CJ racked up 10 tackles against this team when they met a couple of weeks ago, as Jordan Love picked on him in coverage. Due to the Bears dealing with so many injuries at LB, they had to shift CJ’s usage around at times, and against the Packers he lined up in the box a season-high 29 times. Last week, he shifted back to a season-high 41 snaps in the slot, and the slot is the alignment where he’s seeing a much lower tackle rate (7.9% of snaps). I think he stays heavily in that role today, as the Bears will likely be getting LB Tremaine Edmunds back, which should take a ton of pressure off CJ needing to be involved in run defense. In fact, I’m projecting CJ around a 95% snap rate, but with the defense back to full health, I do wonder if there are some packages where he might not be on the field today. Either way, I’m still projecting him at 95%, with at least some chance that he ends up playing fewer snaps than that. With Edmunds and Edwards both healthy for the first time since Week 11, I’m expecting that to chip away at CJ’s tackle rate. That doesn’t mean he can’t clear this again and rack up 10+ tackles. He’s been very boom/bust, clearing this in just 2 of 6 games (33%) where he’s been a full-time player for the Bears, and in both of those games he sailed way over with 9 and 10 tackles. But with Edmunds back, I’m projecting him closer to 5.0 today with around a 60% chance to stay under 5.5. There are a lot of moving parts here, which makes this a bit tricky to project, but with only two more full weeks of regular-season football before the Week 18 crapshoot, I’m more willing to roll the dice on this one despite the wider range of outcomes.

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