Elijah Hicks

Hicks knows how to stay valuable when the defensive snaps are scarce. He is a reliable coverage-unit player with enough safety experience to steady the secondary if called on.

Strengths: Special-teams production, experience, tackling and familiarity with Chicago.

Weaknesses: New additions reduce his defensive runway, and he has limited recent starting volume.

Hicks is the kind of player every good roster keeps finding uses for. He has started games at safety, made tackles and recoveries, and his 31 special-teams tackles tell you he will not disappear when the defense is healthy. Chicago bringing him back and then activating him from PUP makes sense. A six is right: he is reliable depth who can handle a spot start, even if he is not the player you design the back end around.

Strengths: He is physical, assignment-aware and a real special-teams contributor. Hicks has enough safety experience to communicate in the back end and has shown a useful instinct for loose balls and turnover chances.

Weaknesses: His range and coverage ceiling are more functional than exceptional. He has limited sustained defensive production, so the best role is a managed reserve workload with core teams rather than an every-down centerpiece.