The injury

On Khalil Mack’s 58th day as a Bear he went for a jog near Lake Michigan. Inside Soldier Field actually. A hundred yards south, a hundred yards back north. Goal line to goal line and that was it.

For the first time in Mack’s five NFL seasons he was going to be inactive, left with an awkward Sunday morning. Mack had sprained his right ankle two weeks earlier in the Bears’ overtime loss to the Dolphins and struggled to make much impact the rest of the day.

The next week against the Patriots, with the ankle still swollen, Mack made one tackle and never touched Tom Brady in a 38-31 loss.

Opting to take a cautious approach, the Bears shut him down temporarily. There was no point forcing the issue.

“I said, ‘Listen, dude. This is a decision that has been well-thought-out,’ ” Nagy said. “‘We appreciate your desire and your want and all that. But this is what we’re doing.’

“He’s a competitor. So there was a little pushback. But Khalil is a big-time investment now. We had to be able to step back out of the trees and ask, what’s the best for him? What’s the best for us?”

In the lead up to kickoff against the Jets in Week 8, Mack found acceptance as best he could. When he finished his casual jog, he found offensive lineman Bradley Sowell and asked to play catch.

“You could tell he was antsy,” Sowell said. “Khalil’s one of those dudes you have to keep from himself. He’s a guy who has that feeling of being invincible.”

Mack was restless that afternoon in a 24-10 Bears win and again the next week at Buffalo when he was confined to the sideline for a 41-9 victory.

That damn ankle. Ineffective for two games, inactive for the next two. That surge of September momentum had been slowed. Mack had to convince himself this was all for the best. Better for the team, he said. “So I bit my tongue and sat back and listened.”

And during warmups before the Jets game, Mack used Sowell to help release some of his pent-up energy.

Through much of this season, Sowell and Mack have developed an unexpected but significant bond playing catch. Friday mornings, before the week’s last practice begins, both big men scratch their quarterback-receiver itches.

Mack, Sowell says, could probably be effective at either position.