How Charles Leno became the only Bears player to take every snap

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Charles Leno has played every snap this year. (AP)

Twice a week, Charles Leno drives to Highland Park to freeze his body into survival mode.

The Bears’ left tackle steps into a cryotherapy cylinder, where, for two minutes, his body — below the neck — is blasted by temperatures hovering around -240 degrees.

His cryotherapy center — and others around the country — claims his blood vessels constrict, forcing blood toward the core, where the body naturally removes toxins and sends blood back out to affected areas.

His recovery from the rigors of an NFL season, then, is hastened.

“Within five minutes you can feel it,” he said. “It’s a refreshing feeling. Major aches and pains don’t go away right then and there, but the minor ones, they start to slowly go away.”

Thus far, it’s worked: the left tackle is the only Bears player to play every snap of their dreadful season. Only rookie center Cody Whitehair, who missed two snaps against the 49ers with an ankle injury, comes close. Entering Sunday’s season finale in Minneapolis, no other Bears player has even topped 90 percent.

Bears coach John Fox and his staffers like to say that the best ability is availability. It’s fair to question the former in Leno — he’s had an up-and-down season — but not the latter.

Leno began a regular cryotherapy routine this year, and gets chiropractic work and massages done at Halas Hall. He doesn’t give the deep freeze sole credit for his durability; rather, it’s a symbol of the effort he’s put in to try to remain available.

“I take pride in it,” he said. “Also, it is luck — anything can happen on any given play. But I work hard outside the football field to take care of my body so I can be out there.”

Leno credits former Bears Jermon Bushrod, Matt Forte and Matt Slauson for showing him the way a professional should prepare.

“Everything,” he said, “is learned.”

The rest of the offensive line room, minus Whitehair, looks at Leno’s snap count with envy. Center Hroniss Grasu tore his right ACL during “Family Fest,” while hyper guard Kyle Long, who had right ankle surgery in November and will repair his labrum in February, has already started nagging his position coach about next year’s plans.

“Players bitch when they gotta practice everyday,” offensive line coach Dave Magazu said, “but I think it’s worse when they can’t.”

When Leno has played, he’s been inconsistent.

Offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains said this week he was “ascending,” but needed to work on pass-protection fundamentals in the offseason. He must better anchor his outside foot, Magazu said, and maybe gain a few pounds.

Leno struggled against the Redskins, allowing outside linebacker Preston Smith to record  the team’s only sack and had two pressures.

“It’s like anything else,” Magazu said. “You can be right 100 times but if you give up a sack, you’re a goat.”

Despite Leno’s struggles in his first year at left tackle in 2015 — Magazu joked in training camp that his son swore every so-called expert hated Leno — the Bears didn’t sign anyone last offseason to challenge him.

It’s hard to see them taking the same tack this offseason. The Bears need someone to push both Leno and right tackle Bobby Massie, and, at worst, play swing tackle.

Left guard Josh Sitton, who has missed four starts with an ankle injury, has been impressed by Leno’s intelligence.

“When things are happening fast,” he said, “he’s able to kinda spit those calls out and relay them to me quickly.”

In a room full of “colorful gentlemen,” Magazu said, Leno won’t scream over anyone. But his leadership comes from his willingness to work, after good games and bad.

And his ability to take every snap — though Magazu superstitiously knocks on a wooden table when he says it.

“Constantly taking care of your body,” Leno said. “This is why I go out there and work.”

Snap count leaders

A look at the five Bears who have played the highest percentage of snaps this season:

LT Charles Leno 100 percent

C Cody Whitehair 99.79

RT Bobby Massie 89.89

CB Tracy Porter 88.34

DE Akiem Hicks 86.66

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