickly: the Bears weren’t in pads and fighting for the ball would have wound up with both players hitting ground. Plus, Byard and Allen are veterans merely tuning up for the season.
Byard held up. Allen caught the ball and celebrated by high-fiving fans standing behind the ropes.
“I could’ve easily reached up or tried to punch the ball through him,” said Byard, a two-time all-pro. “But in my eyes, I would’ve had to really go through him and we didn’t have no pads on. I probably would’ve fell on him. He might’ve hit his shoulder. …
“[There are] certain plays in practice where I feel like as a veteran, you have to know how to practice, you have to know how to protect your teammates.”
From another defensive back, it would have sounded like excuse-making. But Byard has made a career out of his durability. Since joining the NFL in 2016, he’s never missed a practice because of injury. His only missed practices, he said, were when his children were born. Even when he landed on the COVID-19 list, it was during a bye week. He’s never missed a game due to injury.
That’s a stark contrast to the safety he’s replacing — and part of the reason the Bears gave him a two-year, $15 million deal after cutting Eddie Jackson this offseason. In his last three seasons with the Bears, Jackson missed 13 games due to injury.
“It’s a little bit of God blessing me, it’s a little bit of taking care of my body,” he said. “It’s a lot of different factors that go into that.”
Maybe it’s the banana slices. For breakfast, Byard covers his oatmeal with exactly six pieces of banana — “It’s gotta be six,” he said —to go with berries, cinnamon and honey. Nutrition is important — Byard doesn’t eat beef during training camp, nor grains or carbs at dinner — but so is routine.
“Go to sleep at the same time, wake up at the same time, eat the same food,” he said. “I want everything to feel the same. It’s about meetings, pre-practice warm-up, everything. Because I think a lot of that is injury prevention, …
“I want some of the young guys to see how I prepare, how I do things, make sure I’m getting my conditioning in. staying after and getting extra work after practice. … For any successful person, they will always tell you routine is the best thing to try to do.”
Former Bears tight end Jimmy Graham, a 13-year veteran, stressed the same to Cole Kmet when they were teammates from 2020-21. In Kmet’s rookie year, Graham asked him what the most important statistic was. Kmet guessed touchdowns, then receptions, then receiving yards.
Graham gave him the answer.
“Games played,” Kmet said. “That’s the most important stat. It shows your availability, your dependability. It’s a testament to the routine you have day in and day out. The guys who are able to take care of themselves like that, I don’t think it’s a fluke.”
For Kmet, it’s about what players do when no one’s watching. Even muscle pulls during practice can be a reflection of what players put in their bodies — or don’t.
“You’re on it all the time,” Kmet said. “People talk about that, but you see that during the course of a period of time. And [Byard] is about it all the time.”