ORLANDO — For all the excitement around Chicago about what Allen Robinson and Taylor Gabriel can do in Matt Nagy’s offense, there’s still a former top-10 pick in the Bears’ wide receiver room. And while Kevin White hasn’t lived up to those expectations in three injury-plagued seasons in the NFL, Nagy is excited to see what he has in the 6-foot-3, 210 pound receiver.

Nagy, when asked what he knows about White on Tuesday at the NFL annual meetings in Orlando, offered a passionate response.

“Well, I know that this is a kid, just from the outside, this is a kid that had a lot of expectations put on him by being a first-round draft pick,” Nagy said. “To anybody out there and to himself, has he lived up to what the first-round draft pick is supposed (to be)? No, he hasn’t. But that’s okay, though. He’s young.

“For me, I really, truly mean this when I say it: I am really excited to dig deep into him and put him in the best situation possible for Kevin White to succeed.”

White has only appeared in five games with the Bears, and hasn’t been particularly effective in those, catching 21 of 40 targets for 193 yards. Before he broke his scapula in Week 1 of the 2017 season, White didn’t have many standout days in training camp, and only had four catches for 32 yards in three preseason games.

Nagy said he hasn’t watched White’s practice tape from last year, but that hasn’t tempered his excitement about the role he can play.

“He’s a guy that can take the top (off the defense),” Nagy said. “He’s a big guy. That’s why he was drafted in the first round. He’s a big guy that has speed. For him right now, it’s just going to be a confidence thing, being able to get his confidence back. If we can figure out a way to get his confidence back, he has all the physical tools and again you hire people to be able to be teachers and to be able to help guys excel.

“Mike Furrey, our wide receiver coach, played the position. Mike is a very positive guy. He’s gonna be able to — well I know this, he is going to give everything he can to make guys like Kevin White better. I am really, really intrigued to see how that process goes.”



A year ago at this time, Kyle Fuller was coming off missing the entire 2016 season and was viewed as a first-round bust who may not have a role on the 2018 team. The Bears signed two players to his position — Prince Amukamara and Marcus Cooper — and, at best, he was destined for a bench role; at worst, he wouldn’t make it through training camp with the Bears.

But something clicked for Fuller last year, and he parlayed a strong training camp into a better regular season, and then that four-year, $56 million offer sheet from the Green Bay Packers that the Bears matched earlier this month.

Nagy is hopeful White can follow a similar path in 2018.

“Here is a guy we have on our roster that, to a lot of people, can get lost in the shuffle or just pushed to the side,” Nagy said. “That’s not going to happen. We’re going to give him every opportunity to succeed. You see a kid that is working hard during the offseason. You hear it from different people.

“You just know that those are the feel good stories. How cool would that be to be able to get this kid to come back and be a dominant player, right? You think he doesn’t want that? No, of course he wants that.

"Let’s as coaches, let’s look at the glass half full and let’s get this kid right. Now, am I making any promises? Absolutely not. But I will tell you this, we’re going to give that kid every opportunity possible.”