Here’s whom the Bears will lean on if star Akiem Hicks can’t go Sunday

Akiem Hicks smiled last week, unable to contain his pride in fellow Bears defensive lineman Nick Williams. Williams is such a hard worker, Hicks joked, that the Bears put his locker next to Hicks’ to keep him inspired.

‘‘That’s my guy; I got a soft spot,’’ Hicks said then. ‘‘You have teammates, you have friends and then you have lifelong friends. Nick is one of those guys, just because he has this positive energy that just never stops.’’

Even though Williams played in only two games last season, Hicks said adding him before the 2018 season was a ‘‘big step in how we’ve developed.’’

Hicks’ words will be tested if he spends Sunday on the sideline. He didn’t practice Thursday because of an injured right knee, and coach Matt Nagy said his participation against the Vikings is ‘‘probably going to end up being a game-time decision.’’

If Hicks doesn’t play, the Bears will lean on two players, Abdullah Anderson and Williams, who took less-traveled paths to the team. They already have Roy Robertson-Harris starting for Bilal Nichols, who remains out after breaking his right hand against the Broncos.

Williams, who will turn 30 in February, entered the NFL as a seventh-round pick from Samford. After playing for the Steelers’ practice squad and in games for the Chiefs and Dolphins, Williams couldn’t land a job in 2017. He spent the season out of football, training at Godspeed Elite Sports Training Academy in Hoover, Alabama.

He had two workouts — with the Bears and Falcons — but neither led to a job offer. He considered beginning a career in real-estate investment.

‘‘I had those workouts, so I knew there was some interest,’’ said Williams, who is 6-4 and 308 pounds. ‘‘I just had to stay in shape. I started looking around. You always know football is not going to last forever.’’

The Bears invited him to a tryout camp in April 2018 and signed him to their 90-man roster afterward. He spent most of last season on the 53-man roster.

Williams, whom Nagy knew from their days together with the Chiefs, said landing a job required a combination of factors, from fit to opportunity to luck. He seems to have found it. He has played 80 snaps this season — almost double his 2018 total — and has a sack in each of his two games.

‘‘This NFL is a crazy business,’’ he said.

Anderson, an undrafted player from Bucknell, made his NFL debut Monday against the Redskins hours after he was added to the active roster. He spent his rookie season on the practice squad in 2018.

‘‘When you’re undrafted, you’re ‘not supposed to be here,’ ’’ said Anderson, who is 6-3 and 297 pounds. ‘‘I worked hard to get what I think I deserve.’’

Against the Redskins, that was 28 snaps. He said the first few felt odd before he settled down.

Anderson called Hicks ‘‘the most unique player, I think, in the league.’’ Robertson-Harris said he was a ‘‘bully on the field.’’

‘‘There’s no way we can replace Akiem,’’ Williams said. ‘‘The guys that have to play in his place, we have to do a great job with our technique and really bring the energy. Akiem is a bear out there.

‘‘I hate that we’re kind of banged up on the D-line. But we’re going to go out there and do what we do every week and prepare the right way and put our best product on the field. . . .

‘‘We don’t want it to be a big drop-off.’’