Bears4Ever_34

Keenum was absolutely sensational tonight. I was totally wrong about my keys to the game. I thought the only way the Bears could win was by running the ball. Keenum was making some incredible plays against pressure all night. The floaters he had that were dropped perfectly into the receivers hands as he got it out just before taking the hit was elite quarterback stuff. If Caleb ever adds that to his game, he's going to win MVP. Can't say enough good things about that gutsy performance from Keenum. Hats off! The defense was not good in the 1st half, but did a complete turnaround in the 2nd half, pitching a shutout. Dennis Allen finally brought pressure and fooled Hurts a couple times in key situations. Reminded me of the Rams playoff game a little bit. Theineman might be a stud. He's made plays in every game so far. He's always around the ball, and seems to be the surest of tacklers I've seen in a while. I think we got a good one. Special teams continues to be a disaster this year. Sam Rousch is awful and continuously makes the dumbest mistakes. Tripped over his own feet on a wide open catch in the first series, then, for some reason, decided to fall on the punt that was already lying on the ground at the 1 yard line and couldn't keep his foot from touching the goal line. Pretty sure he missed another blocking assignment on special teams and was benched later in the game. He needs to sit more than he is, because he is costing them big time. Also, Cairo Santos with his 4th or 5th kick that fell short of the landing zone already this year. Completely unacceptable. Return coverage was also quite bad. Kevin Hightower has somehow evaded a firing for years, but it's becoming really difficult to ignore with each passing week how poorly his unit has been playing. Last thing I'll say is that Keenum needs to start next week. I'm pretty sure Ben Johnson already hinted that it's going to be Bagent, and I think that is the wrong decision. Bagent has made 4 starts in his NFL career and none of them were particularly good. He got sacked on the last play of the game against Minnesota and threw a few hospital balls that were lucky to have been completed in that game, too. Keenum has over 60 career starts and is coming off maybe the game of his life against a really good opponent. I don't understand what we're doing here? Bagent has earned nothing. There's nothing wrong riding the hot hand, and if Keenum struggles against the Jets, you can go back to Bagent against the Packers. If Bagent struggles against the Jets, and the Bears lose, now you just gave away a game you should have won and immediately find yourself in a position to go back to Keenum and ruin Bagent's confidence. Maybe he'll be good and I'll eat crow next week, but I just don't know why you would mess with a good thing now. These next two weeks are so important.

Two glaring things that stood out to me from this game: -Ben Johnson is really bad against NFC North defensive coordinators -The Bears receivers might suck 3rd time in a row Brian Flores thoroughly outcoached Ben Johnson. They blitzed over 70% of the game and our receivers still couldn't get open. They had zero answers for anything. The OL got pushed around all game again, too. Colston Loveland only has 1 catch this season. Really discouraging sign for Mr. offensive genius who wants to break scoring records. Maybe just focus on looking better against quality coaches instead of bum slaying? If Caleb Williams ends up on IR, the season's over anyways. How quickly things can change. Back to being miserable...

I really would like to see Zavion Thomas getting in on the action sometime soon. I'm intrigued to see what he can add at the RB position with this group. If he could form a 3 headed monster in the backfield, their offense will be even more unstoppable than it already is. It'd be like an earth, wind, and fire kind of a thing.

What a crazy game. Started off like a disaster, but they hung in and Carolina just couldn't keep up with their explosiveness on offense. When the run game and pass game is that in sync, the Bears will be a very difficult team to beat. Caleb looked great minus 2 poor throws (Kmet and Loveland). He looked noticeably quicker with his decision making, and I loved how he didn't avoid taking off with it himself. Sometimes he needlessly inhibits his own ability to generate yardage when he passes up scramble opportunities... The receivers finally made difficult catches and helped out their quarterback, for once. Defensively, they are horrendous. It's going to be an issue all year. Bryce Young had all day to throw. The defensive tackles, for some reason, were creating a massive hole in the middle by rushing the outside shoulder of both guards. Young killed them on second reaction plays. Anytime he broke the pocket, the Bears DB's couldn't cover anybody. If there is one bright spot on defense, it's that both rookies look very good. All in all, a much needed win to start the season with some tough games coming up. The Bears need to do a better job in their divisional games compared to last year. Next week will be another good test for the offense to prove they are legit.

Don't know anything about him, but I saw some ATL people say he was better at outside than inside in their system, but struggled against the run. At 5'9, I see no world he plays outside in Dennis Allen's system. But if nickel isn't his strong suit either, I'm not sure how much value he has to the team as a backup. I'm hoping the Bears can get more out of him at Nickel than ATL did, because it would allow Mohamed to play his more natural position on the outside.

It's a tough pill to swallow when you can only get a 5th round pick for someone drafted in the 2nd round only a few years ago, but it's better to get something for a guy the Bears had no intention of re-signing, and who was losing reps to other guys on the roster. The decision to draft him in the first place was always perplexing. He played in a read and react system at Florida, but the Bears drafted him as an up-field player in Matt Eberflus' system. Dennis Allen also uses his DT's as up-field guys instead of space eaters, which is not what Dexter is good at. His get off speed was one of his biggest weaknesses in college. Just horrible scouting by Ryan Poles on this one. There's no way around it. You can't whiff on so many 2nd round draft picks. Unfortunately, it seems like Stevenson and Shemar Turner won't be that far behind.

Yuck. I sure hope this isn't their starter. Clear downgrade from Dalman.

I really hope the Bears didn't clear up over 30 million in cap space to not make some sort of splash signing/trade. They just lost 3 quality starters this week. If they lose out on Lindenbaum or Crosby, it's going to put immense pressure on Ryan Poles to nail the draft again to replace a lot of these guys. They still need 2 safeties on top of a C, LT, and pass rusher—and now WR3.

Drake Maye just finished off the worst stretch of games in playoff history for a quarterback to make it to a Superbowl. 21 sacks, 7 fumbles are both NFL records. The Patriots came into the game already having scored the fewest combined points of any SB team during their playoff run. Turns out, conventional wisdom won the day. Patriots were schedule merchants throughout the regular season and rode an extremely fortuitous stretch of injury luck in the playoffs all the way to a Superbowl they really had no business being in. Also, Will Cambell's arms are too freakin short to play LT.

Drake Maye's 3 game playoff stretch: 15 sacks, 6 fumbles, 2 INT's, 55.8% completion %. He was horrible. Injury luck is the biggest reason they're in the Superbowl. Texans didn't have Nico Collins, and lost Dalton Schultz and their starting RB early in the previous game, and then, of course, Bo Nix misses the AFC Championship game. Pretty sure the Broncos score more than 7 points with him in the lineup... Must be nice. I hope they get their ass kicked in the Superbowl.

Yep. I'll keep saying it, but his insistence on every drop back needing to be a pass has cost his team so many yards throughout the season. It's also had a negative impact on his efficiency. Instead of an incompletion (or turnover), it would go down as a positive run. I often times wonder if internally he's having a battle with himself where he doesn't like running because he wants to prove to everyone he is a pocket passer. When you're in a gotta have it situation, you don't want to introduce more variable into a play by passing when you can just use your legs and scramble for what feels like could be 10-20 yards anytime Caleb wants to, but that's the problem: he doesn't.

Yeah, they haven't had a quick game all year. The quarterback is still too much in all or nothing mode. There were several times in this game he missed the RB in the flat for major yardage. He misses 5 yard out routes. It HAS to get better next year. Their lack of run game only highlights the necessity for having a quarterback that is efficient with the quick game to make up for it.

Caleb Williams and Ben Johnson both had their worst games as a professional. Caleb's down field accuracy cost them this game, as well as Ben Johnson's decision making in the redzone. Gut wrenching loss. Defense played their ass off.

Un freaking believable

Ben Johnson has been a disaster for the past month. 100% blew this game with his refusal to throw the ball inside the 10. Unbelievably bad coaching.

Once again Caleb lazily doesn't pick up a 1st down when he easily could, which forces a 3rd and short that the Bears predictably don't get. I can't believe how many blown opportunities this offense has had tonight. The Rams have been begging them to take over this game.

Caleb has been atrocious for 90% of this game. What the hell are these throws? He's becoming a turnover machine at the worst possible time.

These bounces the last two games have all gone against the Bears. That's the 3rd fumble the Rams have recovered of their own. They've been flirting with a turnover the entire game.

Coleston Loveland has had a terrible 1st half. That's maybe the 3rd drop already for him in this game. I think we're at at least 5 for the game, and it's only been 1 half. Everyone will shit on Caleb's completion % again, but this is another example of it not being completely his fault.

Looks like Kyler Gordon is back to being a difference maker!

Ben's playcalling on 4th downs is unbelievably bad. Can we please stop forcing the runs inside?? They haven't been working for at least a month with this team. The outside runs have worked all year! What are we doing??

Williams missed a wide open Swift in the flat that would have picked up 15+. Can't miss these opportunities to extend drives with an offense like the Rams.

Odunze is awful. Ruined a touchdown drive. Referees missed an obvious blow to the head, and still, Ben Johnson refuses to take the points. Terrible start.

Special teams might win the Bears the game. The Rams are legit awful, and the Bears have gotten much better ever since the disaster in Cincinnati. They were low-key heroes of last week's game, too, with several big returns. Would be a great time to pull out a trick play against them in a pivotal moment, IMO.

He really is starting to break conventional wisdom. The way he plays it's become a trade off of efficiency for explosiveness, and it's working. To analogize it to the NBA, it's sort of akin to how modern day offenses would rather you take a higher volume of 3's and shoot it at a 35% clip than taking more 2's and making 45% of them. Caleb can get away with having a lower completion % because he's hitting the bigger plays downfield, and he makes throws nobody else can make outside of Patrick Mahomes. When you combine that with how well he takes care of the football, this is the result you get. That's why he was the consensus #1 pick for 2 years in a row at USC.