Bears TE Trey Burton placed on IR, Vaughters promoted

Instead of the weekly cut-sign of Bradley Sowell, the Bears made a different move this week.

After already ruling out Trey Burton after he missed all week of practice, the Bears moved him to injured reserve Saturday and promoted linebacker James Vaughters.

Burton played in eight games this season, starting five but had just 14 receptions for 84 yards and zero touchdowns. It’s been a disappointing season for the 2018 free agent signing from Philadelphia.

Burton played well last year, catching a career-high 54 passes for 569 yards and six touchdowns. This year he’s dealt with a lingering groin injury that kept him out of the playoff game last season and then injured his calf last week, which is what ultimately landed him on IR (presumably, the team didn’t specify).

Vaughters comes up in his place, having played in the last two games and registering one tackle. He filled in a little last week for Danny Trevathan, getting in on 16 percent of the defensive snaps. He’s played nearly a third of the special teams snaps though the past two games.

Is this the end of the road for Burton? Probably, according to Spotrac he can be cut with just $7.5 million in dead money in the offseason.

Either way, the Bears definitely need to overhaul the TE room and with seven games left, we’ll get some looks at J.P. Holtz and Bradley Sowell, as well as RB Ryan Nall perhaps, starting tomorrow.

The last word on it, is that it’s slightly curious that with Adam Shaheen already ruled out, it’s interesting that the choice was made for Vaughters over another practice squad TE like Jesper Horsted or Dax Raymond.