Another veteran Bears defender will be moved off the roster this year. The team is releasing Mario Edwards, according to NFL.com’s Tom Pelissero (on Twitter).

The former Raiders second-round pick had settled into a rotational role with the Bears over the past two seasons, but he joins most of Chicago’s front-seven vets of recent years in being jettisoned by a new-look Bears front office.

Khalil Mack (trade), Akiem Hicks (free agency), Eddie Goldman (released, later retired), Danny Trevathan (released) and Bilal Nichols (free agency) have departed from the Bears’ front seven this offseason. Although Roquan Smith is back at practice and tied to a fifth-year option salary, he is not exactly on good terms with the team.

As for Edwards, he re-signed with the then-Ryan Pace-overseen Bears in 2021. After adding Edwards initially in 2020, the Bears gave him a three-year, $11.55MM second contract. The deal included void years, which will not leave much in the way of cap savings associated with Tuesday’s release. As a vested veteran, Edwards will pass straight to free agency.

Edwards, 28, recorded six sacks during his two-year Bears tenure. The Florida State alum logged 26% and 27% defensive snap rates during that time. He missed time during training camp due to injury this year, however.

The Bears will re-sign defensive lineman Mario Edwards, as Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk was first to report. Adam Schefter of ESPN.com added that it will be a three-year contract for the 2015 second-rounder, with Ian Rapoport of NFL.com reporting that the deal is worth $11.55MM (Twitter links). Aaron Wilson of the Houston Chronicle tweets that the deal includes $5.5MM in guaranteed money.

It’s unclear how much of that is guaranteed, but it represents a nice payday for Edwards, who bounced around the league for a couple of years before finding some stability in Chicago in 2020. Though he played in just under a quarter of the Bears’ defensive snaps last season, he managed a career-best four sacks and graded out as the third-best interior defender in the league, per Pro Football Focus’ advanced metrics.

The limited snap count and the inherent uncertainty in PFF’s metrics suggest that Edwards’ stellar overall grade of 90.1 might skew a little high, but the Bears clearly feel confident that he can continue to be a productive rotational piece if nothing else. That is despite the fact that Edwards will be suspended for the first two games of the 2021 season due to a PED violation.

The deal comes one day after the Bears finalized a series of restructures to get under the 2021 salary cap of $182.5MM.

Mario Edwards will be looking for a new home this spring, but the veteran defensive lineman won’t be able to suit up for the beginning of 2021. Edwards has been suspended for the first two games of next season, a source told Field Yates of ESPN.com (Twitter link).

It’s for a PED violation. It certainly won’t help Edwards, who’s set to be a free agent, find a decent contract. He played a good amount for the Bears this season, notching around 25 percent of the defensive snaps in a rotational role across 15 games. He finished the year with 17 tackles, six for a loss, and four sacks to go with one pass defended.

The Florida State product was drafted 35th overall by the Raiders in 2015, but never lived up to his draft status. He didn’t standout as a rookie, then missed almost the entire 2016 season due to injury. He started 14 games for the Raiders in 2017, but was waived before the 2018 campaign.

After spending one year with the Giants, he signed a two-year, $5MM deal with the Saints in March of 2019, and had three sacks with them in a similar rotational role. Cut back in September, he was picked up just a few days later by Chicago. Still only 26 (for another week), he should get picked up by somebody this offseason despite the looming suspension.

It didn’t take long for Mario Edwards to find a new home. One day after being released by the Saints, the veteran defensive end has agreed to sign with the Bears, as Mike Garafolo of the NFL Network reports (via Twitter).

New Orleans was reportedly interested in re-signing Edwards to its practice squad, but the Bears were quick to pounce in an effort to bolster their defensive line depth. Though Chicago’s LB corps looks pretty stout, the club is a bit thin along the D-line in the wake of Eddie Goldman‘s decision to opt out of the 2020 season.

Edwards is not a replacement for Goldman, a nose tackle, but he will provide a more experienced DE to bookend with Akiem Hicks. He will likely push 2018 fifth-rounder Bilal Nichols for playing time.

Now 26, Edwards has never lived up to his status as a second-round draft choice. The Raiders selected the Florida State product in the 2015 draft, but he was waived after three seasons with Oakland. The Giants claimed him off waivers, and he parlayed his one year with Big Blue into a two-year, $5MM pact with the Saints last offseason. New Orleans liked him enough to keep him on this year’s practice squad but did not consider him good enough to be a part of its deep D-line rotation.

The Bears, however, don’t have as much depth, so they will give Edwards a spot on the 53-man roster.