Bears tackle Ozzy Trapilo reveals his secret to flipping sides

"After practice, even though I was the right tackle, the last two years in college, working left, making sure that it's still smooth. Still feels good, especially after the season. I was working more left than right just catching up for lost time. It felt good today.”

In a sense, he never gave up the left side by continuing to practice his footwork, hand technique and left-side alignment after practics. And now he feels he can step in and compete quickly there when his camp competition could be veteran starter Braxton Jones.

"I've touched on this before, but in a way, if you're more used to playing right tackle at live speed, and you're still consistent with left, you feel good at left.

"It's almost easier when you're learning new technique because you don't just get into that flow state, your habits are all coming back. You're hyper focused on every movement because it's not as natural. It feels smoother. It feels easier to adapt to this new coaching style, new techniques and all the above.”

The switch occurred in college because they had Lions right guard Christian Mahogany coming back and BC wanted to pair the two NFL-bound linemen together to have a side they could always run to if they needed it.

“There was a lot more that went into it, but that was sort of the basis," Trapilo said.

It's uncertain at this point whether he'd really need to switch. If Braxton Jones returns from his broken lower leg bone, as expected, it could be a situation where Trapilo can work in slowly rather than quickly.

"Definitely wouldn't be the end of the world," he said. "My goal here is to play football, to get on the field as soon as I can. I'm going to do whatever I can to get that done.

"At the same time, I know I have a lot to work on as a player. I'm a rookie. I'm not going to show up and be the best. My goal is to become the best player I can, but I know I'm not just going to do it without work. It takes a lot of work; it takes a lot of time. My job is not to be results driven, it's to be process driven.”

Coach Ben Jonson could shed no real light on the future after one practice. After all, there's another offensive lineman in the mix who still will be heard from at training camp and in OTAs—Kiran Amegadjie. But Johnson does appreciate what he, offensive coordinator Declan Doyle and line coach Dan Roushar have to work with in Trapilo.

“It is still early to make too many assessments on that but he's exactly what we thought he was going to be," Johnson said. "He's super smart. I had a meeting last night with him, meeting this morning with him.

"He's able to apply those concepts right to the field immediately. He's very advanced in that regard. Technique, fundamentals, he takes those seriously. Something we talked about this morning as a team, just transferring the little things that coach Roushar, (assistant offensive line) coach (Kyle) DeVan are talking about in that meeting room and being able to apply them immediately. It's really impressive for a young guy.”

Now it's Trapilo's task to keep impressing, whether he's on the left side or right side.