Quick Comments: Bears at Seahawks 8/22/14

  1. I thought I saw some good penetration from the defensive line. They just weren’t getting the results they needed from it.
  2. Russell Wilson had a lot to do with that. The key is a disciplined pass rush that traps him in the pocket. The Seahawks know that so the first think they have him do a lot of the time is drift left or right to get him outside. Its not exactly a roll out but he’s not sitting in the pocket either. It makes it tough to get a handle on him.
  3. Also on a related note, the Bears are going to be have to be able to penetrate against teams like Seattle. They aren’t physical enough up front otherwise. The Seahawk’s success in the running game pretty much demonstrated that. There were stretches where it looked like they could have run it all day.
  4. The Bears lined up Willie Young in what looked like a “wide 9” position once or twice. That’s a formation commonly played by the Lions when Jim Schwartz was the head coach there where he was way outside of the offensive tackle. So Young’s played it quite a bit in the past. Interesting.
  5. You can pretty much chalk up the first Seahawk touchdown to Shea McClellin. He got sucked inside and Marshawn Lynch went right through the spot McClellin was occupying. Color man Jim Miller attributed the mistake to defensive end Lamarr Houston but Houston was occupying the lineman and McClellin was left free to make the play. I thought he was the one out of position. I won’t say he played badly McClellin didn’t do much with the starters in this game.
  6. Chris Conte showed up. Hopefully he’s not concussed.
  7. There were definitely some problems with defensive assignments, tonight. I don’t know enough to be able to say exactly what was wrong but way too often guys were making catches with no defensive player within 3 or 4 yards of them. That really shouldn’t ever happen.
  8. The offense was pretty much all Brandon Marshall and Alshon Jeffrey. I sure would have liked to have seen Josh Morgan and the tight ends more involved. The running game looked better and they were making some positive yards but they didn’t do it much. I think keeping Matt Forte healthy is a major priority right now.
  9. Having said that, its worth noting that Cutler was trying to get the ball to Morgan on the interception at the end of the half. He obviously thought Morgan was going to come back to get the ball on the back shoulder. I suppose those sorts of miscues are the reason he might be hesitant to keep going away from Marshall, Jeffery and Bennett.
  10. Special teams continues to be a concern. The coverage units were especially bad. I’m looking at you, Joe DeCamillis.
  11. I thought I saw some good, aggressive play from Lance Briggs tonight. He was around the ball a lot. Good to see.
  12. I thought Cutler wasn’t maybe as accurate as I’d typically like to see him. The receivers were working mighty hard to make those catches.
  13. Jordan Palmer’s accuracy and ball placement was pretty awful. Jimmy Clausen’s was better but that’s not saying much. Neither was anything to write home about.
  14. I’m starting to like what I see from Ka’Deem Carey. I noted that he came in before Shaun Draughn and played with the starters some in the first half, perhaps indicating that he’s moved ahead of him on the depth chart. He can block, he can catch and he always falls forward for a couple extra yards. Not much elusiveness there but otherwise he might be a really good one.
  15. Demontre Hurst keeps showing up in these games and making tackles. Its worth noting.
  16. Terrell Pryor has a long way to go. Tossing that ball up for grabs under pressure for an interception in the fourth quarter wasn’t a good look.
  17. Preseason game or not the Seattle crowd was still loud enough to make it a challenge.
  18. The Bears were close to making plays all over the field this game. They were missing by inches. They’re close but I guess that’s the difference right now.

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