The Bears will have one of their best defensive players back on the practice field Thursday.
Bears activate Montez Sweat from NFI list
The Chicago Bears activated defensive end Montez Sweat from the Non-Football Injury (NFI) list, making him available for practice.
Scoring Zone's Take
Montez Sweat is a pure IDP/best-ball-adjacent asset in most standard formats, but the news still matters if you're in a defensive-scoring league or just tracking Bears roster health for your draft board. Getting activated off the Non-Football Injury list and cleared for practice is a clean positive signal — it means whatever kept him sidelined is resolved enough for the team to trust him on the field again, and there's no indication of a setback lingering into camp.
For draft prep purposes, treat this as confirmation that Sweat should be evaluated as a full-go option rather than a question mark. If your league rosters IDPs, he was already a premium pass-rush asset when healthy, and this update removes a lot of the risk discount you'd otherwise apply to a player coming off an NFI stint. Bump him back toward his normal draft cost tier and don't let outdated "recovering" notes on your cheat sheet talk you down — the two independent reports here align and carry solid confidence.
Action item: add him back to your "healthy" tier in IDP or dynasty-style rankings, and don't hesitate to draft him at his typical cost rather than fading him for injury risk. This isn't speculative "expected to return" language — the activation itself has already happened. Just keep an eye on practice reports over the rest of camp to confirm he's taking full-speed reps before you lock in a first-round IDP capital commitment, since full practice availability doesn't guarantee full workload right away.