Schedule release (building it as it comes out)

[adam]

Week 1 - Vikings at Bears (MNF) - W
Week 2 - Bears at Lions - L (short week, team still gelling) 
Week 3 - Cowboys at Bears - W
Week 4 - Bears at Raiders - W
3-1

Week 5 - BYE WEEK
Week 6 - Bears at Commanders (MNF) - W (2024 rematch with a much better team/coach, bye gives them an extra week to prepare)
Week 7 - Saints at Bears - W
Week 8 - Bears at Ravens - L
Week 9 - Bears at Bengals - L
2-2

Week 10 - Giants at Bears - W
Week 11 - Bears at Vikings - W
Week 12 - Steelers at Bears - W
Week 13 - Bears at Eagles (FRI) - L
3-1

Week 14 - Bears at Packers - L
Week 15 - Browns at Bears - W
Week 16 - Packers at Bears (SAT) - W
Week 17 - Bears at 49ers (SNF) - L
Week 18 - Lions at Bears - W
3-2

11-6

If the Bears can beat DAL in Week 3 at home and handle business in the division at home, they have a great chance at going 8-0 at home with the other games being NO, NYG, PIT, and CLE. 

 

[Stinger226]

33 minutes ago, adam said:

Week 1 - Vikings at Bears (MNF) - W
Week 2 - Bears at Lions - L (short week, team still gelling) 
Week 3 - Cowboys at Bears - W
Week 4 - Bears at Raiders - W
3-1

Week 5 - BYE WEEK
Week 6 - Bears at Commanders (MNF) - W (2024 rematch with a much better team/coach, bye gives them an extra week to prepare)
Week 7 - Saints at Bears - W
Week 8 - Bears at Ravens - L
Week 9 - Bears at Bengals - L
2-2

Week 10 - Giants at Bears - W
Week 11 - Bears at Vikings - W
Week 12 - Steelers at Bears - W
Week 13 - Bears at Eagles (FRI) - L
3-1

Week 14 - Bears at Packers - L
Week 15 - Browns at Bears - W
Week 16 - Packers at Bears (SAT) - W
Week 17 - Bears at 49ers (SNF) - L
Week 18 - Lions at Bears - W
3-2

11-6

If the Bears can beat DAL in Week 3 at home and handle business in the division at home, they have a great chance at going 8-0 at home with the other games being NO, NYG, PIT, and CLE. 

 

I'll take that.

[AZ54]

On 5/14/2025 at 1:29 AM, BearFan PHX said:

I think teams with weak schedules who get the playoffs usually dont do very well. I kinda like a tough schedule, because if you succeed, you know what youve got?

Agreed.  

[adam]

Here are the QB matchups with what we know today. Depending on how you view Caleb, there will only be a handful of games where the other team has the better QB. Right now BAL and CIN? I don't think Goff w/o Johnson is better than Caleb w/ Johnson. I think Caleb is at least comparable to Hurts, Daniels, Purdy, and Love. 

Week 1 - McCarthy (first pro start)
Week 2 - Goff - 6th QBR
Week 3 - Prescott (3rd game back since injury + new HC)
Week 4 - Geno Smith (new team)
Week 5 - BYE WEEK
Week 6 - Daniels  - 4th QBR
Week 7 - Rattler/Shough
Week 8 - Jackson - 1st QBR
Week 9 - Burrow - 3rd QBR
Week 10 - Wilson/Dart
Week 11 - McCarthy
Week 12 - Rudolph/(Rodgers)?
Week 13 - Hurts - 10th QBR
Week 14 - Love - 5th QBR
Week 15 - Pickett/Flacco/Gabriel/Sanders
Week 16 - Love - 5th QBR, Love vs CHI in 2024 (1 TD, 1 INT)
Week 17 - Purdy - 7th QBR
Week 18 - Goff - 6th QBR (Goff outdoors in January)

9 games against top 10 QBR QBs, 8 games against non-top 10 QBR QBs. I expect Caleb to be a top-12 QB this year for QBR. 

[adam]

I have seen a lot of projections with the Bears automatically losing to WAS in Week 6. Besides the Bears beating them last year before that ridiculous hail mary, this is who they faced the last 6 weeks of their season, and they lost to Cooper Rush, then won 5 straight. Their signature win on the season was a Week 3 win over Joe Burrow and the winless Bengals. 

[Stinger226]

You do notice, none of them were juggernaut defenses either.

[BearFan PHX]

Jayden Daniels isnt that great. He is a lot like Justin Fields - amazing arm, great with his feet, but not ready to read a fully dimensional offense.

Kliff Kingsbury has gotten the most out of him - really amazing results. Let's see if it continues this year. It's hard to make a QB look good consistently if they cant read a defense, eventually the NFL will catch up to what you're doing schematically, and force Daniels to play the position, and then i believe he will be exposed..

[adam]

20 hours ago, Stinger226 said:

You do notice, none of them were juggernaut defenses either.

Yeah, but the media is eating them up. Daniels in MVP talks and the Commanders are magically a top 5 team in the NFL. They had a cream puff schedule and then had the easiest path in the playoffs. 

20 hours ago, BearFan PHX said:

Jayden Daniels isnt that great. He is a lot like Justin Fields - amazing arm, great with his feet, but not ready to read a fully dimensional offense.

Kliff Kingsbury has gotten the most out of him - really amazing results. Let's see if it continues this year. It's hard to make a QB look good consistently if they cant read a defense, eventually the NFL will catch up to what you're doing schematically, and force Daniels to play the position, and then i believe he will be exposed..

I think Daniels is a better passer than Fields, but the frame scares the hell out of me. He is one hit away from being out for the year.

I read something about what Kingsbury did, and it was essentially one read, checkdown, then scramble. Pre-snap determines first read, hike the ball, first read yes or no, checkdown yes or no, then scramble. This allowed Daniels to get the ball out of his hands but it also didn't really have him doing too much processing. That can only get you so far. 

[BearFan PHX]

10 minutes ago, adam said:

I think Daniels is a better passer than Fields, but the frame scares the hell out of me. He is one hit away from being out for the year.

I read something about what Kingsbury did, and it was essentially one read, checkdown, then scramble. Pre-snap determines first read, hike the ball, first read yes or no, checkdown yes or no, then scramble. This allowed Daniels to get the ball out of his hands but it also didn't really have him doing too much processing. That can only get you so far. 

When I say passer, in this case, I just mean the physical act of throwing the ball, not including decision making. And I personally have always thought that Fields has an incredible arm. He has a killer deep ball, very accurate. I think Fields' body with Bagent's brain would make an incredible QB, for example.

As for your description of Kingsbury's scheme, I totally agree. If you watch film of Daniels, he locks on to his primary receiver before the snap, and its yes, or run. You almost never see his head turn. A couple plays have what looks like a scripted look off, but i dont see Daniels making multiple reads. Ive only seen him do that a handful of times, overwhelmingly, it is as you described, and I agree the NFL will catch up to it.

But how does Kingsbury get his primary receiver so wide open on so many plays? That's the part thats astounding to me!

[adam]

14 minutes ago, BearFan PHX said:

When I say passer, in this case, I just mean the physical act of throwing the ball, not including decision making. And I personally have always thought that Fields has an incredible arm. He has a killer deep ball, very accurate. I think Fields' body with Bagent's brain would make an incredible QB, for example.

As for your description of Kingsbury's scheme, I totally agree. If you watch film of Daniels, he locks on to his primary receiver before the snap, and its yes, or run. You almost never see his head turn. A couple plays have what looks like a scripted look off, but i dont see Daniels making multiple reads. Ive only seen him do that a handful of times, overwhelmingly, it is as you described, and I agree the NFL will catch up to it.

But how does Kingsbury get his primary receiver so wide open on so many plays? That's the part thats astounding to me!

I agree on Fields.

I think it has to do with just taking what the defense gave them. I know he averaged fewer intended air yards than Caleb did per throw, so he had a lot of short passes.

[BearFan PHX]

20 minutes ago, adam said:

I agree on Fields.

I think it has to do with just taking what the defense gave them. I know he averaged fewer intended air yards than Caleb did per throw, so he had a lot of short passes.

still, it seemed like the primary receiver was open most of the time. I gotta give credit to Kingsbury for that. And I didnt do any kind of film analysis or anything, but Id love to know how he gets his first read open so much.

But we agree that its basically a one read and run offense for Daniels, and that cant be sustainable?

[adam]

25 minutes ago, BearFan PHX said:

still, it seemed like the primary receiver was open most of the time. I gotta give credit to Kingsbury for that. And I didnt do any kind of film analysis or anything, but Id love to know how he gets his first read open so much.

But we agree that its basically a one read and run offense for Daniels, and that cant be sustainable?

It is a great question, he did pretty well with Kyler, who peaked in years 2 and 3 in that offense, then the wheels came off in Year 4. 

[BearFan PHX]

I think Kingsbury is a real offensive genius. I also understand him to be difficult to be around. I'm happy with Ben Johnson as our coach, but I think Kingsbury is his equal in Xs and Os, but BJ is the far better head coach.

[Mongo3451]

1 hour ago, BearFan PHX said:

But we agree that its basically a one read and run offense for Daniels, and that cant be sustainable?

I don't agree.  And honestly, I don't believe you are seeing what he's doing.  Daniels head is very calm in the pocket and that's what you want.  He scans with his eyes then flips his hips and throws.  Not staring at his primary.  Defenders are too smart for this and they didn't have Randy Moss to offset that.  I know you won't agree with this assessment, but it's simply my opinion.  Daniels did some fantastic things last year and I don't see a letdown this year.