Bears not getting far in Benson negotiations

By John Onan  |   Wednesday, July 27, 2005  |  Comments( 0 )

Chicago Bears
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According to General Manager Jerry Angelo, contract talks with 1st round pick and former Texas Longhorns star running back Cedric Benson haven't gone very well. As a matter of fact, the two sides haven't spoken since the beginning of training camp on Monday.

''We're certainly on top of this,'' Angelo said. ''We're very motivated to get him into camp. We made a very, very strong offer - something we felt should have gotten it done. Obviously, they didn't think that. We have to respect their side, obviously. We'll just wait and see what the next step is.''

San Francisco's signing of the top overall selection has set off a pretty decent run of other 1st round selections coming to terms with their respective teams, but not in this case. The Chicago Bears first preseason game is August 8th versus the Miami Dolphins in the annual Hall of Fame Game; their regular season begins September 11th at the Washington Redskins. So there is plenty of time to get negotiations headed in the right direction, but the Bears are obviously discouraged by Benson's holdout.

The Bears had hoped to get a deal done sometime this week for Benson, the forth overall pick in the 2005 NFL Draft, who amassed over 3,700 rushing yards in his college career and has been compared favorably to another former Texas Longhorn great, Ricky Williams. With each day that passes without Benson in camp it looks more likely that incumbent Bears starting running back Thomas Jones will be #1 on the depth chart when the regular season begins.
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