DABEARSDABOMB

So my overreaction Monday is - I didn’t think Fields looked awful in first half. I thought he missed some plays and things were too conservative but I thought they moved it ok and he was pretty accurate. I actually even liked that he had some good check downs. 2nd half the defense was getting destroyed and oline was bad and Fields looked like a deer in the head light but maybe that happened cause he was getting mauled every play and it’s just human nature to do that. That is the only real excuse I can make for the offense. We know Lucas Patrick sucks and I am convinced Davis is pure garbage (what an awful moved by Poles - dude clearly wants nothing to do with the Bears). Whitehair is not what he once was and even than he was overvalued by Pace (pace gave him that extension). Defensively - I am far less worried, other than I think Williams is not good dc. I do expect they will have trouble generating a pass rush - but I also expected communication issues from this d. Lots of new players, lots of young players, and a ton of various injuries during training camp was like a trifecta of things that would lead to the type of miscues and breakdowns they saw.

On the bolded - my problem is, I think part of the problem is Fields isn't comfortable and doesn't trust his eyes to throw downfield. And at this point - if I were to bet, I don't think he ever will. I hope this is an overreaction I look back on and if there was ever a week you could really overreact it would be week 1. I will also admit - during part of the 1H I was thinking, Fields looks pretty good - so a lot of my view compounded in 2H when everything got terrible. I didn't think Fields played terrible in 1H - I would have to turn those field goals into touchdowns, but I could look the other way, in the 2H, his pocket presence and compsosure was awful. Total check down. I did notice on some of the plays - it was as if he never even did a 3 or 5 step drop - it looked like he literally was right behind the center which meant any push at all allowed the Packers to blow it all up.

Claypool was blown up every time I saw him. With that said - I think it was Davis. Guy got a contract, hasn't showed up the whole off-season to much anything, gave up 8 pressures. Was a straight up disaster. This is as bad of a move as it gets - especially given they gave him big money (I think of 12M/yr as big money for a guard - unless I'm remembering wrong and he got a lot less).

Claypool or Davis would be my 2 guesses.

It’s the only bright side to me - week 1 so I can discount it a bit. 3 or 4 more weeks like this and than my mind will be made up regarding our QB.

I still expect them to be 2-2 heading into Thursday night football against Washington. Win next week Loss to Chiefs Win Vs Broncos

Let’s just hope If they get to that point they have picks 1 and 2 - pick both qbs and pray to god they get one of them right haha. In all honestly - I put odds at 50 percent plus they are replacing qb next year. I hope not cause I really like Justin, but I have rationalized guys for years - put up or shut up time this year.

Either the play calls were terrible or the offensive coaching staff thinks Fields sucks or both. Awful awful offensive performance. I am not going to accept anything / not deal with excuses. If fields is legit - than we should see him overcome it and be good. This is black and white - if he is mediocre or we are trying to rationalize - than move on and draft a qb. I’ll give him this year and I get first game could be an anomaly, but that was not a good start. At all. That was an awful performance all around. Pathetic.

Urlacher was so much better. Not a knock on Lewis and I was not always the biggest Urlacher guy, but when I think of Urlacher I think about a falcons bears game with prime Mike Vick. Urlacher made him look slow. He wasn’t as flashy as Lewis was but it was because he made it so easy in terms of how much he took away from the te and how he was able to cover the whole field. Dude was something else. He did have real good weapons around him. Briggs was a monster most of his career and Colvin/Holdman were pretty good too plus peanut and others….but Urlacher was some kind of special.

I’ll be honest - I am not giving fields another oc, unless it’s because he kicked so much butt that Getsy is now a head coach. I do think If they win 7 games, Flus is probably back - might be fields isn’t back. I guess the exception would be if they went like 7-2 and than completely flopped down the stretch (for some reason other than your all pro qb went down). And I caveat - I am going to try and not overreact on first few weeks - but by middle of the season I better see a lot of improvement from Fields.

I'm not going to lie - right now all of my inner mind is telling me, buckle up, this is not going to be the fun season I was hoping for. I really hope I am wrong and the Bears surprise but trying to manage expectations. This really is about young players emerging and growing (which would hopefully indicated we have a front office that can find talent) and ideally us finding a QB. With that said - if Fields isn't the guy, but the other young parts are looking good, etc, than I at least can have hope that we have the right people in charge, the right picks, and will get it right. That said - I'm hoping for the home run, we hit on QB and the picks.

Come on Bears - let this be the start of a dominant era of Bear football!!!

Get better stinger!!!

Briggs

I think defense is still weak, but hopefully young players take steps forward. Offense still has flaws. I need to see Mooney still has his speed and Claypool at this point has done zilch - so need to see a lot. If they aren’t what they can be - this offense isn’t very good. But I do think this roster is setting up - if Fields struggles, you have the capital to move forward with new QB and be in position to be where they need to be. I truly hope Fields can do it though and I am just going to wait and see. I think 7-10 wins. 10 at absolute most. Gun to my head 7-8.

I don’t get it - Lewis was better than Green but somehow Green is still around.

When I saw where we signed him from, I was curious. Vrabel likes physical players, builds from the lines, etc. So fact that he walked, yes, Bears could have offered more money - but than the way he responded in the offseason staying away, clearly all red flags. I don't know that the story is true - but revisionist history - this is the 2nd major move where out of the gate they look to be poor moves (1st was the Claypool move and 2nd was Davis). With all that said - Davis and Claypool can go on to crush it this year and no one will care about the early bumps in the road.

Again - Poles has made his mistakes, but I like the fact that he doesn't seem to just stick to a guy because he brought him in. Ebner clearly didn't have "it" - they moved on. I like that candor and ability to be objective from a roster perspective.

I don't love giving up a 6th rounder, but I do agree we have a need for some depth. Would have rather waited cause I suspect a better player will get cut.

Agree with everything you said - re: Bagent and also re: Fields, especially regarding OSU and the level of talent surrounding them and the type of habits it created. Those are not going to be easy to break and it takes time.

If Fields could throw the quick ones like Bagent - he would be an all time great. That isn't to say Bagent is great at the quick ones, but very clear he can process the short stuff quick. Fields is a monster down the field and has the arm talent and obviously physical talent. He also works hard and mentally is strong - but I think he's spent his whole career going big whale hunting and in the NFL you are going to get killed doing it. The %'s just aren't as good as they are at lower levels where you have more spacing, can complete at higher percentages, etc. He has to be able to get the check-downs and do the short and intermediate throws that open up the deep ball. He doesn't have to do it awesome, but being average is probably good enough with his other skill sets. I do think if he can do that - its one of those things that 3-4 years later, you'll see he will actually continue to improve at that, just as he's seen so much more from the NFL - but the only way he gets that chance is if he can be decent enough now.

I also noticed Bagent hasn't really thrown anything down the field.

I still think the risk that Fields will never process the field fast enough is real. Again - he doesn't need to process like an above average QB, given his pure athleticism and ability to run - but he has to be ability to process quick enough, etc. Same issue Trubisky had - dude just couldn't see the field quick enough.

Haha - I have enjoyed having it on YouTube. I had the single streaming version for past couple of years but really glad I can finally record the games.

This cuts make total sense and glad to see they aren’t afraid to make them.