Bears host the Rams Sept 29 Noon on Fox

[CBears019]

Welp i got woken up at 4am to be called in for a murder….didnt get to see any from this one.  Glad they won and seems like there’s some movement in a positive direction with the offense.  Sucks that Tevin got hurt.  Sucks even more that it seems they improved as an OL without him.  
 

Hopefully no one dies next week and i can actually watch the Andy Dalton revenge game.

[Epyon]

Rookie of the Year isn't Henry Rosengartner

 

 

[dll2000]

Somebody pee'd in Mark Potash' cheerios this morning.

 

[HuskieBear]

1 hour ago, dll2000 said:

Somebody pee'd in Mark Potash' cheerios this morning.

 

evergreen post

[AZBearsFan]

Watched this one late last night due to conflicts.

Pros:

-Caleb was efficient throughout and was a few things out of his control from having a HUGE stat line (DPI against Allen in the EZ would’ve been a TD without the penalty; DJ pulling up on the sideline route that didn’t connect was on DJ (per DJ this morning on The Score) and the Rome double move that drew a defensive hold the play before it would likely have been a TD without the hold too). He’s reading the field better every week. His ability to move within the pocket is something we never saw with Fields and is a key trait of all high level QBs. Both the TD throw to DJ and the seam to Kmet had like 2” windows for him to hit. That was high level stuff.

-Running game found some traction. They seemed to call more of what fits Swift’s skill set, but he was more decisive yesterday too. And they finally used him as the asset in the passing game that he should be used as. Roschon should get a comparable share of the work every week. He continues to show he deserves it whenever given an opportunity.

-Gervon Dexter continues to pop every week and justify Poles’ and Flus’ faith in a 2nd year jump for him. He’s been one of the best pass rushing DTs in football the first month, and his run defense is notably better.

-Tory Taylor was awesome yesterday. I don’t say that lightly either, as someone who thinks most punters are reasonably interchangeable.

Cons:

-For a team that spent the offseason building what is supposed to be the best WR room in the league to support their #1 overall rookie QB they really like to play offense not to lose. It worked yesterday, and it’s good that Caleb can do the “take what they give you” thing (it’s important that he can), but the lack of any aggressiveness or killer instinct on offense from a schematic standpoint is a severe hampering on the team, and I DO NOT think that’s coming from Waldron (who attacked downfield in SEA with DK/Lockett/JSN a lot). I think that’s all Flus. I like that they put the game in Caleb’s hands on the final 3rd down coming out of the 2 minute warning (they should both because it’s a growth opportunity and because it was a passing down anyway), but a designed QB run? That’s not really putting it in his hands. Let the kid make a play with his arm! He’s been solid and smart all day and was really good in the 2nd half! But no, let’s be content to punt and hope that our D that basically hasn’t stopped Stafford outside of the RZ all day can all of a sudden do that (they did, but that’s not the point). I won’t go so far as to say that coaching is stunting anything for Caleb because I don’t think it is, but it’s certainly holding back the ceiling of what this offense (and by extension the team overall) can be in 2024.

-Our OL in pass pro continues to be a complete mess. Jones got bullied by Verse the entire day to the point where pulling him had to be at least considered (to be fair, Verse is a dude and is everything I thought he could be when I was stumping for him at 9 during the draft cycle). Bates can’t get healthy soon enough to get Shelton back to the bench, and we don’t even really know what Bates will be at C - that’s how bad Shelton has been. Wright looks to be all over the place mentally right now and it’s leading to a ton of pre-snap penalties. I’ll repeat my (likely to be) weekly critique of Chris Morgan here, because his group has been awful for 2+ years now.

-DJ Moore is just off. I don’t know if it’s how he’s being used or what, but he and Caleb aren’t in sync for some reason, and it needs to get fixed ASAP.

[dll2000]

44 minutes ago, AZBearsFan said:

Watched this one late last night due to conflicts.

Pros:

-Caleb was efficient throughout and was a few things out of his control from having a HUGE stat line (DPI against Allen in the EZ would’ve been a TD without the penalty; DJ pulling up on the sideline route that didn’t connect was on DJ (per DJ this morning on The Score) and the Rome double move that drew a defensive hold the play before it would likely have been a TD without the hold too). He’s reading the field better every week. His ability to move within the pocket is something we never saw with Fields and is a key trait of all high level QBs. Both the TD throw to DJ and the seam to Kmet had like 2” windows for him to hit. That was high level stuff.

-Running game found some traction. They seemed to call more of what fits Swift’s skill set, but he was more decisive yesterday too. And they finally used him as the asset in the passing game that he should be used as. Roschon should get a comparable share of the work every week. He continues to show he deserves it whenever given an opportunity.

-Gervon Dexter continues to pop every week and justify Poles’ and Flus’ faith in a 2nd year jump for him. He’s been one of the best pass rushing DTs in football the first month, and his run defense is notably better.

-Tory Taylor was awesome yesterday. I don’t say that lightly either, as someone who thinks most punters are reasonably interchangeable.

Cons:

-For a team that spent the offseason building what is supposed to be the best WR room in the league to support their #1 overall rookie QB they really like to play offense not to lose. It worked yesterday, and it’s good that Caleb can do the “take what they give you” thing (it’s important that he can), but the lack of any aggressiveness or killer instinct on offense from a schematic standpoint is a severe hampering on the team, and I DO NOT think that’s coming from Waldron (who attacked downfield in SEA with DK/Lockett/JSN a lot). I think that’s all Flus. I like that they put the game in Caleb’s hands on the final 3rd down coming out of the 2 minute warning (they should both because it’s a growth opportunity and because it was a passing down anyway), but a designed QB run? That’s not really putting it in his hands. Let the kid make a play with his arm! He’s been solid and smart all day and was really good in the 2nd half! But no, let’s be content to punt and hope that our D that basically hasn’t stopped Stafford outside of the RZ all day can all of a sudden do that (they did, but that’s not the point). I won’t go so far as to say that coaching is stunting anything for Caleb because I don’t think it is, but it’s certainly holding back the ceiling of what this offense (and by extension the team overall) can be in 2024.

-Our OL in pass pro continues to be a complete mess. Jones got bullied by Verse the entire day to the point where pulling him had to be at least considered (to be fair, Verse is a dude and is everything I thought he could be when I was stumping for him at 9 during the draft cycle). Bates can’t get healthy soon enough to get Shelton back to the bench, and we don’t even really know what Bates will be at C - that’s how bad Shelton has been. Wright looks to be all over the place mentally right now and it’s leading to a ton of pre-snap penalties. I’ll repeat my (likely to be) weekly critique of Chris Morgan here, because his group has been awful for 2+ years now.

-DJ Moore is just off. I don’t know if it’s how he’s being used or what, but he and Caleb aren’t in sync for some reason, and it needs to get fixed ASAP.

I agree with all of this.  Nice observations. 

You know what I like about Caleb is from his answers he clearly knows football up to level he has been taught.  He is a thinker.  Those guys have high ceilings if they have talent to match which I think he does.

 

 

 

[StLunatic88]

4 hours ago, AZBearsFan said:

I like that they put the game in Caleb’s hands on the final 3rd down coming out of the 2 minute warning (they should both because it’s a growth opportunity and because it was a passing down anyway), but a designed QB run? That’s not really putting it in his hands. Let the kid make a play with his arm! He’s been solid and smart all day and was really good in the 2nd half! But no, let’s be content to punt and hope that our D that basically hasn’t stopped Stafford outside of the RZ all day can all of a sudden do that (they did, but that’s not the point).

Not saying you can’t let him try for it, but that really isn’t the math. It’s Tory Taylor + a great defense + them needing a TD (which they only had scored one all game) plus they just came off forcing a 3 and out.

giving them the ball back with 1:09 vs 1:45 is a massive difference for a Matt Stanford led offense. Yes he was killing us on those deep crossers in a few 2nd half drives. But we had adjusted and stopped that. 

I have no doubt that in a few years, you let Caleb try to get that. But right now he is still a pretty raw rookie. And he is still making rookie mistakes pretty regularly. Gotta trust your defense there

(also I’m pretty sure it was an option play, I asked) 

Edited September 30 by StLunatic88

[HuskieBear]

4 hours ago, AZBearsFan said:

-For a team that spent the offseason building what is supposed to be the best WR room in the league to support their #1 overall rookie QB they really like to play offense not to lose. It worked yesterday, and it’s good that Caleb can do the “take what they give you” thing (it’s important that he can), but the lack of any aggressiveness or killer instinct on offense from a schematic standpoint is a severe hampering on the team, and I DO NOT think that’s coming from Waldron (who attacked downfield in SEA with DK/Lockett/JSN a lot). I think that’s all Flus. I like that they put the game in Caleb’s hands on the final 3rd down coming out of the 2 minute warning (they should both because it’s a growth opportunity and because it was a passing down anyway), but a designed QB run? That’s not really putting it in his hands. Let the kid make a play with his arm! He’s been solid and smart all day and was really good in the 2nd half! But no, let’s be content to punt and hope that our D that basically hasn’t stopped Stafford outside of the RZ all day can all of a sudden do that (they did, but that’s not the point). I won’t go so far as to say that coaching is stunting anything for Caleb because I don’t think it is, but it’s certainly holding back the ceiling of what this offense (and by extension the team overall) can be in 2024.

I agree with you about Flus. It's his QB 200 crap (2 TDs, 0 turnovers, 0 sacks) that is coming from the DC in him. He'd rather Caleb play more conservative to not make mistakes rather than push things to open up more potentially explosive plays. That was always going to be one of the main problems with having a defensive minded coach (especially a first time coach who might not have learned from mistakes at a previous stop).

[Epyon]

Watched the Tim Jenkins breakdown, and while there was some really really good plays by Caleb, including two massively more impressive throws than I realized watching live (Kmet over the middle layering the ball, and DJs TD)..... Caleb also blatantly missed 3 TD passes (wrong read or poor throw) . Odunze's over throw pass that should have been dpi or a td on its own, for example, DJ was running the same route on the other side and absolutely destroyed his coverage by 7+ yards wide open. 

Still plenty of good to be happy about, but there where lots of plays left on the field that would have been the difference between the solid performance he had, and the potential elite performance that was available to be had. 

The flip side of that, as a positive, is that I had felt post game that the offense felt a bit mid or even lackluster given how terrible the Rams defense was. Knowing that it could have been a beat down had we connected on all the plays we had the opportunity to connect on makes me a bit more hopeful, since a defense that bad is exactly the kind you SHOULD dunk on. The offense was always going to need a bit time, but the opportunities where there at least, we just have to develop a bit more to make them. 

Another bit, from one of the podcasts, we scored on every drive without a penalty. Cleaning those up is probably the simplest thing we can do to get the offense really looking better. 

Edited September 30 by Epyon

[AZBearsFan]

8 hours ago, StLunatic88 said:

Not saying you can’t let him try for it, but that really isn’t the math. It’s Tory Taylor + a great defense + them needing a TD (which they only had scored one all game) plus they just came off forcing a 3 and out.

giving them the ball back with 1:09 vs 1:45 is a massive difference for a Matt Stanford led offense. Yes he was killing us on those deep crossers in a few 2nd half drives. But we had adjusted and stopped that. 

I have no doubt that in a few years, you let Caleb try to get that. But right now he is still a pretty raw rookie. And he is still making rookie mistakes pretty regularly. Gotta trust your defense there

(also I’m pretty sure it was an option play, I asked) 

I don’t disagree with what you’re saying re: the clock, but the punt you reference on the 3 and out the prior possession was also the only one we forced the entire game. Stafford completed 69% of his passes on the day for 7.7 ypa, and Williams ran for nearly 5 yards per carry. They had moved the ball up and down the field against Flus’ defense the whole day except for that prior drive. A pass play there even if a failing one doesn’t have to mean an incompletion. “Here’s the look we want - either it’s there, or eat it and we punt from midfield instead of the 43,” but if it is there the game is over right then and Stafford never even touches the ball. At some point you have to trust your offense too, don’t you? Williams was 9-10 in the second half and had made sound decisions with the ball the entire day. Is that not a good time to give him a shot to be what you presumably want him to be? The whole of 2024 is supposed to be about Caleb’s development, isn’t it?

Doesn’t matter I suppose - what we did worked this time and that’s all that really matters for this game. I just detest that Flus’ default is to lean on the defense and hope they can hold on versus allowing the offense to try to end it right there, especially after that approach has cost us dearly in several games the past 2+ seasons. The offense was the better unit in the second half on Sunday, and that should matter in these decisions. I think that’s flawed process, and sometimes flawed process will still yield good results. 

Edited October 1 by AZBearsFan

[chisoxguy7]

10 hours ago, AZBearsFan said:

“Here’s the look we want - either it’s there, or eat it and we punt from midfield instead of the 43,”

Some teams even have a kicker who is a threat to score 3 from the 43!

[StLunatic88]

13 hours ago, AZBearsFan said:

They had moved the ball up and down the field against Flus’ defense the whole day except for that prior drive.

When they did move the ball, it was almost exclusively slow and methodical. And they only got inside the 30 like twice? If you want to take into account game flow, that is what was really happening and the bet was there was no way they were about to be crazy explosive to make it down the field with no time outs.

Also, as has been pointed out, Caleb still played plenty like a rookie Sunday, Outside of his pre-snap mistakes, he also threw a few ball on wrong option routs/uncatchable by his target. I think Caleb has done alot of good these past few weeks, but if you think a hero-ball attempt or a incompletion when we need the clock to keep running is off the table, youre living in fantasy land. 

You call a pass play there, more bad things than good can happen. Thats just the reality of that situation in football. So unless you have one of the best QBs in the league making that decision, you play the correct move especially with a difference maker at Punter and a Good Defense who just stopped them cold.

[BEAR FACE DOWN ARROW]

On 9/29/2024 at 8:12 PM, StLunatic88 said:

20 yardline behind the Bears bench. Such a fun atmosphere, but Soldier is such a mess, it took almost the whole 3rd Quarter for the stands to fill back up

Haha yea so quick story time.

We had field passes pregame to see our friends (a few guys on the Rams staff too) and for some reason Jaylon was still working on his pedal and break on the ball for INTs when we got out there, which is not something I’ve ever really seen that late when we are allowed on. Maybe he was late and that might explain a pretty lackluster game (that’s being nice)

But he was doing toe taps on the sideline, and we are inside the 20, like a yard/maybe two off the white paint (where they tell you to stay) and not once but twice he came flying at us, tapped for the catch and nearly ran my wife over, just barely side stepping her. She has the second one on video, I’ll try to get it uploaded to share here.

Not malicious or anything, obviously. just a funny thing that happened. 

That's awesome, glad you got to go and had a fly by. 

[AZBearsFan]

6 hours ago, StLunatic88 said:

Also, as has been pointed out, Caleb still played plenty like a rookie Sunday, Outside of his pre-snap mistakes, he also threw a few ball on wrong option routs/uncatchable by his target. I think Caleb has done alot of good these past few weeks, but if you think a hero-ball attempt or a incompletion when we need the clock to keep running is off the table, youre living in fantasy land. 

You call a pass play there, more bad things than good can happen. Thats just the reality of that situation in football. So unless you have one of the best QBs in the league making that decision, you play the correct move especially with a difference maker at Punter and a Good Defense who just stopped them cold.

Of course a hero ball play could happen, and I never said it couldn’t. If you tell him “This, or just go down” and he doesn’t do either of those things then that’s a problem. Williams is a rookie but he’s also a guy with a really high football IQ. And yes, bad things can happen if you choose to call a pass play. The guy on the other side of the field should factor into the equation too. Conservative makes sense too and is certainly justifiable.

But, bad things can happen on a QB run or QB option too and that’s what they called. Bad things can happen on defense. A punt can go awry. Bad stuff happens all the time. Conservative shouldn’t always be the way though, and it is for Flus. 3rd and 5 is hardly unmanageable and let’s not pretend that Williams is incapable of making a good decision either, and if I can win the game in one play by doing something normal I tend to prefer that to potentially giving the other team a dozen plays where things can go wrong for me too.

Tl;dr version: There are merited arguments to both approaches. I’d like to see Flus not take the “afraid of bad things” option so often. 

[StLunatic88]

22 minutes ago, AZBearsFan said:

Tl;dr version: There are merited arguments to both approaches. I’d like to see Flus not take the “afraid of bad things” option so often. 

And if he let Caleb throw it, and it gets tipped for a pick? Or his surest handed receiver had his 1 in 100 drops, or makes a catch then gets stripped? Or that extra 35 seconds is the difference of them having to chuck a Hail Mary from the other side of the 50 and a clean shot into the end zone inside the red zone?

You and every meathead in Chicago would be SCREAMING that it’s yet another impossible way that Flus managed to lose a game.

Bad things can happen on literally every play, yes. Which is why it’s always about risk mitigation. If it wasn’t we would see teams call “Da Bomb” from Blitz every play. And the least risky thing was to run the ball, kill another 1/3 of the time remaining in the game and let your all world punter pin them deep for your great defense to stop.

i am honestly shocked that this is even a discussion. Maybe the unrealistic standards that decades of Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers and Patrick Mahomes have created really skew perspectives. Caleb Williams may one day be in that echelon of QB, but he ain’t that guy right now.