Bears4Ever_34

If Caleb could just hit those deep balls, his numbers would have looked a lot better today. That's the thing that's really been killing him this season. He's just not even close with anything beyond 15 yards. I've given him a 4 week grace period before getting too critical, but he HAS to start hitting those shots to DJ down the sideline when he's open. If you're going to dink and dunk for most of the game, you can't blow the few opportunities you do have to attack a team down the field. To his credit, he didn't turn the ball over, and the run game and penalties didn't allow him to be as prolific as you'd like to see, yardage-wise, but he did have some nice moments in the pocket. The TD to DJ and the dot over the middle to Kmet on the final TD drive were special throws. CAR JAX WAS NE AZ Going back to the IND game, the Bears have about 7 consecutive games against teams with shoddy defenses. This is the part of the schedule I anticipated Caleb having the most success with. You can't drop more than 2 of these next 5. Realistically, I think they probably need to go 4-1 to get to 6-3 before facing the Packers to put themselves in contention for a playoff spot down the stretch. Even with a win today, I haven't seen enough from the offense yet to make me feel confident in their ability moving forward. Still only 260 yards of offense against a bad defense today, despite the W.

I really don't get QBR at all. It's so strange to me how Stafford can have 2 turnovers and no touchdowns and still somehow come out of that game with a significantly better QBR (54) than Caleb today (39). They don't really explain the methodology clearly enough for me to trust the stat as meaningful. I mean, Bo Nix has a QBR in the 50's, somehow, despite a 1/4 TD/INT ratio and a game with 60 passing yards. It's crazy.

It really blows that the NFC North just happens to be the best division in football the year the Bears get the #1 pick. I was banking on MIN being one of the worst teams in football (yikes) because I didn't believe in Darnold. There's still a long way to go in the year, but I don't see MIN slowing down anytime soon. They easily have the best combo of OC/DC in the NFL right now. If they are a real contender this season, I think the Bears playoff hopes are all but diminished, barring Caleb Williams playing close to out of his mind down the stretch, which seems unlikely and unfair.

Lots of short stuff with half field reads. Commanders are going with a conservative approach to Daniels, hoping to expand the playbook as he gains confidence with all the easy stuff. Bears are throwing Caleb into the fire immediately, hoping he'll learn the more advanced stuff faster through his mistakes. The Bears are even giving Caleb what looks to be complete autonomy at the LOS to change plays. Personally, I'm fine with the Bears approach as long as he's improving with knowing his protections schemes and recognizing the hot reads. If he's still struggling to pick up blitzes, this method could get him killed. However, the hope is that eventually he'll learn enough from those mistakes and reach an advanced level of pocket passing quicker than Daniels, who at some point, will need to show he can be more than a 1 read, take off and run style of quarterback.

Speaking from what I think the Bears perspective will be and not necessarily mine: I think Poles is safe no matter what happens this year. I think the Eberflus decision will come down to how Caleb plays. If he's still struggling by the end of the season and the Bears miss the playoffs, It would be criminal to not look at an offensive-minded head coach in the off-season. That said, I could also see a scenario where he's brought back if the Bears win 7 games, but Caleb is looking vastly improved by the end of the season. Ryan Poles has to be aware of the Bears history of how changing coaches in the middle of a young quarterback's career has had a negative impact on the future. He's going to want to give Eberflus the longest leash possible to avoid repeating the same tired formula that continues to haunt this franchise. A mistake that, again, could have easily been avoided if he'd have just gotten rid of the coach before you drafted the quarterback...

Kingsbury has him playing smart, efficient football. I disagree that he looks like Stroud. If you watch Daniels play, he's still very much a 1 read/take off and run QB. The good news is that his 1st read is almost always open because most of his throws are not going beyond 15 yards of the LOS. They sprinkle in a few deep shots here and there, but WAS has done a good job of giving him a heavy dose of screens, quick hitches, and slants to get him into a rhythm. If the 1st option isn't there, he either dumps it off to a RB or he just takes off and runs for positive yardage nearly everytime. I'll be very curious to see how he adjusts when defenses begin to sit on the short stuff and do a better job of containing him in the pocket. Right now, it's working tremendously, but he's going to have to improve as a full field reader, like Stroud did, if he wants to sustain a long career in the NFL. I see a lot of RGIII in his game with a little weaker arm. He looks too skinny to withstand the punishment he's taking on some of those hits. I don't think his body holds up long term, but for right now, things appear to be clicking.

I said at the time that I thought he should have been fired the moment he decided to keep Matt Eberflus. Every sane person knew the most logical decision in the moment to make was to reset this coaching staff under a new rookie QB and keep everybody on the same timeline, and yet, here we are repeating history. If that wasn't bad enough, they also missed out on Jim Harbaugh, who was the homerun, can't miss coaching candidate of the last decade, and other bright offensive minds in Bobby Slowik or Ben Johnson. It was the absolute worst possible decision the Bears could have made in that situation, and one they may end up regretting forever depending on what ends up happening with Caleb.

Any semblance of a run game would add so much to this offense. It takes pressure off the OL and the QB, which means less sacks and more efficient passing. Play action is effectively useless right now. I don't know what it's going to take to rectify this issue, but I do know that more DeAndre Swift is not the answer.

Rams might be a tougher game than I originally expected coming into the week. They somehow beat a good 49'ers team, albeit a team missing about as many critical starters as the Rams, and completed a nice comeback. I still think the Bears should have an advantage playing at home against a severely undermanned team. Bears defense is really going to have to do a better job stopping the run against Williams, because he's their only real threat on offense with Kupp and Nakua out. You hope that Caleb's progress continues to be as linear as it has, so far. He's gotten more comfortable in every game, going from awful in week 1, to bad in week 2, to maybe just below average this week. An average game with more TD's than turnovers is what I'm hoping for next week. That should be enough to win.

Yep, he looks like a disaster of a signing. No vision or contact balance, whatsoever. At the very least, I thought he'd be useful catching passes out of the backfield, but so far, he's been terrible at that, too. It's hard to fathom how this team could go from a top 5 rushing team to the worst in a year. I know Fields makes up for a huge chunk of that, but they still got positive production out of both Herbert and Foreman for several games, some of those came with Tyson Bagent. I don't know if they're running a new blocking scheme or what, but they have got to figure something in a hurry because Williams cannot survive throwing the ball 52 times playing behind this OL all season. Personally, I'd like to see more Herbert, and if the struggles continue for another week or two, you might be forced into Velus out of desperation. It's crazy that we're already at this point.

This was a horrible loss, but Caleb and Rome Odunze made clear signs of progress despite the ineptitude of this coaching staff. If it wasn't obvious already, this run game is completely broken. Colts were the worst run defense in the league, by a mile, and they looked like the Steel Curtain out there today going against Bears RB's. It's actually even more impressive that Caleb was able to have as much success throwing the ball today while being forced into one dimensional football. Next week's game becomes a must-win. The Rams are reeling, the Bears cannot afford to start the year off 1-3 with a back-loaded schedule of good teams waiting for them starting in week 11.

Their schedule really until the Packers game looks incredibly favorable. Assuming relative health, they won't be a heavy underdog again until at least the Packers. Certainly, with IND and LA missing a lot of their key players the next couple weeks, the Bears have a realistic shot to run the table up to the London game. 4-1 would be a terrific start to the season. This week will be the key game, IMO. It's the most likely of the 3 (IND, LA, CAR) they could lose because it's on the road.

The schedule and injuries sets itself up well for the Bears to make a run over this next month and a half. The Rams won't have Nakua 2 weeks from now, and now Kupp is hurt, too. Critical time for Caleb to show something as the schedule really starts to lighten up.

This loss goes directly on Ryan Poles. His decision to keep Matt Eberflus and ignore the OL this off-season is setting this franchise up for another draft bust at quarterback. This coordinator has no idea what he's doing. The personnel groupings make no sense. Too much Travis Homer and Gerald Everett and not enough Kmet and Khalil Herbert. I just watched Malik freaking Willis look like a competent quarterback today with Matt Lafleur calling plays. The way they were able to scheme up some creative run calls early in that game for Josh Jacobs really took the pressure off Willis, and it paid off. Caleb has no chance if Waldron is just going to continue allowing DeAndre Swift to get the ball 14 times for 18 yards (!). The Bears have CAR in week 5. If Caleb and this offense doesn't start to turn the corner by then, I'm going to start pushing the panic button, because it cannot looks this bad. I figured they'd have their bumps and bruises, but I did not expect the OL to give up 7 sacks in a game and for the quarterback to not be able to throw the ball accurately more than 10 yards down field when his receivers are open. This is way worse of a start than even my most conservative predictions thought it would be. Awful sign.

I'm reaching for optimism, but it's possible A.) The Titans defense is going to be really good and B.) They had the element of surprise advantage coming into this game, given the fact they had a new coordinator with no play calling experience. You'd figure it might be easier to scout a Texans team who's defense you actually have film on.

Needless to say, that was one of the most ugly wins you'll ever see. I don't really feel all that great after that one, to be honest. A win is a win, but also, not really. This formula is not sustainable. You can't score zero touchdowns on offense, throw for less than 100, and expect to win very many games. Caleb played about as bad as one could for their first start. His accuracy was atrocious. Deep balls weren't close and neither were most of his short throws. He looked rattled after they fell behind early. 1st game jitters or something else? All I know is that it HAS to get better next week. That wasn't acceptable today, even for a rookie. Too much talent on this offense for it to look like that. Play calling, run game, OL, Caleb, everything has to be better. As for the good: -Darrell Taylor was the most important player out there today. He was flying around out there. Poles might have gotten a steal if he can continue to show out like this. -Andre Carter had some nice kick and punt returns. -Hardy had the play of the game to jump start the comeback with that punt block. Other concerns: - Waldron's play calling lacked creativity. Very little misdirection, no up-tempo to change things up, only 1 WR run late in the game (which happened to be their 2nd biggest run play of the day). His fingerprints were all over this, too. -Keenan Allen looks washed. Terrible drop in the endzone, and it looks like his foot is already bothering him again. Early returns on that trade aren't looking so hot right now. He had a bad pre-season, too. -OL couldn't block anybody. What else is new? Poles decision to ignore the center position two years in a row is going to haunt this team. Shelton and Bates are both ending up on their ass too much. RB's were getting touched far too often in the backfield.

Hard for me to see a scenario where Will Levis dominates against this Bears defense. My only real concern going into this game is on offense. If they can avoid the self-inflicted mistakes (Caleb turning it over/OL committing dumb penalties), they shouldn't have a problem beating this team at home. They have the better roster.

OL, DL, and punt returner remain the team's biggest weaknesses. Can't expect to be a playoff team if both sides of the line are bad. Will be interesting to see which players (if any) step up at those positions. My confidence meter is a little higher with the DL than OL right now. I think Booker is going to be a player. Saw a stat that said the Bears are the first team since 2013 SEA to post a point differential that high in the pre-season. SEA won the SB that year. I saw another stat from week 1 where the Bears posted their highest single game margin of victory since 2006, which is the year they went to the SB. I'm not saying, I'm just saying

I totally disagree with you about Velus. He looks good at RB. Runs with some pop. Reports are that he's had a great last couple days in training camp at his new position. I'm not big on Roschon Johnson at all anymore. He looks very ordinary as a runner, doesn't make people miss and doesn't break as many tackles as you thought he would coming out of college. Velus, if he can hold on to the ball (which is a big IF), gives this offense a real speed threat they don't have with anyone else. He didn't have many opportunities out there today, but I'm totally on board with this experiment. I've been calling this positional change for 2 years now. He can't catch, but every time he's gotten an end around in an actual game, he almost always does something positive with it.

The most important thing we've learned from this pre-season is that Caleb's special traits will pretty clearly translate to this level. That's all that matters in pre-season, is seeing whether or not those traits show up on tape from your drafted players. We knew from Justin Fields' first pre-season game that he had elite speed. Caleb's pocket mobility and playmaking skills on the run is uncanny. He was toying with the defensive lineman out there. He struggled with accuracy early on, but those are things he can learn from. I did like the fact that he didn't put the ball in harm's way this week. Could have had two explosive throws downfield if Tyler Scott wasn't held on the DPI. It was a perfect ball. Overall, you have to be really pleased with how he's looked in these two pre-season games. There's definitely room for growth, but like I said, the traits are there.

Couldn't have scripted the game much better for Caleb. He showed tremendous poise in the pocket, went through his progressions, and delivered the ball on time, both inside and outside the pocket. I don't know what more anybody could have asked from him in his first live game action. Both drops came in the redzone, which stalled one of the drives, and the other got stalled out with 3 straight runs. I loved his ability to recognize the defense shifting from single high safety to 2 man, understanding the hole in the defense was to scramble, which allowed him to pick up that last 1st down inside the red zone. Hell of a start to his career. I can't wait for next week.

Genuinely shocked they only gave them 3 primetime games. I hate how the only home night game they give the Bears is always the crappy Thursday games. I honestly can't recall the last home SNF or MNF game they've had in years. At first glance, my initial thoughts are that the team better get off to a hot start before that week 11 game against the Packers or it could be tough sledding to finish the season. The backloaded divisional games with SF thrown in there, as well as a 3 games in 10 days stretch, make it absolutely imperative to win early. I've got them at 10-7. I think the division will be super competitive, but the Vikings will be playing for draft position by the end of the year while the Bears, Lions, and Packers battle for the playoffs.

We've heard rumblings about this kind of stuff ever since Dan Orlovsky criticized his work ethic during the pre-draft process based off the information people were giving him at the time. The most credible report came directly from Josh Lucas, former player personal director under Ryan Pace, who flat out said the relationship between Fields and the other quarterbacks did not work at all. Who knows how true any of it really is. I tend to believe there's at least a kernel of truth there. Fields has never been a talkative guy. His podium pressers left much to be desired from a charisma and personality standpoint. Sometimes he looked disinterested and agitated even in situations that were supposed to be light-hearted. I always got a weird vibe with him. If any of that carried over into the locker room, it wouldn't surprise me if he came off poorly to certain people.

Yeah, it would irk me if the Bears passed on a better deal for the sake of Justin. The Bears should only be concerned about what's in the best interest of what makes their team better. That said, I'd love to know the difference in compensation. You're right in that it could be a question of sending him to another conference for a slightly lower pick. If it's anything more than that, though, that's a problem.

Hard to believe we live in a world where Kenny Pickett can warrant a 3rd round pick, but Justin Fields only nets a conditional 6th. I get the contracts play a part in the matter, but a 3 round difference in compensation is wild to me. I don't think Justin Fields is good, but he's certainly better than Pickett. The reality of the situation is that Fields' lack of scheme versatility in combination with the contract and awful 4th quarter performances really cratered his value to teams. He played like a low-end starter this year and was in the bottom 3rd of the league in almost every major passing category. It sucks, but I'm glad it's over and we can move on to finally discussing the next soon-to-be quarterback in Chicago (Caleb Williams) with a clearer mind.