So...we are 4-1? That was a fun game to watch. Especially when you see Brady get frustrated. This defense is pretty good. It's not record breaking great...but it's good enough to keep the Bears in games and give them a chance to win. Offense is poop. Big poop. Foles overthrows receivers even better than Mitch. Who knew? Roquan has played well lately but the missed tackles hurt a lot. Need to clean that up. Mack had a really good game. And finally showed up on the stat sheet with sacks. Trevathan kinda redeemed himself a bit. Speedy teams will still beat him up though. Not sure why the Bucs didn't try to exploit him. Mingo is a bargain as a rotation edge guy. The pick wasn't on Foles...that should have been caught. The offensive line started off well this season by now in week 5 they have regressed to being about as bad as they were last season. Whitehair is getting his ass beat weekly. Hey Pace....pay Allen Robinson. Don't be stupid. Just fucking pay the guy. Why does Pat O'Donnell continue to collect a paycheck? Can someone explain? Winnable game with Panthers next week then you go into a stretch where the schedule gets tougher. So these early wins are really important. Offense still sucks. Not sure what else to say that we haven't said over the last decade.
My goal for the offense this season was to finish 16th, as average as it gets, in the final rankings. If we could get to that magical point, we're a playoff team. With the state of the o-line, questionable play calling, that 16th ranking still seems a long way off. The biggest takeaway from the game was the exchange between Foles and Nagy on the sidelines. Foles hurry up offense was rolling right down field inside the 20 and Nagy then put a stop to that. Immediately afterwards, we lose 15 yards and then have to settle for a FG on the drive. Foles is usually very low key, mild mannered. For him to get this animated... let's just hope Nagy is receptive.
My personal s***y lip reading skills see, "Go, go go", "We're pushing them and pushing them", and the big one, "I don't care!". Yeah, definitely sounds like Foles was telling Nagy what he wants, and that sounds good to me. The offense definitely looks different with Foles than it did with Trubisky, but not necessarily better. They've abandoned snapping under center, so now it makes the offensive line's job harder, and it's all regressing to the offense we saw last year. Now there's just a slightly more competent QB running it. This offense needs to evolve now that Foles is QB, not regress. We will see what happens. Nagy's job depends on it. I have other thoughts about the game, but probably for later. My biggest thing was tackling - it was bad last week, bad again this week. I'm grateful the Bucs didn't run the ball more.
Foles has those crazy eyes when men get those something epic is about to happen, now on the other hand when women get those, ...RUN. Foles was in a rhythm and looking sharp at that point and Nagy needed to put the brakes on his genius-ness and listen to his QB.
I'll start with the OLine. So that's why Alex Bars is on the bench. Daniels going down hurts. Whitehair looked over-matched at times, especially after Daniels went down, and Bobbie Massie was far worse than Charles Leno. Monty catching passes out of the backfield is really nice. Blang brings up the bears offense looking different with Foles as opposed to Mitch, but after playing two top-5 run defenses in the NFL in back to back weeks; next week there's no excuse against a Panthers team without Kuechly giving up 5+ YPC. So you signed Lamar Miller to not play him? Even part time to ease him into the offense? Is he not ready? If he doesn't make you better, why sign him? Why is Ryan Nall still getting snaps? My inner pessimist keeps waiting for Darnell Mooney to have a rookie moment. He doesn't. The kid can play, and he can get open. Allen Robinson has done himself no favors if he wants to get paid by turning 3 catches this year into interceptions. Nonetheless, pay the man Pace. Another week, more snaps/opportunities for Demetrius Harris instead of your #1 draft pick back from April. After Nagy say Kmet needs to get more involved. The early game penalty on Kmet I think made Nagy sour on him. I love/hate Patterson sometimes. Dude's electric, but sometimes just is shit for brains. Less than a minute in the half, yuo're wide open, get enough yards for the first--run out of bounds and stop the clock. Gaining an extra yard and the clock moving gets bailed out by points. Had the bears come away with 0 just before the half... Jimmy Graham, your table is ready. I like Matt Nagy the head coach, he has pulled out 4 wins. The team plays hard for him until the last second. Matt Nagy the playcaller? Fucking atrocious. 2 offensive touchdowns is an upgrade. Its not 4 TDs. Score more points. Here's another thing I don't get. You love Kmet. Graham is a weapon. Why not line up flanking out Mooney/Robinson with Kmet and Graham either slotted or off the tackles and your best blocking back in the backfield? That formation would scream mismatches no? Foles is good enough. He can see a blitz, key in on a hot WR, pre-snap reads competently. He's got a short memory, which is good when you fuck up. I don't want to hear any more "rust" comments. Dude has to make simple throws. You cant miss wide open guys with field in front of them. Robert Quinn I was disappointed in. He and Mack got a ton of 1 on 1's. He spent the entire game blocked. Mack finally got on the stat sheet. Mingo is really nice for a 3rd edge after years of Sam Acho, Aaron Lynch and Isaiah Irving not existing. Hell James Vaughters got on the stat sheet. If Danny Trevathan wasn't bad, that 37 yard Jones run goes for 1 yard. I didn't forget about you, Noquan--fucking awful for 3 quarters. He made some plays late, but ILB is soft and an enormous position of weakness. Kyle Fuller has an all time great hit. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the last one was Briggs on Megatron. You know which one. We talk about Goldman's absence, but really, with Hicks still playing elite--the bears need one of RRH, Nichols, Urban, Mario Edwards to be good. Edwards had a couple of plays. Sacks will happen if one of the other 5 techs plays above level. I've been tough on Pagano, but props to him for removing the 'mystique' of Tom Brady, a QB who's never lost to you and has been in the league as a starter since 2001 (granted you only play him every 4 years because he was in the other conference)--and treating him like the 43 year old, shell-of-himself guy he is. He missed throws, got rattled and pissy, and most of all, had a CTE/brain fart moment now knowing what down it is. Pat O'Donnell is still on this roster why?
Hypothetical question: If Fuller put a hit on Brady like that do they pick up the flag or the pieces?
Someone on PFF was very VERY drunk... Blatantly disrespectful. Is Sayers' corpse cold? Did I wake up in an alternate universe where Devin Hester doesn't exist?
Remember for several years in the middle of Hester's career with the Bears he wasn't even returning kicks. He was handling punts only. Daniel Manning was our kick returner and he was awesome, leading the league in yardage for a few years. He would catch the ball and go fast and hard right up the gut. Patterson hasn't even reached Manning's level yet.
I agree at best he's third-best on the Bears and you could probably make an argument that he is fourth if you consider Cecil Turner and what he did in 1970 with 4 kick returns. I found this Gem that's a synopsis of the Bears team in the Superbowl era from 1970 with a dash of domination followed by heaping spoonfuls of abomination.
- Nick Foles chewing out Nagy was one of the more satisfying sights of this season. There may not have been any F bombs or getting right in the other guys face, but as QB-HC interactions go....that was a chewing out. We dont even need to hear the words, the body language told it all. Foles very animated, very expressive, eyes wide and fixed on Nagy with barely a blink. Nagy repeatedly breaking eye contact, head down looking at the ground. Yah, we know exactly who was right and who was wrong and which guy got the telling off. See, you're dealing with an actual NFL QB now Nagy. Whatever Foles' flaws, and he has em, the dude has a football brain and can see when he has the enemy on the run. So next time Nagy just stay the F out the way and let good things happen. - Speaking of Nagy, as a playcaller the guy sucks prison ass after halftime. That is a time a good playcaller looks at what did and didnt work in the 1st half, makes the adjustments and improves production. Thru 5 games the Bears have ZERO points in the 3rd Quarter! Nagy couldn't adjust his own underpants if he had an atomic wedgie. - Speaking of playcalling/game management. The decision to throw on 2nd down on that last drive was absolutely the wrong move. The smart move there was to bleed the clock. You could've taken the clock down to around 35secs but instead gave the guy with the most game winning drives in history about 1min 13 to come back, ie plenty of time. Without the inexplicable mistake he takes the check down and there's a very good chance they would've had a shot at a game winning kick. As with so much this season, it all somehow worked out and they got the win. But that was bad game management from a HC who has form for bad game management in the past. - Word is James Daniels is done for the season. That is an absolute hammer blow to this offense. Daniels was the best player on that O-line up to this point. He'd taken his level up a notch from last year and gave maximum effort every play which i always appreciate. The Bears need to get on the phone to Larry Warford and see whats up, cos Bars doesn't convince me at all. Its possible the entire run game goes in the tank from here. - Speaking of Bars. His first play in they run to the right, away from him, smart move. Second is a pass play where he's left 1 on 1 and gets beat giving up the sack and killing the drive. Which genius drew up that protection! Whitehair basically had no one to block and slid over to help Ifedi on the play. So whether thats on Whitehair, or Foles for not telling Whitehair in the huddle, or Nagy for not telling Foles etc, that was a silly move when the guy's facing his first pass play. - Noquan, this fucking guy. Twice meets the RB in the backfield and twice makes a feeble whiff. Those 2 plays cost a nett of 20+ yards. A year from now they're gonna overpay this fucker, i can just feel it. - The TE Position: 1- That was an all-star level catch by Jimmy Graham for the TD. And he's been a big redzone hit in general. But outside the redzone the guy does nothing for me. Misses blocks every game, zero YAC. He's eating snaps. 2- As a blocker, Demetrius Hurst is as advertised. And I want to be annoyed at how often he seems to be out on routes.... but the guy seems to get open a lot. Whenever he's targeted its either a catch, or a DPI or missed on a throw when he's wide open. Hurst is actually on the field for nearly 50% of snaps each week, which considering how little the Bears run the ball tells its own story. 3- Cole Kmet's usage is driving me pretty nuts. Zero targets once again last night, its just not good enough. Now part of Kmet's problem is points 1 & 2. Yes its early and yes im prob being impatient, but he's already a better blocker than Graham and more athletic, and he's faster than Hurst. They've gotta start using him more. The Bears are running TE personnel groupings A LOT this season, they need to start involving Kmet more. - Does it seem to anyone else like Cordarrelle Patterson is on the field a lot every week? He actually isn't. The guy gets on average about 20% of snaps, its just he gets used a lot of the time he's on the field. So 1- Surely that must be a bit of a tell to a DC worth his salt no? And 2- I dont know where Patterson took Nagy for dinner during the offseason, but it must've been the most wonderful, romantic evening of Nagy's life. - Im not sure you can ever pull Foles out of a game. No matter how bad he's playing, the next hot streak is always potentially right round the corner. With Mitch you knew within the first couple series each game. Foles is a total rollercoaster. - Hats off to the D, they didn't look great early, but they kept fighting and the DL in particular slowly ground their opponent down until by the 4th Q they were the boss and firmly in Brady's head. I love seeing Brady take a beating. - After a bad game last week, Kyle Fuller had a great game. That blowup causing the fumble was like a step back in time. Remember when those plays used to happen every game every week? *sighs* - Carolina up next and although the Bears record looks pretty, this next one is a game they really need to win. After this the next 3 are nails. - Tom Brady is the B-Boat(Biggest Bitch Of All Time)
I said it on the game thread, but I believe Nagy played it correctly. The objective was to get as close to the end zone as possible to set up the easiest possible field goal for Santos. If we run there, most likely we pick up no yards and Santos is tasked with making a 45-50 yard FG, instead of a 38 yard FG. Yes, it's Brady on the opposite sidelines but you have to trust your QB and your D in that situation to make the smart play and not choke. It's better to leave the game in Foles or the D's hands, rather than the kicker. Nagy has learned this the hard way.
Great thoughts all around. Some I had. 1. Allen Robinson deserves to get paid, but it is frustrating the hell out of me how he is constantly losing jump balls / contested catches. For a #1 WR he is missing far too many of these. The int was on him, and at the end of the game, it wasn't a bad play/throw, but once again down the sideline he loses to a DB (who did have great position, no doubt) - at some point, you have to WIN those battles. I feel like I'm being unfair, but there's no question I am frustrated. 2. Nagy. pat says it well, as a HC/motivation guy, there's no question this team plays for him, they have his back and he theirs, but as a playcaller, holy hell. I understand the Bucs run D is very good, and the Bears O line, not so much, but the Bears passed 42 times, and ran 13 (at a clip of 2.5 YPC). I don't know how many of those were called runs either, as I remember Foles audibling at least once. I don't think he's learning, and I certainly don't think he's the "offensive genius" he's made out to be. You don't do your line any favors by eliminating the guess work and allowing them to pin their ears back. That said.... 3. There were plays to be made that were missed. Foles overthrowing, or the one where he missed a WIDE OPEN Mooney for 6. There is no question Foles is smarter than Mitch but he has those missed throws, and also it seems like he floats balls a bit when throwing out quick. It's clear he should be the starter, and should have been to start the season, but he's far from perfect. I did love him recognizing the blitzes and hitting the hot read, where Mitch to this day is still wondering where the guys came from. 4. The missed tackles on D (Noquan most especially) were painful, but honestly I think the D redeemed themselves as the game went on. They got more confident and overall played well. Good not great is definitely good enough, if the offense could get their head out of their ass. Johnson continues to improve, I was surprised to see him lined up against Evans quite a bit. Mack winning his battles was good to see. Quinn is a real disappointment, whether that's injury, scheme or just what it is, I don't know. 5. Add mine to the voice wondering what the hell is happening with Kmet. Shades of Shaheen? 6. I feel bad for Mitch. Such a likable guy, but dumb as a box of rocks. The above tweet doesn't show it, but I remember during the game you can see Mitch listening right behind Nagy with this big dumb grin on his face. I don't feel bad he's not going to start for the Bears ever again.
Never say never, with this offensive line and Foles injury history that day may come sooner than you think.
