Chicago Bears News and Views as Well as Points of View from Around the NFL
Quick Comments: Bears at Lions 11/19/23
Offense
The Lions appear to be very wary of Justin Fields legs. They tried to be very disciplined in their pass rush. Fields took to leaving the pocket early but even then the Lions looked more to me like they were just trying to corral him.
It was notable that the Bears had Fields running with the ball so often early. The read option was involved. These plays involve simple reads and simply allow Fields to take off. I’m wondering if the Bears simplified the offense for Fields.
Fields passes did not look like they were affected by the thumb to me. He threw a wonderful touchdown pass to DJ Moore late in the third quarter.
Fields did a good job of taking underneath throws when needed today.
Its funny how often Fields finds DJ Moore late in a down. Moore seems to have a gift for finding ways to get open when the play breaks down.
The Lions looked to me like they were relying heavily on man-to-man defense. It was an interesting choice from a team that doesn’t have what I would consider to be a great defensive backfield. I suppose they didn’t respect the Bears receivers outside of DJ Moore much.
On a related note, it was interesting to see the Lions start to crash the line of scrimmage late in the first quarter, especially when D’Onta Foreman was in the game. That’s probably because they know that he’s likely to run if he’s in as he’s not great at anything else that running backs do They sold out to the run and challenged Fields to beat them with his arm. It put more pressure on the Lions defensive backfield.
On a related note to that, Khalil Herbert never looks to me like he hits the holes as hard as Foreman. But I know he’s better in pretty much every other way. What the Lions are doing when Foreman is in the game is probably related to why the Bears didn’t have him on the active roster very often early in the year.
First and goal from the Lions 1/2 yard line and I’m surprised the Bears didn’t go to the “tush push”. The Bears scored on a run by D’Onta Foreman. Notably they tried the sneak later in the fourth quarter. It failed.
Lucas Patrick goes down and Dan Feeney is ahead of Cody Whitehair on the depth chart at center? They gave up on Whitehair fast. Fields looked like he was having a hard time getting on the same page as Feeney.
The Lions were also bringing heavy pressure on third down. It certainly looked to me like an opportunity for a screen pass or something similar.
I would swear that Tyler Scott slowed down just a little bit near the end of the deep pass on 3rd and long with 2:30 left in the game. He’d have had it otherwise and that might have been the game.
With all of the nice things that there were to say about Fields today its still stands that when he had to pass at the end of the game, he lost any feel for the pocket that he might have and he failed.
Defense
You can always count on Mark Schlereth to emphasize offensive line play. Loved his comment about the about 100 year old TE Marcedes Lewis.
Nice catch by Tyrique Stevenson on his first NFL interception on the Lions first possession. It looked like Jared Goff expected his receiver to break in more but he got bumped off of his route. Goff also either expected him to be deeper or, as the announcers suggested, the pass rush affected him.
Justin Jones looked good today. He seemed to be around the ball a lot.
I thought the Bears were doing a decent job of pushing the pocket on Goff. Most of the time it looked to me like a straight four man rush. They varied it a little bit but nothing special for the most part. It was notable that when they blitzed at the end of the first half, they got burned.
Having said that I thought it was pretty funny when the athletically limited Jack Sanborn blitzed at the beginning of the second half. Goff probably was apoplectic with surprise. He took the sack.
Ad opportunistic as the Bears defense was today, its notable that Jaylon Johnson dropped two interceptions in the middle of a contract year. No making it rain today celebrations today.
Good play by Detroit on the touchdown with about 3 minutes left in the game as they targeted the hole in the Bears zone. But Eddie Jackson was very late getting over to my eye.
People around the country probably think that David Montgomery gave this game some extra effort because he was playing his ex-team. He didn’t. He always plays like that.
Miscellaneous
Very irritating that the good people at FOX couldn’t keep the time straight as the clock wound down in the first half. Kind of a critical situation with the Lions driving to not know how much time was left.
I’ve never seen a network push a college game like FOX is pushing Ohio St. – Michigan next weekend. I know its a big game but there have been plenty of others that went by without that kind of hype.
Multiple delay of game penalties today along with a wasted timeout were inexcusable. That needs to be cleaned up.
Credit the Detroit crowd. They were loud. They certainly have reason to be excited about this Lions team.
The Lions did everything that they could to blow this game. Crippling penalties. They lost the turnover battle 4 to 1. The Bears doubled the Lions time of possession. But the still pulled it out in the end. Kudos to them.
Between a couple of games pre-injury and this game, Fields has looked much better to me. The day that he complained about how his head was spinning with all of the things that he was supposed to be looking at was a turning point. I’m guessing that the Bears simplified the offense and tailored it more to his strengths at that point. The defense was notably more opportunistic than usual today and the defensive line looks better. The team over all has come a a long way since that first miserable game against the Packers.