As many regular visitors know, I don’t stay up to watch Bears games in prime time anymore. I’m an early riser who works for a living so…. whatever.
Nevertheless, I do have a few thoughts after watching the condensed game on nfl.com.
- Caleb Williams had a decent game. I thought he played better last week but he was still pretty good. He missed a few wide open receivers down field and I’m sure he won’t be happy about that. But he had a very good feel for the pocket and rarely had to break out of it. Yes, a nice game over all.
- Williams’ protection was pretty good and I thought the offensive line played well against a good defensive front. A good effort.
- Williams has a habit of rolling out other his right when he breaks the pocket. The wide receivers usually break toward the right sideline when he does that and Williams tries to hit them as they fall out of bounds. The Bears burned the Seahawks a couple times with this early in the game. But the Bears divisional foes all know about this tendency and never let him get away this anymore. Its a prime example of a major difference between playing a divisional opponent and a team outside the division who doesn’t know the Bears as well. Such things are a cardinal reason why the Bears have had so much more success against non-divisional opponents.
- Great night for Rome Odunze. When they drafted him I assumed he was a 50:50 downfield throw guy. But head coach Ben Johnson doesn’t like thise kinds of plays and I think it took Odunze more time to develop because of that. But he’s cooking now with some tough catches. This was probably his best game as a Bear.
- Jeffery Simmons was everything I was told that he was. Eventually Seattle double-teamed him, leaving Montez Sweat and Grady Jarrett one-on-one with blockers. Sweat, in particular needs to take advantage of Simmons’ presence in the worst way. He still had double digit sacks last year but he needs to do better to earn another year on the team at his salary.
- Generally speaking the Bears did a much, much better job of getting pressure rushing four tonight without blitzing. I don’t know what the statistics will show but I bet they blitzed less in this game than in any game this season. Simmons is at his best as a run stopper but he apparently made a big difference as a pass rusher as well.
- I saw some criticism online this morning about how Joe Buck and Try Aikman were raised in their call of the game. What nonsense. Even watching the condensed game without all of the chatter in between plays I could tell that both were very complimentary of the Bears and, especially, Williams and Simmons. I always got the feeling that Buck, in particular, is, if anything, biased towards the Bears rather than the other way around. Some of you people have to open your minds and your ears and get over yourselves.
- There are a lot of Seahawks that are going to be upset that they didn’t play better. It wasn’t Sam Darnold’s best night but they needed to do a better job protecting him. He wasn’t great under pressure. Jackson Smith-Njigba should have killed the Bears over the top. If they meet again, Seattle will do a lot better, I’m sure. They’re a better team than they showed.