The UFL has become a league where players can keep their pro football dreams alive, and NFL teams take notice when they look to tweak rosters heading toward training camp. In the days after the league's 2026 season ended, the Chicago Bears signed two UFL players; linebacker Tony Fields II and wide receiver Kaden Davis.
Fields was the second-leading tackler in the UFL this season, with 77 total stops suiting up for the Columbus Aviators. He also has noticeable NFL experience, with 45 games for the Cleveland Browns over four seasons (2021-24). With the Aviators not in the UFL playoffs, and D'Marco Jackson added to T.J. Edwards as an injury concern at linebacker, the Bears had him in for a workout the week before signing him.
Davis spent some time with the Detroit Lions in 2024 when Bears' head coach Ben Johnson was there. He was a preseason standout that year, but a deep wide receiver corps proved impossible to crack, and he ultimately landed with the Cleveland Browns.
UFL star given pretty darn good chance to make the Bears' 53-man roster
Mike Kadlick of SI.com has taken a look at each UFL player NFL teams have signed, with a percentage chance each will make the 53-man roster of the team that signed them. Fields and Davis are of course on the list, with Fields tying for the second-best chance to make a roster.
"Given the uneasy state of Chicago’s linebacker room—T.J. Edwards’s season-ending fibula injury in 2025, D’Marco Jackson getting hurt at OTAs and the volatile nature of Devin Bush’s play—Fields should have as good of a chance as anyone to compete for a roster spot throughout training camp."
"Chance to make 53-man roster: 45%"
Kadlick gave Davis a 15 percent chance to make the Bears' 53-man roster. Special teams encompasses the entire possibility there, after he had just four catches for the Houston Gamblers. That said, a 27.5-yard return average and four tackles on kick coverage in the spring league this season make him an interesting multi-special teams phase possibility to swoop in and earn a roster spot.
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Being given a one-in-two chance to make the Bears' 53-man roster, without participating in the offseason program, is a pretty good sign for Fields' actual chances to make the cut come late August. And if he doesn't make the initial 53, a spot on the practice squad seems reserved for him as long as another team doesn't claim him amid league-wide roster cuts.
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