- Brad Biggs at the Chicago Tribune answers your questions:
“Why do the Bears struggle to cover opposing tight ends? — @edmundjburkeiii
“The Bears are 28th in the league as opposing tight ends have averaged 61.9 yards per game against them. They’re 32nd in the league in yards per catch by tight ends at 12.6 yards, and that is largely due to the huge game George Kittle had at San Francisco when he made seven receptions for 155 yards. Evan Engram had 10 catches for 102 yards in the London game when the Bears blew out the Jacksonville Jaguars, and Minnesota’s T.J. Hockenson had seven grabs for 114 yards in the Week 12 game at Soldier Field. Take those three games away — and I realize you cannot do that — and the Bears have been solid against opposing tight ends.”
That may be true, but I have noted a disturbing tendency among Bears opponents related to this. Opponents usually don’t throw in the direction of potential Pro Bowl corner Jaylon Johnson, and early in the season, this meant that Tyrique Stevenson was getting a lot more targets on the other side. But lately, Bears opponents aren’t targeting Stevenson but are going after the Bears safeties instead.
This is made considerably easier because the Bears play predominantly zone defense and don’t move their defensive backs around the formation a lot.
Jaquan Brisker‘s absence may have contributed to this. But the Bears are going to have to take a very good look at what they are doing at safety in the offseason. Yet another position to add to their list, albeit not at the top.
- Biggs answers another one:
” The Kansas City O-line is not very good this year, so Andy Reid has made adjustments. Often, Patrick Mahomes takes just a couple of steps back and fires a quick slant or quick out only a few yards beyond the line of scrimmage, getting rid of the ball in a bit over 2 seconds. Why can’t the Bears and Caleb Williams do the same? — Mike B.
“The Bears have been doing a lot of that. There are quick outs designed for Keenan Allen nearly every week. DJ Moore was targeted eight times at Minnesota [a couple of weeks ago] and caught all eight throws for 46 yards. Those were quick routes where [Caleb] Williams got the ball out swiftly. I don’t think it is accurate to say the Bears have not put stuff in their offense to have Williams get the ball to his playmakers quickly. The problem is the Bears haven’t done the other stuff particularly well. They’ve struggled too often when they have been asked to pass protect for longer periods of time, and they haven’t broken enough tackles on the short throws to create more chunk plays.
Without a doubt, opponents have been more than happy to let the Beas have the short passing game and limit the run after the catch. And they’ve generally done a great job of it.
One thing I will say in defense of the question writer, the Bears almost never go to the quick slant where a receiver can catch a ball in stride for a bigger play. I don’t know if it’s fear of letting Williams throw over the middle or what, but the extent of the short passing game seems more often than not to be exactly what Biggs said it is. Quick outs to wide receivers.
- Another one from Biggs:
“I don’t recall where you stood on this, but it seemed like most in the media felt like Ryan Poles had put together a roster good enough to compete for the playoffs. Given how the season has played out, was that just not true? Not really seeing any media saying “my bad.” — @hickeymj
“Certainly, the Bears built a roster that was positioned to be much better than the 4-10 record the team currently has. I thought the Bears would be in the mix for a playoff spot, and with seven spots, they really should have been.”
“This wasn’t a perfect roster. The Bears were not positioned to win the conference. But they’ve got a better quarterback, and things should have gone better than they have. I figured nine wins, which would have been a two-game improvement, was realistic. I thought if they got off to a good start and built some confidence, 10 wins was a possibility. Certainly a lesson for everyone in this.”
Certainly so. It’s very evident that the offensive line was worse than anyone thought.
Having said that, I heard very few media members actually account for the fact that Williams is a rookie and that there was virtually no one on the staff that had proven that they could coach quarterbacks. In that respect, this season was a problem waiting to happen.
It will be a long time before I get over the disappointment I felt in the Bears organization from top to bottom this year. With ownership being what it is and [with Bears president and CEO Kevin Warren in charge along with Poles, you have to think that the long-term prospects of this organization might be very grim.
It will certainly be a long time before Warren is gone. So unless he’s a lot better at making critical decisionsthan his history indicates(https://www.si.com/college/indiana/football/commissioner-kevin-warren-says-big-ten-football-is-still-determining-covid-19-policies), I’m starting to wonder if I will ever see the organization win anything again. They may just have to get lucky, and historically there has been little indication that’s likely to happen.
- Bill Barnwell at ESPN.com ranks the most desirable potential head coaching jobs going into the offseason. He has the Bears at number 3.
“The Bears find themselves in third, the same place the Jaguars landed in 2021 after their highly touted No. 1 pick endured a difficult debut season amid coaching changes. Like Trevor Lawrence after the 2020 season, Caleb Williams’ struggles are going to be chalked up to what was around him. The offensive line hasn’t been good enough. Wideouts Keenan Allen, Rome Odunze, and DJ Moore never seemed to mesh. Shane Waldron was the wrong choice as offensive coordinator, and after he was fired, coach Matt Eberflus followed shortly thereafter. Write off the entire season as a bad dream and start over in 2025.”
“The overwhelming expectation is that the Bears will hire a coach with a background in offense, with the city of Chicago ready to start a GoFundMe to bring over Johnson from the Lions. Regardless of who takes over, the new coach will have to reimagine the offense and add players accordingly. [Keenan] Allen, a free agent, is unlikely to return. [D.J.] Moore has looked uninterested all season and has a tradable contract. The only lineman who should be guaranteed a starting spot is right tackle Darnell Wright. The Bears project to have the fifth-most cap space of any team in the offseason, so they can afford to target replacements. They need to get those moves right, though.”
A couple of things here:
- Other than Williams, Barnwell doesn’t seem to think nearly as much of the Bears’ offensive skill position talent as most of Chicago seems to. And, though the Bears don’t seem inclined to move on, he indirectly questions whether GMRyan Poles should survive, as well.
It will be interesting to see what potential head coaching candidates think of this situation. I’m inclined to think that the fact that the Bears ownership will get out of the way, give the football people what they want (within reason), and let them do their jobs will count for a lot here. Contrast that with the Jets, who would be the worst nightmare imaginable.
The Bears’ biggest problem is that they can’t make the right decisions at the top. But no head coaching hire is going to believe that they are the wrong decision. A lot will depend on what they think of Poles and team president and CEOKevin Warren.
- D.J. Moore is a fascinating problem. The Bears have had a hard time getting him the ball all season and have resorted to using him in the running game to get him involved since interim head coachThomas Brown took over.
I really don’t know what this means. It could be that teams are concentrating on Moore so much as the Bears’ biggest threat that they’ve shut him down as a receiver. It could also mean that the Bears have grossly overestimated Moore’s talents. What action the team takes once a new offensive staff is hired will tell us what the situation really is.
- Speaking of the Jets, Barnwell has them 8th behind only the New Orleans Saints, who are in cap hell for at least two years. Here’s what they said about the Jets:
“Well, you saw what happened over the past two years. A Jets team that attempted to shoot for the moon with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback landed in the darkness instead. At 4-11, they are guaranteed a worse record with Rodgers this season than they had with Zach Wilson & Co. in 2022 or 2023, a fate that even the most skeptical of Rodgers cynics wouldn’t have predicted. Though he has been better in recent weeks, it’s painful to even imagine the Jets running it back for another season with the now-41-year-old. For cultural reasons alone, it should be time to move on. Still, it’s tough to rule out anything in New York.”
Rodgers said a couple of weeks ago that he went back and looked at a film of himself when he was good, including when he was in his twenties. I, along with most Packer fans, could have told him what the problem was a long, long time ago. Instead of working within the confines of the offense and following a game plan, Rodgers tried to make a career out of bailing out and improvising. Most of that was done with the full support of a fawning media who care less about good football and more about exciting individual play (see Kyler Murray).
In any case, Rodgers, apparently as a result of his sudden introspection, has looked a lot better the last couple of weeks. He’s suddenly throwing with anticipation and getting the ball out on time.
It’s almost certainly way too little, way too late, though. If Rodgers had listened to coaches earlier, he probably would be finishing his career with multiple playoff appearances with the Packers rather than potentially doing so in disgrace with the dysfunctional Jets.
It will be interesting if he can find a landing spot next year or if he just retires.
- Barnwell has the Dolphins second.
“I’ll start by saying I’m not sure the Dolphins should be looking to move on from Mike McDaniel, whose job could be in jeopardy if his team misses the postseason. McDaniel is 27-22 and made the playoffs in each of his first two seasons in charge; the last full-time Miami coach to finish his run with the Dolphins with a winning record was Dave Wannstedt, who left 20 years ago. This franchise hasn’t won a playoff game since 2000. Moving on from McDaniel would be an aggressive decision.”
“Stephen Ross can be an impulsive owner, and given past reporting and his background, he might regret not being in a position to hire Jim Harbaugh when the now-Chargers coach decided to leave Michigan a year ago. Would the Michigan booster really countenance hiring a Buckeye and go after Mike Vrabel? Firing McDaniel would only seem to make sense if Ross has a definite, landable target in mind. That coach would take over a talented roster and have a quarterback in place, but would he be facing unrealistic expectations?”
Like so many teams around the NFL, including the Bears, ownership is the biggest issue in Miami. With the second-oldest roster in the NFL, they have gone all in the last two years with some aggressive moves, but, like so many owners over the history of the NFL, Ross just hasn’t learned that you can’t buy a championship.
McDaniel isn’t the problem. What Ross needs to do is find a better general manager who can draft good, young talent and be patient. But Chris Grier is a long-time general manager and an apparent Ross favorite. If he’s dumb enough to fire McDaniel as a fall guy, he should be near the top of the Bears’ list of candidates.
- As is my usual habit, I will not be staying up to watch the Bears play tonight. I habitually get up very early in the morning for work, and I simply can’t stay up until all hours of the night watching football, even the Bears anymore.
One thing I am enormously grateful for is that the Bears didn’t play as many night games this year. This will be only their third night game of the 2024 season. I would like to send out a personal thank you to the Chicago Bears and the NFL! Please keep it up!
- For those of you who haven’t been to a game in a while, it’s a wonderful time to pick up tickets late in a bad season when the weather is cold. I went to last week’s game after being given tickets as a wonderful gift (hence no quick comments last week, either).
My brother and I sat in a 400-level section near midfield. The section was about 30% Lions fans, who were mostly well-behaved. Having said that, the guy directly in front of me was the single most obnoxious football fan I’ve ever encountered who wasn’t obliterated by alcohol. It was fun!