Football

Long Journey To The Middle – Chicago Bears Position Review: Linebackers (or So Long, and Thanks for All The Lynch)

By Tony Martin 1035 0

For the purposes of this article, I’ll be considering edge rushers as linebackers.

Roster/PFF Grade/Stats:

Kevin Pierre-Louis (90.5) 27 tackles, 0 sacks
Khalil Mack (86.2) 34 tackles, 9 sacks, 4 forced fumbles
Nick Kwiatkoski (72.6) 51 tackles, 3 sacks, 1 forced fumble, 1 interception
Leonard Floyd (69.8) nice 32 tackles, 3 sacks
Danny Trevathan (61.9) 54 tackles, 1 sack, 1 forced fumble
Isaiah Irving (61.1) 8 tackles
James Vaughters (60.0) 3 tackles
Roquan Smith (52.4) 76 tackles, 2 sacks, 1 interception
Joel Iyiegbuniwe (42.1) 2 tackles
Aaron Lynch (36.0) 2 tackles, 2 sacks

First, let’s parse out the data. Irving and Iyiegbuniwe aren’t on the team next year, Vaughters might be. Aaron Lynch needs to go, though. I can shrug off Irving and Iggy’s small sample size, but Lynch played in every game this year. He logged 244 snaps, about 15 a game, and he sucked. I thought he was only brought here to be part of Vic Fangio’s defense as an old friend from San Francisco, but they kept him around for another season and it was a season too long. As low as I am on Irving, I’d rather see him get some run, or see if James Vaughters can play with the starters for a spell. Lynch has to be gone next year, right? Right?

Roquan Smith started off slow, got hot in the middle of the season, and cooled off before his injury against Dallas in week 14. Opponents caught 75% of the passes he was credited as the primary defender on, which is about right given the amount of swings and dumpoffs he was required to stop. His tackling is still his best quality, and he maintained the same level of dominance there in 2019 as his stellar rookie campaign. His only two sacks both came against Detroit in week 13 against first-time starter David Blough, so take that with a grain of salt too. Chuck Pagano needs to make sure to scheme better for Roquan to move in space. If Danny Trevathan doesn’t come back next year, the pressure will be on Smith to do all the things he does so well while also being the main focus of all the second level blocking on inside runs. For what it’s worth, Smith was rated highly for his block-shedding coming out of college, so at least there’s hope.

If the Bears think they could do okay with replacing Trevathan with Nick Kwiatkoski, it would be Kwit’s excellent last few games that made his resume too much to pass up. He hadn’t played as many snaps as he did in 2019 since his rookie season, and the team and fans saw a kid who has developed from playing behind outstanding veterans and learned how to be a Swiss Army knife. He is a stud on special teams, but if the Bears end up letting Trevathan go and sign the cheaper Kwiatkoski, they might have to find a new replacement inside linebacker that can go make the plays he does on kick coverage. One of these two dudes leaves and is starting in a new uniform Week 1 of next year, it’s just a question of who. I personally think the Bears pay AR12 and let Danny walk, which hurts my heart but it is what it is.

I’m a sucker for Leonard Floyd but I kinda waxed too poetic about him in my team defense review, so I’m gonna skip it now. Just know, I say nice things about his ability to set the edge and I think the Bears should seriously consider re-signing him depending on how this year goes.

Khalil Mack is a hard player to write about because he really reminds me how amateur I am in all ways, even in talking about how awesome he is to watch. So many real journalists have poured over Mack that it almost feels pointless to say anything. His numbers could never truly represent exactly how much shit he ruins and how much his being on the field alters the very concept of the way the game is played. You know whenever any referee apologist says something like “well, there’s holding on every play” they’re right, but it’s kinda hard to focus on long enough to prove? Yeah, Khalil Mack gets chipped, double-teamed, and held on literally every single play. It’s like watching a created player in Madden that you just said “fuck it” on and made everything a 99 overall, but instead of shredding CPU lineman while quarterbacks takes seven-step drops, the AI actually gameplanned to stop Mack and half the time it still didn’t matter. The game would stop every play if they called holding on Khalil Mack the way they do for most other players, which is truly a blessing and a curse.

Basically, this linebacker corps has studs in all spots and maybe two quality backups. This offseason is gonna be a tough one, but hopefully the Bears linebackers go into 2020 being their strongest unit once again. That’s a special feeling that makes all Chicagoans do three things: look for that old Bears starter coat in their closet, pretend for one fleeting moment that Mike Ditka wasn’t a hardcore right wing drunken buffoon, and just vibe, baby.

Football

Rapid Recap- Bears 24, Lions 20

By Tony Martin 1149 0

Well, the Bears won. Somehow. Just barely. The local boys escaped Ford Field victorious and are now the least convincing .500 team in the league at 6-6. Are we going to spend another week and a half pretending this win is symbolic of a team finally putting it all together? The offense looked better than it did almost all season, save a handful of stupid penalties. Anthony Miller feasted on a pisspoor Lions defense, Allen Robinson looked good, and Mitch made a handful of great throws. The gameplan was solid, but once again it’s hard to differentiate between a mediocre team looking good because they planned well and a team who just happened to beat a far inferior team. Mitch went 29/38 for 338, finishing his line with 3 TDs and 1 INT, but still made a handful of head-scratching plays. That 3rd down in the red zone where he decided to run laterally instead of get the almost assured key first down? Great QBs don’t do that unless their name is Lamar Jackson.

The Bears came out making David Blough look like the next great Jeff Driskel-esque QB, but after the first 14 points that Detroit put up in the first quarter, they managed 6 the rest of the way. The Bears bent but didn’t break, and it was nice to see them bring pressure in key moments. It’ll be interesting to see if Prince Amukamara comes back healthy, because any serious winning streak will require a healthy defensive backfield since Dallas, Green Bay, Kansas City, and Minnesota are the teams left on the schedule.

The Good: Mitch looked great, the wide receivers played outstandingly (even Javon Wims put up good numbers), and David Montgomery runs HARD. If the Bears invest heavily in the offensive line this offseason he could put up some incredible numbers next year. Nick Kwiatkoski looked great again, and it makes me wonder if this is indeed the last season Danny Trevathan will be playing for the Bears. Kyle Fuller saved the game with a key third down tackle inside the 5 yard line, holding Detroit to a field goal. He played great all game. Eddie Jackson is back in the stat column and everything feels right.

The Bad: The Bears were determined to lose this one in the 4th, didn’t it seem? Bad penalties plagued the last Detroit drive before Roquan and Eddie teamed up to end the game, and though the Bears committed only one more penalty for four more yards than the Lions, it sure seemed like they came at the worst times. Once again the line play was uneven, and the Bears couldn’t bring consistent pressure with the front four once again.

The Ugly: I had to watch this game with my family who I love but also my mom’s friend who was pretty much yelling “OMG SPORTSBALL DID WE WIN” for the entire second half. I need a fucking nap.

If this team wins 10 games, they deserve to make the playoffs because the changes they’d need to make to get there would signify a serious righting of the ship and who knows? Stranger things have happened.

Football

Week 13 Bears at Lions Preview: Dessert Before Dinner

By Wes French 842 0

 vs

Bears (5-6) at Lions (3-7-1)

Kickoff: 11:30 am

TV: Fox 32

Radio: WBBM 780

 

If this all feels oddly familiar, it is. The Bears and Lions will meet for the second time in three weeks, playing the early Thanksgiving game in Detroit, all for the second straight year of this exact same format.

In 2018, the Bears won a pair of sort of ugly games over Detroit, first with one of Mitchell Trubisky‘s best games of his career with a 23/30, 355, 4 TD (1 rushing) performance in blowout at home. Trubs would pick up a shoulder injury the following week, though, and Chase Daniel would manage the Bears to a slim win on Thanksgiving 2018 with a massive performance (on the field and with celebrations) after some very timely turnovers.

The 2019 version of this possibly never changing schedule quirk is sort of sticking to the script: the Bears win a few weeks ago in Chicago featured A 3 TD performance from Trubisky, albeit without the big yardage and convincing offensive performance. The Lions are in a bit of a different space, though, as they again won’t have Matthew Stafford (and possibly Jeff Driskel) and his broken back. Driskel kept things interesting in Chicago as Stafford missed his first game of what had become a career season prior, and Detroit could be without both on Thanksgiving as Driskel is trying to overcome a hamstring injury.

Enter, uh….David Blough? David Blough. So yea, the Lions head into this one in a pretty bad spot. The thing you have to watch most with Driskel is his ability to extend plays or beat you on the ground by moving around, and even if he starts he mostly likely won’t be able to get out of the pocket. The Bears defense will look to build some confidence against the Lions unsure/struggling offense, hopefully capped off by some new endzone celebrations.

On the offensive side, Mitch and Nagy will hopefully be on the same page for this one and keep adding plays that Mitch is more comfortable with – play-action and bootlegs should be used early and often. Maybe it’ll even open up some holes for David Montgomery and the rushing attack, as they’ll be able to try and sharpen their own shortcomings in run blocking against a Detroit unit ranked 23rd against the run. This will be the second week in a row against a 23rd ranked rush defense, and the Bears helped the Giants to improve two places in a week…so don’t hold your breath on some rampant rushing attack four days later.

This game will be a strong opportunity for the Bears offense to take advantage through the air, something they did pretty well two weeks ago and got a little better last week. If they can take another step and put together a solid plan around the run fake and moving Mitch around, maybe they can start to make you believe. Believe they can get in a rhythm and at least make things hard on Minnesota and Seattle down the stretch – two teams that play each other on Monday Night Football to wrap up the week.

They’ll do so without Taylor Gabriel and Ben Braunecker, but against the 30th ranked pass defense Allen Robinson and Anthony Miller could be in line for huge days. We might even see some Tarik Cohen in the slot or some creative uses of the runnings backs in the passing game.

The opportunity is there for the Bears to give everyone a reason to be thankful, helping to ease us all into the post-meal drunken stupor as we take in the chaos that’s potentially there for Bills-Cowboys. Watching that with a smile instead of a scowl is good enough at this point.

Happy Thanksgiving (drinking), everyone.