Newly signed Bears running back Kevin Jones has been medically cleared to return to practice.

He is coming off knee surgery in January and his return has been nothing short of remarkable given the normal recovery time for similar injuries.

The former Lion, a former first-round draft pick, said on the first day of training camp that he signed with the Bears with the idea of winning the starting running back job. Saturday night in Bourbonnais, he gets his first opportunity to start making his bid.

Regardless of whether Jones is able to wrestle away the starting gig from rookie Matt Forte, if Jones can stay healthy the Bears have very good depth at the running back spot, which they will need to help take whatever pressure they can off the quarterbacks.  When healthy Jones has shown he can be a very effective runner, but as the case with some other Bears players, mainly Mike Brown, that big IF usually goes against us.