Bears4Ever_34

Scrolling through some of the tweets from practice today, it seems like it was a better day for the offense than the joint practices against Miami, but LT has become a major bottleneck for their ability to sustain drives. Way too many false starts and sacks given up. Braxton Jones with another subpar practice. On the positive side, OZ keeps making plays as WR3. Another 40+ yard TD reception in one of the final 11 on 11 drills today, and the Caleb/Rome connection is apparently red hot right now. Multiple TD's for Rome in team drills on the day. Oh, and Shamar Turner came back to practice, which is good to see.

This is the guy they had to have instead of Jalen Carter. Not a great news day for Ryan Poles' OL draft picks. Trapillo seems destined for the swing tackle position as he continues to lose reps to Braxton Jones and an undrafted free agent at LT.

That was a rough watch. Brutal offensive execution down the stretch, especially after the big sack to set them up in FG range. My only real observation/takeaway from that game is that Keenum looked a lot more comfortable than Tyson Bagent. I'd elevate him to QB2 for the next pre-season game, at the very least.

Booker with the hat trick today. He's a pre-season demon. If only he could translate this to the regular season.

Not a good day for the Bears secondary or Tyson Bagent. Monongai looked great, though.

Sounds like another rough practice for the offense in joint practice with Miami. From what I was reading, he threw a pick on the first play of 11 on 11's, followed that up with a 70 yard TD to Zacheus, but then not much success after that in any other team drills. Sacks, false starts, and throwaways seemed to be the theme of practice. I wonder if Johnson is going to regret not having #18 out there in pre-season on Sunday. I understand his decision, but I feel like he needs to play better in these practices to justify it. On the flip-side, the defense dominated without Kyler Gordon (and Johnson, of course). Miami also didn't have Tyreek Hill, which shouldn't be discounted. Tua had 3 picks today after reportedly only having 1 the entire training camp.

What the hell is going on with Zah Frazier? He's been MIA since before camp with a "personal issue." Whatever it is, it's kind of crazy he'd potentially throw away his NFL career over this, because I can't imagine him making the team at this point.

I haven't heard anything out of camp this year that feels any different than in year's past. It's always the same story about the struggling offense and quarterback. There's still a few weeks left to turn a corner, and maybe they will after the install period is over later this week, but the vibes don't feel great to me with the quarterback. Way too many delays of games and lack of anticipatory throws.

Saw this play pop up on social media yesterday, but this angle adds a layer of context that makes the play look even better. I think Jenkins is correct here. It's a designed sprint action throwback towards the opposite sideline. You can see the route the receiver runs is synced up perfectly to Caleb stepping back up into the pocket after fooling the defense with misdirection. These are the kinds of plays I imagine Ben Johnson is designing specifically for Caleb to take advantage of his mobility. More of this please.

Yeah, I saw that late last night cycling through my feed. Not surprised. Eberflus tried to do some of that last year in camp, but he wasn't/isn't smart enough to learn anything from it the way I'm certain Ben Johnson can. It sounds like they are trying to drill in the under center aspect of the offense, and he's not reacting to it particularly well, at this point. I'll be curious to see when the season starts if they abandon that idea and keep him primarily in the shotgun while mixing in some tempo to keep him comfortable. Hopefully he starts to take more to the things he's struggling with now, because that will make the entire offense more dynamic, but it also wouldn't surprise me if they started the year off super basic, running variations of the same few plays that the QB likes and expand from there. Peyton Manning made a HOF career out of that.

All good. I'm very optimistic about Ben Johnson. I'm still a Caleb fan, but the honeymoon phase is over, at least on my end. No more excuses. He needs to look like a #1 pick, and I think he needs a fast start to the season to maintain any chance of a potential playoff spot.

It's not one particular play, but a general vibe of how the day has gone. It's always the same story. Slow out of the gate, disjointed, clunky, quarterback struggling to get rid of the ball, taking sacks, etc... The defense has "won" the vast majority of practices since 2018, and before that, 2013—the last truly great Bears offense. It's not a coincidence that those two seasons were also good training camp years for the offense, especially 2013. You're right that it's too early to make any declarations, and there's still ample time to turn things around before week 1. I'm not saying the Bears or Caleb WILL be bad this year, but I am saying that if history is any indicator, if this trend of bad practice performance continues, it will translate into bad regular season performance, and I expected the #1 pick in the draft to be able to adapt more quickly than he has, not just this year, but last.

We're 3 days in, or 6 if you count mini-camp, and everything feels exactly the same. The offense is struggling, the quarterback sucks, the defense is dominating, and the excuses are beginning to form. It's all so tiresome. I was optimistic about Caleb when we drafted him, but the rough practices are beginning to pile up for him already. If history is any indicator, we better get ready for another rough offensive season if these reports don't start changing in the near future. Part of me is beginning to wonder what his work ethic is really like. There are rumblings out there that haven't gone away. At this point, I have more confidence in Ben Johnson than I do Caleb Williams.

Burden needs to stay healthy. He's already way behind other players who were able to practice during the off-season program. Both Loveland and Burden need to be factors this year for the Bears to do anything special. Sometimes I wonder if Ben Johnson thought Burden was milking his injury a little bit during mini-camp, based on the things he said at his press conference. I wouldn't be surprised if Burden started out behind Zaccheaus at the beginning of camp, just to make it clear that he needs to earn his position, and it starts by being available. Soft tissue injuries are sometimes an indicator of poor weight training habits in the gym.

Yeah, he said something like "The Bears can find another CB, but my daughter can't find another father", as if he's the only dad playing in the NFL.

It's probably nothing major. He could be sick, or have one of those "personal" issues that always conveniently occurs during off-season practices. I don't think he's dumb enough to demand a new contract already after 1 year, but I guess we'll see. He totally seems like a guy who just doesn't put much value in off-season programs at this stage of his career, similar to guys like Aaron Rodgers. He's always going to be looking for an excuse to miss as much time as he reasonably can to save his body for the games that count. You'd like to think he'd show more of a sense of urgency to be there for the new staff, but whatever..

I meant that they could fast track his hiring should they lose next week, or whenever that is. It's better to get the procedural crap out of the way as soon as possible so another team can't offer him the job before you can.

Upon review, the rule is you have to interview two external minority candidates, and they have to be in-person. So, Thomas Brown wouldn't count. That would explain why the Patriots interviewed Pep Hamilton and Byron Leftwhich. I wasn't aware it changed to 2. Means they need another one of these sham interviews to fast track the hire, if that's what they want to do.

Fair point. I actually forgot about the Brown dynamic. Don't think he's interviewed for the job yet, weirdly, unless I missed something. Ron Rivera would be a disastrous hiring for the Bears as a HC. Another defensive retread who can't hire coordinators. He's also publicly stated his support for Jayden Daniels over Caleb Williams. You can't put that genie back in the bottle. If it's not a Rooney rule thing, then it's a useless "favor" interview, as DABEARSDABOMB previously stated.

Apparently, to fulfill the Rooney rule, you must interview a candidate in-person for it to count. Rivera is scheduled to be the only candidate to interview in-person, so far, and I won't allow my mind to go to a place where they'd realistically hire him as the HC. My guess is that they are prepping for in case DET were to lose next week, they could just get everything over quickly now.

The perks of playing in the perennial worst division in football every year. It doesn't take much to win that division. That said, it's still a testament to their coaching that they were able to hold it together despite all of the injuries. I still believe Stroud will bounce back and that you can't really get a good idea on how good a QB really is until after his 3rd season.

Joe Brady was requested today, and Pete Carroll is reportedly interviewing Thursday. This list is way too long, and, once again, leaves me with the feeling that this organization has no idea what they're doing. They interviewed 10 offensive coordinator candidates last year and ended up with Shane Waldron. Just hire Ben Johnson and let's get this thing over with.

Unpopular opinion, but Mike McCarthy is a pretty good coach. It's funny to me the discrepancy between how the general public views a guy like McCarthy and how they view Mike Tomlin. If you compare their resumes side by side, they are eerily similar. McCarthy: -18 seasons - .608 regular season win% - .500 playoff win % - 1 Superbowl Tomlin: -18 seasons - .630 regular season win % - .444 playoff win % - 1 Superbowl He wouldn't be my 1st or 2nd choice, but the Bears could do a lot worse. There also would be something poetic about Caleb Williams being coached by the man who developed his favorite player into a Hall of Famer.

Vrabel has to be the front runner for the New England job now that they fired Mayo. Bears better get their shit together and fire Ryan Poles ASAP before Ben Johnson takes the Jags job.

Will be watching as background noise this week unless they come out playing inspired football. If it looks like a blowout by halftime, I'll find something else to do. Not going to let this team ruin another Sunday.