Bears injury report is mostly clean Ginn and Graham didn't practice but they were veteran days off Mack and Quinn both listed as limited. Mack played after being limited last week so no concerns there. Quinn being limited could mean he might play?
I miss Mongo's keys to the game. My thoughts this week.... Shut down Barkley. Make the Giants a one dimensional team. That will be a big task...Bears struggled with Adrian Peterson. Daniel Jones has a lot of potential. You can force him to make mistakes but the kid can also really sling it. Don't give him a lot of time...the pass rush needs to get going. Build on the success of the oline….especially in run blocking. Run game was strong against the Lions. Don't wait until the last quarter to actually start making plays, Mitch. More Mooney. Speed kills. Excited to see more of Jaylon Johnson. Thought he played well...his size kinda shocked me...he looks more like a big safety. Didn't like seeing him wearing Peanut's number at first but he played well enough that I will forgive him for now. Someone sack the QB. Please.
The Giants OL was abysmal on sunday. They got owned in the run game even worse than we owned the Patriots in SB 20. If Garrett hadn't called a very effective quick passing game i expect they would've got killed in pass protection too. Our DL needs to show up this week to make things less complicated, but if they do this will be an easy W. I too will be watching the run game closely, i hope Nagy sticks to this new approach we saw last week, with even more carries for Monty please. The Giants DL is better than the Loins so if our OL can come out and run the ball as well as week 1 that will be really encouraging. There's plenty better DL's than the Giants out there but one thing at a time. The Bears schedule is very favourable to helping a new Offensive approach bed in so lets hope they can keep it going and Trubisky can avoid soiling his own mattress for 45mins. Really hoping we see a better performance from the ILB's sunday. These are the guys Pace went with so we have to hope it pans out. For Trev the only way is up i guess, and while i liked Smith's play speed he didn't seem to affect the game much after that first drive. Also want to see much more Cole Kmet please. Yes its early and im being impatient, don't care.
Smith was a C- or D+ for me and Trevathan was an F-....I'd give him a lower rating if one existed. Kmet looked good in the blocking game...definitely deserves to see some targets that are catchable.
As do we all...I'll add: Pittsburgh did a fantastic job shutting down Saquon Barkley running. He made his most notable plays on Monday catching passes out of the backfield. Two facets I really don't like. The bears had a porous Dline and I shudder thinking of Trevathan covering this guy out of the backfield. Curious, this past Monday the Giants didn't run him once in the 4th when they trailed 16-10. I'm going to need Mack and Quinn to show up. Giants are playing a rookie at LT and a back up at RT (their interior OL is their best part). There's no excuses for the highly paid edge rushers. Let's see the run game hopefully continue its success. Monty needs 15+ carries. A backup RB for Pittsburgh averaged 6 YPC and had over 100 yards. Golden Tate is listed as a slot WR, with Sterling Shepherd as the WR1 and Darius Slayton as their WR2. Slayton looked great against the Steelers, so he should be a nice test for Jaylon Johnson. What bothers me is how Stafford attacked Buster Skrine with Amendola and Amendola led the lions in receiving week 1. This has potential to be an ugly match up. Mitch is going up against a transitioning defense from a 4-3 under their previous HC Shurmur to a 3-4 with new DC Patrick Graham--who last year as the Dolphins DC mustered 30th in yards and points against. Keep it simple for Mitch, and as mentioned--don't wait until the 4th quarter to start making plays. Ref we get Bill Vinovich's crew. Last Bears game he called was a win over Arizona week 3 of 2018. Called an even game. Shouldn't be a factor.
There's two things I want to see in this game: 1) Nagy's continued commitment to the run. Let's set the tone early this season that we are a team with a good running game. More pressure off Mitch, the better. 2) Our front 7 wakes up and contains Saquan + collects several sacks. If they play anything like we saw last week and Saquan will rush for 150+, book it.
Thats great news. This should make a big difference to a pass rush that really needs a kick after last week. But having watched the Browns sit back and let Burrow dink and dunk his way all around the stadium on thurs night, despite dominating the LOS, i hope we dont see the same thing from the Bears sunday. Given how passive Pagano can be with what he does in the secondary it does feel distinctly possible. If that happens Quinn being back might not matter as much as it should.
