Bears @ Dolphins, 10/14/18, 12 CT, GAME THREAD

[beardown3231]

1 minute ago, topwop1 said:

My interpretation of the rules is that within 5 yards on any pass play you can make contact with the opposing player and it is perfectly legal as long as you are not holding said player or making an illegal block that is either low or from behind.

That said I don't see what Burton did wrong on this play to cause pass interference? He was running his route as per the pass play and he and Alonso just happened to intersect each other. It's BS to me that that's pass interference but unfortunately that's the way it goes sometimes and Bears were on short end.

It’s my understanding that the defender can be as handsy as he wants within 5 yards, but in terms of the offensive player blocking, I could have swore it’s 1-2 yards down the field before the ball is thrown.

Someone settle this!

Either way, again I just thought it was so egregious of an impact that the call was made with ease. Next time, move.

[topwop1]

3 hours ago, GOGRIESE said:

They paid him that amount of money to make that kick. 

You're absolutely right on that. Though I don't know if the bobbled snap ended up throwing his timing off on that one. Either way..it sucks when u fail to put away a game like that.

[topwop1]

21 minutes ago, beardown3231 said:

It’s my understanding that the defender can be as handsy as he wants within 5 yards, but in terms of the offensive player blocking, I could have swore it’s 1-2 yards down the field before the ball is thrown.

Someone settle this!

Either way, again I just thought it was so egregious of an impact that the call was made with ease. Next time, move.

I guess he could have been a little more subtle about it but still doesn't change my opinion on the poor officiating.

What about the play in OT where the ball tips off a bears dman and into the hands of Stills 30 yards down field? Pretty sure that was blatant holding from their RT on Mack.

[Pool]

Tough loss. Bears have to find ways to close out the close games. Trubisky though. Man I get more and more impressed with this kid. 5th game in this system and it's looking like the skies the limit.

[beardown3231]

11 minutes ago, topwop1 said:

I guess he could have been a little more subtle about it but still doesn't change my opinion on the poor officiating.

What about the play in OT where the ball tips off a bears dman and into the hands of Stills 30 yards down field? Pretty sure that was blatant holding from their RT on Mack.

I agree on that one. Miami ended up not scoring on that though.

The game was lost on the two turnovers inside the 11. It can be argued that maybe the 3 best Bears offensive players turned the ball over today, and when that happens, it’s just not your day. IMO, It has nothing to do with refs or temperature or coaching.

[G08]

54 minutes ago, Pool said:

Tough loss. Bears have to find ways to close out the close games. Trubisky though. Man I get more and more impressed with this kid. 5th game in this system and it's looking like the skies the limit.

He's still missing wide open WRs and throwing questionable balls that should be picked off.

I like what I'm seeing outside of that... but God damnit Mitch stop missing wide open dudes.

 

Through 5 games: 70.2%, 1,261 yards, 7.8 YPA, 11 TDs, 4 INTs 105.6 rating.

[G08]

[Heinz D.]

5 minutes ago, G08 said:

He's still missing wide open WRs and throwing questionable balls that should be picked off.

I like what I'm seeing outside of that... but God damnit Mitch stop missing wide open dudes.

 

Through 5 games: 70.2%, 1,261 yards, 7.8 YPA, 11 TDs, 4 INTs 105.6 rating.

Yeah. That's terrible. 

And...isn't it 12 TDs? 

[G08]

8 minutes ago, Heinz D. said:

Yeah. That's terrible. 

And...isn't it 12 TDs? 

NFL.com has him at 11 after today's game.

[Superman(DH23)]

4 minutes ago, G08 said:

NFL.com has him at 11 after today's game.

Its 12 total.  He has a rushing td as well.

[yomyyo]

37 minutes ago, G08 said:

Through 5 games: 70.2%, 1,261 yards, 7.8 YPA, 11 TDs, 4 INTs 105.6 rating.

Currently on pace for: 4035 yards, 35 TDs, 13 INTs. (Bolded are club records.) At the beginning of the season I think we'd all take that. 

[Nads786]

42 minutes ago, G08 said:

He's still missing wide open WRs and throwing questionable balls that should be picked off.

I like what I'm seeing outside of that... but God damnit Mitch stop missing wide open dudes.

 

Through 5 games: 70.2%, 1,261 yards, 7.8 YPA, 11 TDs, 4 INTs 105.6 rating.

This is why I’m not that mad about this loss. Things like this happen to all teams even good teams.

But Mitch has kept progressing which is great to see. 

[JAF-N72EX]

2 hours ago, Heinz D. said:

That's the thing that scares the hell out of me, right there. I don't think the defense is suddenly full of bad players. But Fangio being set in his ways is definitely cause for concern.

Agree. I think Trubisky and the offense nearly winning a shootout, on the road, against a good team, is very encouraging. 

Although overall I'm still not too concerned about the defense moving forward (other than staying healthy), you and @Sugashane do bring up a solid point about Fangio's adjustments--especially in the 4th Q and in the red zone (no I'm not giving the defense credit for Drake simply dropping the ball today either). 

It seems like the defense comes out a little flat in the early part of the game and can play at an elite level for the majority of 3 quarters but then suddenly drop off big time in the 4th/OT.  And it's practically the been with same players (other than Prince missing some time for injury) so injuries can't be used as excuse either--even though Nagy did say that Mack played with an injury today in the 1st Q but still. 

Total opponents score by quarter through 5 games
1st) 21
2nd) 6
3rd) 9
4th/OT) 60

^^That's pretty alarming. 

And this only furthermore proves this is not just an anomaly either. Coming into this game we had already been having the same issues.

Team	First Qtr	Rank	Second Qtr	Rank	Third Qtr	Rank	Fourth Qtr/OT	Rank	First Half	Rank	Second Half	Rank	Late & Close	Rank	Total	Rank
CHI	-5.90%	13	-130.00%	1	-39.80%	2	26.60%	29	-72.90%	1	-1.60%	20	-59.30%	1	-31.50%	1

Now that being said and to be fair to Fangio, this could be the case of the defense just being gassed late in games because the offense are not giving them a breather by either going three and out too often, or turning it over, &/or scoring at a fast pace. And Fangio does seem to make adjustments whenever the defense starts slow in games, such as the Cards and today. So we should really take these things into consideration as well, IMO. 

29 minutes ago, Superman(DH23) said:

I'm not sure what adjustments Fangio is supposed to make to poor tackling.  Its 21-13 the Int, then the Dolphins score on a wr screen.  Offense goes down and scores again making 28-21.  Defense let's them score on the exact same play again.  Both times should have been stopped after short gains.  Now the good news is the defense DID adjust after that and sniffed out those wr screens fast.  

I don't think any major adjustments need to be made to tackling considering that it's only one game and it hasn't been a real issue throughout the season. Prior to this game the Bears defense had only missed a total of 8 broken tackles(T-3rd best in the league with WAS) and were 9th in percentage per play (3.8%). 

Team	Plays	Total BT ▾	Plays with BT	% Plays with BT
CAR	221	4	3	1.4%
NE	326	6	6	1.8%
CHI	210	8	8	3.8%
WAS	224	8	8	3.6%
MIN	287	9	7	2.4%
IND	326	9	9	2.8%
NO	283	10	9	3.2%
DET	282	11	11	3.9%
CIN	333	11	10	3.0%
TB	241	12	12	5.0%
LAC	280	12	11	3.9%
MIA	323	14	11	3.4%
SEA	299	15	13	4.3%
LARM	275	16	14	5.1%
PHI	292	16	15	5.1%
BAL	311	16	13	4.2%
GB	283	17	17	6.0%
DEN	300	17	16	5.3%
JAC	288	18	16	5.6%
BUF	308	18	17	5.5%
SF	310	19	12	3.9%
TEN	301	20	20	6.6%
NYJ	325	21	21	6.5%
OAK	283	23	21	7.4%
NYG	291	24	21	7.2%
ATL	320	24	20	6.2%
PIT	327	26	24	7.3%
HOU	317	27	27	8.5%
KC	338	27	23	6.8%
ARI	349	27	25	7.2%
DAL	304	31	28	9.2%
CLE	361	39	34	9.4%

Now if it continues through consecutive games, then sure, Fangio needs to start making the necessary changes and adjustments but don't let one game overshadow the other 4. 

It's also worth noting that Albert Wilson was tied for 7th in the league among WR's in broken tackles coming into the game so let's give him some credit as well.

7 minutes ago, topwop1 said:

My interpretation of the rules is that within 5 yards on any pass play you can make contact with the opposing player and it is perfectly legal as long as you are not holding said player or making an illegal block that is either low or from behind.

That said I don't see what Burton did wrong on this play to cause pass interference? He was running his route as per the pass play and he and Alonso just happened to intersect each other. It's BS to me that that's pass interference but unfortunately that's the way it goes sometimes and Bears were on short end.

I believe you're thinking of holding on the defense.  The 5 yard rule don't apply to a pick play on offense -- which is when an offensive player intentionally initializes contact to a defender a and can be called on any part of the field. 

But you're absolutely right that Burton was simply heading into his zone as per the play-call (which Nagy even said in his presser) and it just so happen to be at a time where Kiko was crossing into that same zone at the same time and Burton was caught blind-sided and just naturally reacted to brace himself for impact.

[WindyCity]

Putrid game in the heat coming off the bye.

The turnovers were brutal on offense, the fumbles especially.

The defense was horrendous. 274 YAC yards, 0 sacks, tons of missed tackles. Fangios zone game plan was garbage.

Nagy blew a great day for him by getting scared and settling for a long fG.

Trubisky was good. He settled in and made plays. He had 2 god awful throws, but that happens. He took them down to score a TD, defense blew it, has them marching for a game winning FG and Cohen fumbles.

[RJ_11]

This game was awful, and we still should have won. I actually found myself not feeling too bad after it, because we played so badly and so many things didn't go our way (Amos' PD falling straight to Stills, refs missing the delay of game on Gore's late run, turnovers in just the worst spots, Scales' first bad snap in his Bears career) that I don't think we'll play that badly again for a while. And we STILL should have won.

Don't know if it was the heat, the bye or whatever but the defense was awful. Tackling has been solid all season - not this week. We've been destroying O-lines all season - not this week. Right now I feel like it was just a weird off week and I still feel like we can come out of this stretch vs the AFC East with two or three wins. If we're 5-3 or 6-2 after this stretch we're still in a great spot but that's looking too far ahead now.

Offense looked great at times to be fair, couple of amazing catches from Gabriel and Robinson, Cohen looked the fastest and smoothest player on the field, and Mitch made some great throws and reads - couple of bad throws too but seems like once he gets in to a rhythm he does start feeling it - good to see him stack two more encouraging performances in a row.

I'll let the defense off for a god awful day because of what we were treated to in weeks 1-4, I really do this was just a terrible off-day. AND WE STILL SHOULD HAVE WON.