John Mullin at csnchicago.com thinks that the move of Michael Ola to right tackle will improve the Bears run game:
“Coaches were clearly pleased with the results in the run game with Ola at right tackle. Matt Forte rushed for 114 yards against the Patriots to go with 33 from Ka’Deem Carey, together averaging nearly six yards per carry.
“And since Trestman laid out the intention to balance the offense better, Ola is the presumptive right tackle until further notice.
“‘We got to do a better job of [balance] because we have offensive line that can block the run and we’ve got a very good running back,’ Trestman said. ‘We’ve got to do that.'”
If they’ve got an offensive line that can run block they sure haven’t shown it the last two years. Maybe Ola can make the difference on the right side.
Its also fairly clear that running the ball is something the Bears are going to have to do if they want to beat the Packers coming off of the bye. The Saints burned the Packers for 193 yards on the ground last Sunday and Green Bay head coach Mike McCarthy sounded none to happy about it. Via Rob Demovsky at ESPN.com:
“‘We need to tackle the damn ball carrier and put him on the ground. That’s what we’ll be focused on.’
“McCarthy and his staff have the bye week to figure out if they can salvage their run defense, which has not ranked higher than 30th at any point during in the first half of the season and slipped back to 32nd (last) after Sunday’s 44-23 loss.
“‘The run defense was our Achilles’ heel clearly on defense,’ McCarthy said. ‘Too many missed tackles.'”
Missed tackles and dropped passes were problems last year with the Packers and despite devoting much of the offseason to solving the latter problem, it’s still there this year as well. We’ll have to wait two weeks to see how much help they are going to give the Bears.