Football

Long Journey To The Middle – Bears Positional Report Card: I’m Offended By The Bears Offensive Line

By Brian Schmitz 1397 0

There is no other position on the football field that is judged more by the eye test and the offensive line. The QB was sacked from the left? Blame the left tackle. The inside run was stuffed out? Blame the guards. The center got called for holding? He sucks, bring in a new center. It’s a meathead’s paradise and we are all guilty of doing it.

Thankfully, offensive line statistics are available and provide us with actual proof that our eyes are not entirely tricking us into thinking someone sucks – they often do.

It’s not a surprise that the 2019 Chicago Bears O-Line was bad. Both visually to any fan of the team, and through the following stats that up the garbage up front.

Overall

  • Average Yards Per Rush = 3.7 yards (Ranked 28th of 32 Teams)
  • Rushing Touchdowns = 8 (28th of 32)
  • Sacks Against = 45 (12th most in the league)
  • QB Hits Against = 86 (18th most)

When Rushing To The Left Side

  • 1st Downs = 40 (8th of 32)
  • Negative Rushes = 13 (18th most)
  • 10+ Yards Rushes = 17 (18th most)
  • Power Rushes (Percentage of rushes on 3rd or 4th down with two or fewer yards to go that achieved a first down or TD. Also includes rushes on 1st-and-goal and 2nd-and-goal from the opponent’s 2-yard line or closer.) = 38 (Ranked last in the league)

When Rushing Up The Middle

  • 1st Downs = 16 (30th of 32)
  • Negative Rushes = 4 (29th most)
  • 10+ Yards Rushes = 5 (31st most)
  • Power Rushes =27 (Ranked last in the league)

When Rushing To The Right Side

  • 1st Downs = 29 (22nd of 32)
  • Negative Rushes = 13 (17th most)
  • 10+ Yards Rushes = 6 (Last)
  • Power Rushes =82 (6th most)

In taking a macro look into these numbers, you can see the 2019 Bears O-Line had the most trouble getting production from the center and both guard positions. James Daniels, Cody Whitehair, and Rashaad Coward are responsible for most of the damage, with Kyle Long and Ted Larsen also taking a portion of the blame.

James Daniels was a 2nd round pick from Iowa. This season was his 2nd with the Bears and I’m pretty sure this is yet another early pick by Ryan Pace that has yet to live up to the expectations set by being the 39th pick in the draft. Everyone likes to say that these young guys need experience, and that is true sometimes, but you expect a 2nd round pick to come in, play immediately, and improve dramatically in his second season. I am not sure we saw that improvement from Daniels.

Cody Whitehair is fine. He is Bears good, which makes him just OK on most other teams. His ability to play both guard positions is valuable as is his durability since 2016. Unbelievably, Whitehair had played in 99% of the team’s offensive snaps since becoming a Bear. Whitehair is a reliable guy who you can build an O-Line off of. Aside from Eddie Jackson, Whitehair has been the best Bears draft pick during the Pace regime.

If the Bears want improved play from the front-five, then Rashaad Coward is a guy who has to go. When you have a QB who needs time to get through his progressions, Coward is the last person you want protecting him. At best, he is a journeyman lineman who would be best serving as a 7th lineman that can play guard or tackle.

A year ago, Charles Leno was coming off a season in which he played in 99% of the team’s offensive snaps and did not commit single penalty. Fast forward a year later and Leno, who played the same amount of snaps as last year, committed 12 penalties. 12. With one more year remaining on a $38M contract, 2020 is a huge season for Leno, but only if he will be back with the club.

After a career in which he has played in every game from 2014-2018, Bobby Massie has gotten old quickly. Massie played his 7th season in 2019 and managed 10 starts. I believe Massie will be back against next, but this is due more to his pass protection than his run blocking. The tackle was called for only two penalties in 2019, which, as you know, was 10 fewer than his bookend tackle Charles Leno.

Offensive Line 2019 Grade: D

Football

Long Journey to the Middle – Bears Positional Report Cards: Pass Catchers – Now Hiring, TE(s), WR3

By Wes French 1177 0

2019 is going to be the type of football year that you just want to throw in the trash, hoping that things get sorted out in a positive manner and you can mostly forget the things that transpired on the field. That’s essentially the case for the Bears pass catchers save for what passes as the brightest spot from the team, but also includes arguably the darkest, deepest hole (outside of QB…) and Ryan Pace’s second biggest miss of the 2017 draft.

On one hand, you have Allen Robinson being the monster wide out everyone wanted when he signed in the 2018 off-season and the emergence of second-year receiver Anthony Miller into a legit threat on any play. On the other, you have an underwhelming group of wide outs behind them, a one-dimensional backfield passing attack and a tight end room that’s stinkier than David Kaplan’s nose (because it’s firmly planted somewhere inside Tom Ricketts colon, GET IT??).  The team ranked in the lower third in just about all receiving categories, and if you read the rushing post from yesterday and quarterbacks on Monday you don’t have to squint to pick up on the theme of the 2019 Chicago offense. It sucked.

The highs were the type that felt squandered, the lows all disasters that played a part in the unacceptable offensive output – to varying degrees.

Let’s dive in, shall we?

The Good

Allen Robinson. That’s essentially your list. Robinson was the steady, go-to security blanket all season and pulled in 98 of 154 (!!) targets for just under 1,150 yards and seven scores, roughly one third of the entire receiving production on the team. He’s been everything the team needed and wanted when they gambled and signed the oft-injured Robinson two years ago, and Pace would do well to rip up the final year of his contract because 1) He’s more than earned new paper/$, 2) a new deal would actually improve the Bears cap situation for 2020 and beyond (ARob counts $15M against the cap with just $10.5 in actual dollars in 2020) and 3) who in the fuck else are you trusting on this roster going forward, especially after 2020?

Anthony Miller shone at times this season, especially standing out on Thanksgiving in Detroit with a 9/140 line. While he came up big during the min- revival stretch later in the season, he was inconsistent on the whole. But you if you want to argue that was more product of his environment in this slap dick offense you’d get no more than a “fair” from me. Miller is still an injury case, however, as he’ll rehab this spring from the exact same shoulder surgery that ended his 2018-19 campaign. Still, he lands in the positives and the Bears will need him back and building on his success in 2020.

The Bad

The rest of the wide out group left a whole lot to be desired. Taylor Gabriel was the benefactor of three TD catches in a half against the atrocious R-words in Week 3, but again suffered from concussion issues and only played parts of nine games. Rookie 4th round pick Riley Ridley hardly saw the field, working through a litany of nagging foot and leg injuries before totaling a whopping six catches over the final three contests. Javon Wims filled in admirably, again, but when he’s consistently on the field you’re probably in some trouble with your personnel; he’s best suited for ST duty in the opinion of yours truly.

Tarik Cohen was the only real contributor out of the backfield, and while he was used quite a bit (79 catches, 104 targets) all but 19 of his 456 yards were via YAC, meaning he was hardly targeted past the line of scrimmage all year. That’s your #2 in targets, averaging 5.8 yards/catch, often being targeted BEHIND the line of scrimmage. Fun!

The Ugly

The tight end group may have been the worst ever in Chicago Bears history, at least in terms of the modern game. No individual player went over 91 yards FOR THE SEASON, and the two leaders at 91/87 were preseason practice squad players JP Holtz and Jesper Horsted. Big money man Trey Burton got hurt in August, never really got to full health, and submitted to injury in November, landing on IR with all of 24 catches for 84 yards. Pace’s pet Adam Shaheen continued to impress no one but his boss, again dealing with a myriad of injuries and totaling 9/74 line. He now boasts 26 catches in 27 career games since being drafted in the 2nd round of 2017. Blocking TE Ben Braunecker was used in the passing game. Bradley Sowell was active at the position for a few games; that should tell you all you need to know about this shit ass group.

The RBs outside of Cohen weren’t as bad as the TEs, but that group was paced by David Montgomery‘s 25/185/1 line, a bit underwhelming after all the buzz about him “doing it all well” after the draft. FA Mike Davis caught all seven of his targets before he was cut, and the coaching staff failed to get $5M man Cordarrelle Patterson involved in any meaningful way.

Any Hope?

No? Not really? Robinson should get a new deal, possibly very soon, but after that it’s a big ol’ shit sandwich. Miller has the injury history, Gabriel might need to retire (but at least they can save $4.5M in cutting him) and Ridley looks to have a long way to go. This group lacks speed…so maybe just try Patterson out there instead of running him on 3rd and short?? Whoever gets hired to help run the offense would do well to get Cohen involved more down the field and in the slot, potentially, along with Patterson. The speed exists on the team, just not sure these dummies can harness it properly. Maybe some further passing work for Montgomery to keep teams guessing too.

The TE room is all signed for next year, and Burton somehow has so much guaranteed money that they can’t just cut him. The depth pieces are all okay, but this group screams for improvement. Can they sign Austin Hooper if he hits FA? Pace will need to get creative to clear enough space for such a move.

Pace and Co. have quite the overhaul on their hands this off-season.

Final Grade: C-

Football

Long Journey to the Middle – Bears Positional Report Cards: Running Backs – Running in Place

By Wes French 1107 0

Jordan Howard was sent packing. Tarik Cohen, gem of the 2018 draft, planted his flag as the next Darren Sproles-esque gadget back. Ryan Pace maneuvered ahead of his counterparts in the middle rounds to select David Montgomery, the quiet, no-nonsense, blue collar worker back that was going to excel immediately in the system. Pace also signed veteran Mike Davis on the cheap, seemingly because of fit and personnel package and depth. Then came Cordarrelle Patterson, the do everything secret weapon.

2019 was supposed to be the season the Bears rushing attacked returned to great heights, the season the team got back to its Chicago football reputation of pounding the ball on the ground and using that rushing attack to unleash Matt Nagy’s offense.

2019 did not go to plan.

The Good

Umm…right. Well, there was that one game that Mitch did his best LEEEEEROOOOOY JEEENNNNKKIIIIINSSSS and thrashed the Cowboys for 64 yards. That is to be considered good, I think. But, uh, he’s not a running back.

Montgomery did have his moments, rushing for 889 yards on 242 carries for the season which was highlighted by a 135-yard, 1-TD effort (and 5.0 yard per carry average!) in the heart breaking loss to the Chargers at home. Monty also hit the century mark in the season finale, totaling 113 yards and a TD (albeit against a lot of backups).

Cohen chipped in much more via the passing game, helping the offense where he could with 79 catches on 104 targets for 456 yards, good for 2nd, 2nd and 3rd on the team respectively…which will be an indictment when we get to pass catchers tomorrow but we’ll count it as “good” today.

The Bad..and Ugly

Strap in, dear reader.

To call the rushing game “bad” is a bit of an understatement. The coaching staff/Nagy told us they had their pieces, they were going to fix the underwhelming rush attack from 2018 (buoyed by QB  Mitchell Trubisky‘s 421 yards). We’ve already been over the additions to overhaul the group, which saw only Cohen return from 2018. The results were an unmitigated disaster, as the team rushed for under 1,500 yards as a group, averaging 91.1 yards/game. Chicago had a 3.7 per carry average. The Bears scored all of eight rushing touchdowns on the year. EIGHT! Per AP Style standards I can’t even use numerals for that low of a total.

These totals put them in the bottom of the league for rushing all around, 26th or worse in every category I just listed. You watched it. You probably assumed as much, but hot damn that’s fucking terrible. This team regressed by over 500 yards overall, 30 yards a game, and scored HALF as many rushing touchdowns.

So what happened?

Well, the offensive line was not what was expected and not even really close. The play calling was all over the map as well, seeing the Bears call all of FIVE run plays in the gut punch Week 1 loss to Green Bay..at home…by one score. FIVE RUN PLAYS. This would be a tough theme, as Nagy would get far too pass-happy or lean on the pass in games like the stinker against New Orleans where he abandoned it all together. The Bears ran the ball 395 times in 2019, sticking them in the lower third yet again, while it’s also worth pointing out that no other team rushed as much as they did for fewer yards. The Pittsburg Steelers were very similar, but the totals of the other teams near them in attempts are all 300-500 yards (NOT feral hogs, unfortunately) MORE than Chicago.

Montgomery was fed a decent amount with his 242 carries for a rookie season, but beyond that the division of work is alarming. Cohen only had 64 rushing attempts all season, with the damn QB coming in 3rd as Mitch saw 48 (and most of those were in the latter half of the season as things spiraled to hell). Free Agent additions Patterson and Davis saw a COMBINED 28 carries. Patterson seemed to be the choice short yardage back early on, which was curious at best but really it was fucking batshit insane. Nagy lost his damn mind. Poor Mike Davis never got a shot, and the team mercilessly cut in early November so that Pace could at least recoup a compensatory draft pick.

Not great!

 Any Hope?

I don’t know, man. The Bears have a lot to fix on offense, and the goal should be to get more out of the run game first and foremost. I know everyone wants Trubisky to be a star, but he needs help to even get to an even baseline. The offensive line and play calling must be better, and this team needs a third actual running back that can pick up short yards and block. They have their lead man and pass catcher and their gadget man, as Montgomery, Cohen and Patterson should all be back. They just need to figure out how to use them all properly, which I’m not so sure this regime is capable of. I’d expect them to skip RB completely in the draft and find their fourth back on the market this March. Or maybe they can just use a defensive tackle for the dirty work. Just do better.

Final Grade: D+

Football

Long Journey To The Middle – Bears Positional Report Cards: Quarterback – If You Don’t Have Anything Nice To Say, Say Something Anyway

By Brian Schmitz 1132 0

Let’s get this out the way immediately – if Ryan Pace didn’t draft Mitch Trubisky, then Trubisky wouldn’t be the Bears starter, he probably wouldn’t even be on the team. But he did, so he is; and we are going to have to learn to deal with it.

Not a single player on the 2019 Bears took a more precipitous fall from grace that the Bears #10. It was, in a word, bad. Just plain bad. Inconsistency was the only constant you got from Trubisky week in and week out.

But why? And how?

Well, you can blame the head coach, who is calling plays as a generality, and not really tailored to a specific player or offense. You can also blame an inept O-Line, who were inexperienced and couldn’t protect a QB who was desperate to check down every time he felt some pressure. You can blame a running game, which was non-existent much of the year, and let defenses tee-off on a sub-standard passing game. But at the end of day, the lack of success at the quarterback position must be the responsibility of the player himself.

So, let’s unpack Mitch Trubisky’s 2019 season according to the numbers:

The Good:
Trubisky continued to do a great job of protecting the ball this season, finishing with 10 interceptions against 17 touchdowns. These are numbers that reflect more of a game manger than a gunslinger, but with the dominance of the Bears defense, this is not a team that needs a guy who is going to throw for 5,000 yards. In addition to throwing only 10 INTs, Trubisky only fumbled three times. Ball security in the NFL cannot be understated, and this is something a struggling QB and a struggling offense can continue to build on heading into next season.

The Bad:
For a guy who operates on check-down first philosophy, Mitch Trubisky finished 18th in the league with a 63.2% completion percentage. This must improve, especially given his yards per completion rank 32nd league wide.

The Ugly:
Perhaps the most unsettling aspect of Trubisky’s 2019 season was the regression we saw, both statistically and with a simple eye test. In 2018, Trubisky had:
• A higher completion percentage (66.6% vs. 63.2)
• More passing yards (3,223 vs. 3,138) in less games
• A higher yards per completion (7.4 vs. 6.1)
• More TD passes (24 vs. 17)
• Less sacks taken (24 vs. 38)
• A higher passer rating (95.4 vs. 83)

This is not at all what you want or expect from a guy who had other year of experience in the same system in addition to an improved receiving corp.

How bad was it this season?

When you look at the four most important QB categories (Yards, TD’s, INT’s, QBR), the highest Mitch Trubisky ranked in any single category is 18th. In the three other categories, he ranks in the bottom five in two, and the bottom 10 in one. This is what you expect from a guy who was searching for some semblance of confidence all season. Mitch developed a check-down to touchdown mentality, whereas this has become a touchdown to check-down league. Above all, this is why this team and this QB struggled this season. A positive to take from this is that this mentality can be corrected and changed, often very quickly.

Final Grade = C-

If I was to grade Mitch Trubisky on his play alone, it would have been worse. But you cannot evaluate his season without considering an offensive coordinator who did him zero favors and a general manager who didn’t have the greatest supporting cast in place.
I expect a huge bounce-back year from #10 in 2020, because I expect him and everyone around him to be better. Doesn’t that sound horribly familiar?

Football

Bears Safety Net – Eddie gets Paid

By Wes French 1579 0

Well, no one can say Ryan Pace has no idea what he’s doing. He locked in All-Pro Safety Eddie Jackson on a Four year, $58M contract extension on Friday afternoon and managed to deflect at least a little bit of the unsilent majority that’s been killing him for his NYE press conference the last few days.

Jackson takes home $22M in guarantees at signing and $33M overall, so you can assume he’s been given a healthy bonus, small cap number in 2021 (unless this tears up his 2020 $735K of his final rookie year, either way the team will really need it) and the first two years at least fully guaranteed. Jackson, deservedly so, becomes the highest paid Safety in football at just under $15M/season.

Jackson earned that top-salary-in-the-league title with his play, starting way back in 2017 when he picked off Cam Newton and scooped up a fumble, taking both to the house with each TD return going over 75 yards. That’s a single game NFL record and Jackson did nothing but build his resume as a playmaker and takeaway specialist from there. He had monster pick-six returns in huge moments to seal wins down the stretch for the 2018 Division Champion team, though he didn’t record a TD in 2019  as opposing teams avoided throwing his way almost exclusively. Not matter, Jackson just set a career high with five tackles for loss as Chuck Pagano used him more in the box and mixed him in with blitz coverages closer to the line. And the whole “don’t throw at Eddie” game plan helped the Bears hold opponents to a top three finish in plays of 20+ yards at 40 total.

Eddie Jackson is the real fucking deal and he earned this contract. The team is better with him in it, period.

So what does this mean for the rest of the offseason? Well, it’s definitely good that Pace got this order of business out of the way early in the offseason and didn’t let anything linger into OTAs or training camp and the specter of a hold out. Jackson would have gotten all this and possibly more if he’d hit UFA status, so the deal is timely and warranted. This could, however, impact what they do at the opposite Safety position. Jackson is now the lone (true)Safety on the books for 2020 and beyond, with Ha Ha Clinton-Dix, Deon Bush and DeAndre Houston-Carson all UFAs come March.

Bush and Houston-Carson should be cheap enough to bring back, assuming they’d both like to be here. Dix is the more curious case, as he didn’t exactly shine in his new home. He was very steady, though, and didn’t really show the issues of poor tackling that have plagued him in the past. Pace would do well to lock him and one of the lesser depth Safeties up next to save himself from scrambling later this offseason, though he doesn’t have a ton of cap room to work with. If Dix wants a big, 3+ year deal he’s likely going to have to find it elsewhere, so it might come down to how much he wants to continue with his Alabama alum partner and the rest of this defensive core.

You can probably bet that this move will seal Danny Trevathan‘s fate unless he takes a huge pay cut, but Nick Kwiatkowski is also due new money and he showed he’s ready to step into that role after Trevathan and Smith’s injuries this season. The offense is noticeably absent from the any discussion of core players locked up. Pace would be wise to prioritize a new deal for WR Allen Robinson, who was arguably the only good thing the Bears can point to from 2019 on his side of the ball.That, though, can be left for later as everyone celebrates Steady Eddie and his new paper. This gives the Bears a very sound, solid defensive core locked in through at least 2022 including Jackson, Khalil Mack, Akiem Hicks, Kyle Fuller, Roquan Smith, Eddie Goldman and to a lesser extent Buster Skrine and Bilal Nichols.

Enough of the future what-ifs, enjoy some of Eddie’s best work. Congrats to #39. Roll Damn Tide.

 

 

Football

Sons Of Wilber Marshall – Season Ending Edition: The Long, Dark, Cold Winter

By Sam Fels 1227 0

Our Bears wing gets together one last time to work out their feelings about whatever it was that just went down.

 So now it’s all over, and we couldn’t glean anything from the finale. Where are you? How far away do you think the Bears are from getting back to contending next year? What’s most important to you this offseason?

Brian Schmitz: As I have clearly shown this season, I am a Bears pessimist. And to be totally honest with everyone, I took some pleasure in watching this team self-destruct time and time again. That probably says more about the person I am than anything; but…whatever. 

With that, I think the 2020 Bears, with a few tweaks, are a 10-win playoff team. The schedule will get easier next year and you have to expect  improvement from the major cogs of this team: coaching, QB, d-coordinator, kicker, tight end to name a few. 

Tony Martin: I’m excited to see what the front office does to right this ship, you know? It should be pretty clear where the faults lie, and the question is now wether or not the front office can fix the personnel holes with their limited cap space, and if they can wrestle away play calling duties from Matt Nagy. 

Wes French: I, too, am very interested to see what Pace has planned for this offseason. His and Nagy’s fates are predicated on a run at the playoffs if not a division crown in 2020. They’ve got some big decisions to make between QB, OL and a few key contract decisions on defense. 

I can say I didn’t take much pleasure in watching this team punch itself in the dick over and over again and I sure hope they have more of a plan for next season. 

Did you guys take anything out of the postseason press conference at Halas Hall? Other than as an organization the Bears are extremely weird…

Brian: My biggest takeaway is that the entire organization is trying to build up a quarterback that clearly has confidence issues. Pace’s job is tied into his quarterback, so in order to protect his own best interests, he is forced to ride or die with Trubisky. 

Wes: I was a bit disappointed with the press conference as a whole. I know, you can’t expect them to come right out and declare the QB sucks and needs to be replaced, but to continue to talk up his development and that he was very raw coming out of college is like….why did you take him at #2 then??

I think the thing that pissed me off the most though was talking up Adam Shaheen in a similar fashion. Pace almost seems more like he has to defend that pick more than Trubs, citing the same stuff of him being raw, playing at a small school, etc. Then why take him in the 2nd round? Why reach on a guy you know is going to be a major project when you’re trying to set up for a SB run? 

The OC/his staff took the blade as they were mercilessly let go, and I’m curious to see if they bring someone in with a big pedigree that would wrestle play calling or at least game prep away from Nagy. Juan Castillo is familiar with the type of stuff Nagy wants with the O-line/run game to do given his background with the Reid coaching tree. I’m trying to remain optimistic but until we see other hires/FA-roster moves I don’t think anyone at Halas Hall gets the benefit of the doubt right now. 

Tony: This is the last offseason that I’m going into with the full faith in Ryan Pace and Matt Nagy. They’ve had their fingerprints all over this trainwreck, and it should be noted that this is their chance to reflect on the job they’ve done thus far. It’s one thing to assess the talent left on your roster and to try to build around it, but now we get to see how they’ll address the setback that was the entire 2019 campaign. As a professional educator, I embrace mistakes because they are an important part of the learning process. True learning comes from identifying where you went wrong, understanding the error, and fixing it, and I hope the dudes at the top are willing to look at their faults in an honest way for the benefit of the organization and most importantly my Sunday afternoons.

Football

Three Things We Learned From…Whatever The Hell This Bears Thing Was

By Sam Fels 1452 0

There wasn’t too much to be gleaned from the Bears finale, given was a dead rubber it was. So I guess this is the Three Things from the entire season. God help us.

The Bears Offseason Is Going To Be A Mess – I mean, they all are, but this one especially could turn into a real circus. Without knowing exactly who will be available and what the Bears are going to do or want to do, any offseason where this many questions that are this big about the quarterback position is a real swamp to get through. And there aren’t really any good answers.

Look, you can pop up and get to a Super Bowl with just about any goofus as your quarterback. You can even win one. Nick Foles won one. Matt Ryan should have. Somehow, Eli Manning has two and yet the Giants were barely ever a playoff team other than those two seasons and I’m fairly confident he always sucked. A completely decrepit Peyton Manning managed on with the Broncos, and they’ve yet to be heard from since. So the idea that the Bears could tailor an offense to Mitch Trubisky’s strengths with an improved offensive line and a world class defense and maybe have everything go right for a year isn’t completely outlandish. Fuck, they came within inches last year.

But if you want to be consistently around the picture, look at the NFC playoff picture. Rodgers, Wilson, Brees. Cousins is going to embarrass his entire lineage next week, and we can’t be totally sure what Garoppolo is yet (though he looks more like the first group than Cousins), but you get the idea. And Wentz probably deserves more credit for putting together nine wins with rodeo clowns and janitors as his receivers and running backs this season.

The thing is, you don’t get the QB who keeps you around the picture for multiple seasons off the scrapheap. Andy Dalton will not do that. Cam Newton will not do that (although there’s a big part of me that wants to see Bears fan/media reaction to his first sulky press conference after a loss here. Great theater that will be). Fucking Marmalard will not do that. Teddy Bridgewater will not do that, and all will be insanely expensive for a team that will not have that much cap space no matter what kind of binds and inversions it performs this offseason.

Which means you have to draft one, or find one masked as a backup somewhere else like Garoppolo. Can you do that in the second round? Maybe, it’s not unheard of. Or maybe you think Bridgewater is that guy and make the commitment (highly skeptical).

But if the guy isn’t there in the second round, and Bridgewater goes elsewhere, what’s really going to piss Bears fans off is that Trbuisky with a revamped offense is just about as good of an option as any. Sorry, it’s the truth.

No, that doesn’t mean I think Trubisky will be more than ok ever. Even with the perfectly tailored offense he’ll probably never be more than just a shade north of acceptable. And that’s almost certainly not going to be a plan for sustained success, unless the defense can remain dominant for a longer stretch than most manage (even the Seahawks one was only together for about four seasons). What I’m saying is that for next year, it very well may be as presentable of an option as any.

And that won’t make you feel good.

The Offensive Line Has To Be A Priority, But It Has So Much Ugly Money – They couldn’t handle a Vikings defensive line shorn of starters and desire. This is a problem.

We already know that Kyle Long’s spot will be open for next year. I feel like I want to say that Cody Whitehair and James Daniels can be ok if surrounded by other good linemen. I’m fairly sure Bobbie Massie and Charles Leno Jr. need a swift boot in the ass out the door. Except Massie comes with at least $8M in dead cap space for next year. Leno’s penalties are worse in 2021, and maybe the Bears will think they can kick the can down the road a bit here.

But part of the offense’s problems, and the ghosts Mitch was seeing, is that he rarely had time and the o-line rarely opened holes for Montgomery either. Sure, the running game looked better when it was moved to a simpler I-formation and not the RPO’s and zone blocking. But let’s be real, the Bears are never going to move to that full-time, and they’re still going to need to pass block a good portion of the time. The line needs at least one big addition, probably two. Maybe Massie improves with more quality around him, but the Bears had better find out.

The Bears Need To Find Akiem Hicks A Sidekick And Heir Apparent – We can at least try to argue that turnovers are cyclical, but the Bears didn’t get enough of them because they didn’t sit on the quarterback’s head nearly enough. 32 sacks this year, after 50 last year. In a vacuum, slightly more than one per game doesn’t sound like much, but if you think about where those sacks and pressures could have come and you realize how much the Bears lost out on. And almost all of it is not having Hicks pushing linemen into the QBs face and giving him nowhere to go. You saw it in the first two games of the season.

Sure, Nichols or Robertson-Harris or Goldman flashed plays here and there, but not nearly enough. It affected Mack’s season and probably Floyd’s too (though his own limitations are equally to blame if not more). The Bears cannot depend on one player so much next year for so much. They can’t buy another one, but finding someone under the radar, or through the draft, or the development of someone has to be the biggest order of the day for the defense. Hicks isn’t going to play 16 games next year, that you can bet on. He’s also 30, so just how much more time do you have?

I’ll worry about young linebackers in the middle and a secondary that will lose some veterans a hell of a lot less if they only have to do anything for about a second and a half every play.

 

Football

Week 17 – Bears 21, Vikings 19: It’s An Ending, That’s Enough

By Sam Fels 1211 0

It doesn’t mean anything, unless Anthony Miller’s shoulder actually detached from his body this time. The Bears finish 8-8, which seems more fitting for this team, the very definition of completely mediocre and pointless. They couldn’t be more in the middle. They couldn’t block the Vikings’ backups, and the defense did just enough to put the game on a knife-edge both good and bad.

It was somehow telling and symbolic that the Bears only TD drive, the first of the second half, was when they cut out the bullshit, lined up in the I, and ran the ball. David Montgomery had 57 yards on six carries and a touchdown on the drive. Mitch Trubisky had to throw one pass, and it was for a first down.

And then we never saw it again.

Also symbolic that on the biggest play of the game, a 4th and 5 at midfield as the Bears were trying to find the winning field goal, Mitch finally got out of the pocket (not sure it was designed that way) and found Ridley for a first down and set up the winner. That was just about the only time we saw it.

So the game was more of what we already knew. When Mitch gets to be an athlete–getting on the move or stepping into his throws and being decisive–he’s ok. When he’s doing all the gadget stuff, he doesn’t make plays. When the Bears keep it simple, they can move the ball. But they don’t keep it simple. They didn’t get enough sacks, though they did get the turnovers today and even a safety.

No questions will be answered by this. We’ll have to wait some months for those.

Everything else…

-I would imagine Riley Ridley is being groomed to take Taylor Gabriel’s role next season, as that’s one spot the Bears can get some cap savings.

-Khalil Mack will end the season with 8.5 sacks. No matter what else was going on, that’s just not going to get it done.

-Yeah I think I’ve had enough of Ha-Ha. Try something else next year.

-Mitch didn’t even end up with 3,000 yards. That’s hard to do these days. And while it certainly speaks to his struggles, it also speaks to an offense that could never push the ball down the field. Some of that is the o-line, a lot of it is Mitch, but a lot of it is the playcalling. We’ll at least hear whispers of someone being brought in next season to take that over. Don’t know if it will happen, but it should at least be discussed.

-The Bears actually got two turnovers today, which has been a problem this season. That they only resulted in six points is why this was a game at all.

Ok, that’s enough. It’s over. We lived. That’s about all we can say.

Football

Week #17 – Bears vs. Vikings Preview: Escorted Out By Al Bundy

By Sam Fels 3050 0

vs.

RECORDS: Bears 7-8   Vikings 10-5

KICKOFF: 12pm

TV: Fox

READY TO BE KICKED IN THE NUTS AGAIN: Daily Norseman

It was only a year ago that the season ended in the same exact spot with just about the opposite feeling. The Bears marched up to Minneapolis, with nothing to play for essentially as the Rams were up big by the 2nd quarter to eliminate any chance of grabbing a playoff bye. The Vikings however, had everything to play for, needing to win to get into the playoffs. And the Bears used their face to mop the floor simply because they felt like it, because they wanted to. It really felt like they were on to something then, that it was just the beginning. After all, a team that does that simply for the sheer joy of it must’ve been capable of so much more.

One scared playoff game, one missed kick, and a broken coach and QB later and now it feels like that game might as well have taken place in another dimension. Of course, the funny thing to think about is if the Bears had rested everyone, let the Vikings in, would they have simply kicked their ass again a week later on the Lakefront? How would that have changed things? Rather pointless to think about in the end, but you can’t let it go completely, can you?

Either way, the Bears will slink off the stage tomorrow after a dead rubber against the Vikings. Minnesota is locked in as the 6th seed, preparing to watch Kirk Cousins embarrass himself in Green Bay, or Seattle, or New Orleans. Take your pick. So they’ll be resting everyone who matters, making it unclear what the Bears can get out of this other than a win that makes the record look a little better. And hopefully no major injuries to carry over into training camp or something.

The Bears are intent on playing the full team, or at least the one they have. The long-term casualties are still out. You get the impression if the Bears had even been representative last week, not even won necessarily but played well, they might treat this as a time-filler as well. But last week so helpless and sad, they probably can’t end the season with two of those. The offseason will be long and unpleasant enough without that kind of stench hanging over it. Or at least they can fool themselves into thinking there’s less stench.

Maybe 8-8 looks way better to them than 7-9. The difference in draft position won’t matter all that much, they’ll be entrenched in the middle of the second round either way. There won’t be any answers tomorrow, and those won’t come for a few months. The post-mortems have already started.

It’s funny, there have been far worse Bears teams in recent memory. But rarely has a season been this unenjoyable. Even the wins were whiskey-dick experiences. Only the one in Denver due to its excitement and the still very much present hope that was around in just Week 2, the first Vikings game, and the Cowboys win were ones you could get excited about. Feel good about. Washington was what was supposed to happen. The two over the Lions were far harder than they needed to be. The Giants suck. When were you excited to watch the Bears past September?

So we’ll dispose of this season tomorrow, slamming its head into the wall before throwing it out the door, cursing its presence in our lives at all and hoping to never see the likes of it again. We probably will. It’s the Bears after all. But at least there will be time to cleanse.