Bears 8.0: Matt Eberflus FIRED

[Dresden]

How the heck can the Bears IOL be 2nd best in the division, just a hair behind Detroit's? IOL is by far the biggest weakness on the team.

for starters, minny and the pack have IOLs that make the bears look like the chiefs

shelton, after a rough start, has rebounded to #9 in the league in IOL pass blocking (96 starting positions!). and that's ESPN's metric. 1 penalty and 1 sack allowed on the year. of course, we all know that jenkins is good when healthy. that leaves the RG position

the lions have a bad-performing G and their IOL backups have been atrocious

It surely isn't WR, which is what these grades suggest.

not sure what you've been watching, but i've seen lots of dropped passes and bad route running by bears receivers. certainly nobody playing well, though odunze has improved. chalk some of that up to bad chemistry w/ caleb and bad play calling if you want

this is def not true. The one game ragnow missed glasgow slid over to center and Awosika started at guard. They did perfectly fine, didn't even miss a beat really. Only problem on the line in Detroit has been Decker's decline as he ages at RT. The interior is rock solid, there is no reality where Chicago is basically the same grade as Detroit on IOL, PFF grades are just one subjective measure. I'm sure there are others, like yards before contact, (4.4 average yards before contact for Gibbs) that show how good Detroit's line is. Montie is only at 2 yards before contact but he's a back that seeks out contact so I wouldn't read too much into that. They are able to spring Gibbs into the 2nd levelconsistently. I do not see that in Chicago with Swift, a similar type of back. In fact Swift is at only 2.2 yards before contact.

Is that stat yards after the line of scrimmage, or yards after they get the ball?

[patryk7754]

I think eventually, once we get our main issues fixed (OL and coaching) the one over the edge/cherry on top move we will need to make is adding an elite DT. Veta Vea is the one that comes to mind. He's maybe the best run stuffer in the NFL and he's pretty good at rushing the passer. Pressure up the middle might be the most disruptive thing a defesen can do, and if we add that to Sweat and another above average DE, we'd be in pole position for a superbowl.

Mason Graham out of Michigan could be that guy too. He might go top 5. Reminds me a lot of Dexter Lawrence. Elite play recognition, has great patience, and is a flat out bully.

Hopefully we'll get to see a lot of Pickens the rest of the year now and find out if he's any good or not. But there are a number of DT's in the first round or two of this coming draft (projected) that could really help us. Billings, if I'm not mistaken, is not that young so isn't a long term answer anyway.

Yea, it'll be interesting to see what Pickens can do. I think billings was like 27/28 when we originally signed him so when his extension ends he'll be in his 30s and probably on the decline (which might be accelerated by his injury.) I think the best case scenario for Pickens is a good backup or passable starter. But hopefully, he surprises us all and dominates.

[dice]

How the heck can the Bears IOL be 2nd best in the division, just a hair behind Detroit's? IOL is by far the biggest weakness on the team.

for starters, minny and the pack have IOLs that make the bears look like the chiefs

shelton, after a rough start, has rebounded to #9 in the league in IOL pass blocking (96 starting positions!). and that's ESPN's metric. 1 penalty and 1 sack allowed on the year. of course, we all know that jenkins is good when healthy. that leaves the RG position

the lions have a bad-performing G and their IOL backups have been atrocious

It surely isn't WR, which is what these grades suggest.

not sure what you've been watching, but i've seen lots of dropped passes and bad route running by bears receivers. certainly nobody playing well, though odunze has improved. chalk some of that up to bad chemistry w/ caleb and bad play calling if you want

this is def not true. The one game ragnow missed glasgow slid over to center and Awosika started at guard. They did perfectly fine, didn't even miss a beat really. Only problem on the line in Detroit has been Decker's decline as he ages at RT. The interior is rock solid, there is no reality where Chicago is basically the same grade as Detroit on IOL, PFF grades are just one subjective measure. I'm sure there are others, like yards before contact, (4.4 average yards before contact for Gibbs) that show how good Detroit's line is. Montie is only at 2 yards before contact but he's a back that seeks out contact so I wouldn't read too much into that. They are able to spring Gibbs into the 2nd levelconsistently. I do not see that in Chicago with Swift, a similar type of back. In fact Swift is at only 2.2 yards before contact.

when did i say detroit's line wasn't really good? i said they have a bad starting guard and they do. he's paid as a low end starter. ONE bad player on an otherwise excellent five man line doesn't sink the ship. their tackles are much better than ours

the discussion was about the INTERIOR line

whether or not an o-lineman gets beat or not on a pass rush is not particularly subjective. and ESPN's 2.5 second standard is even less subjective. by that measure shelton has done a damn good job of pass protection. pryor surprisingly good too

bears pass block win rate for entire line is 14th in the league. run block 5th
lions pass block 9th, run block 6th
vikings pass block 7th, run block 17th
pack pass block 8th, run block 23rd

swift is not a particularly good running back. all the analytics show that. detroit replaced him w/ montgomery, then philly decided he wasn't good enough. herbert did better behind this line. swift is here because of his receiving ability. probably fits waldron's system better, for whatever THAT's worth

once again, the bears line is NOT a substantial issue. upgrades can be made, of course, and almost certainly will be, but don't expect the offense to suddenly start humming unless caleb takes a big step forward next season

[Dresden]

for starters, minny and the pack have IOLs that make the bears look like the chiefs

shelton, after a rough start, has rebounded to #9 in the league in IOL pass blocking (96 starting positions!). and that's ESPN's metric. 1 penalty and 1 sack allowed on the year. of course, we all know that jenkins is good when healthy. that leaves the RG position

the lions have a bad-performing G and their IOL backups have been atrocious


not sure what you've been watching, but i've seen lots of dropped passes and bad route running by bears receivers. certainly nobody playing well, though odunze has improved. chalk some of that up to bad chemistry w/ caleb and bad play calling if you want

this is def not true. The one game ragnow missed glasgow slid over to center and Awosika started at guard. They did perfectly fine, didn't even miss a beat really. Only problem on the line in Detroit has been Decker's decline as he ages at RT. The interior is rock solid, there is no reality where Chicago is basically the same grade as Detroit on IOL, PFF grades are just one subjective measure. I'm sure there are others, like yards before contact, (4.4 average yards before contact for Gibbs) that show how good Detroit's line is. Montie is only at 2 yards before contact but he's a back that seeks out contact so I wouldn't read too much into that. They are able to spring Gibbs into the 2nd levelconsistently. I do not see that in Chicago with Swift, a similar type of back. In fact Swift is at only 2.2 yards before contact.

when did i say detroit's line wasn't really good? i said they have a bad starting guard and they do. he's paid as a low end starter. ONE bad player on an otherwise excellent five man line doesn't sink the ship. their tackles are much better than ours

the discussion was about the INTERIOR line

whether or not an o-lineman gets beat or not on a pass rush is not particularly subjective. and ESPN's 2.5 second standard is even less subjective. by that measure shelton has done a damn good job of pass protection. pryor surprisingly good too

bears pass block win rate for entire line is 14th in the league. run block 5th
lions pass block 9th, run block 6th
vikings pass block 7th, run block 17th
pack pass block 8th, run block 23rd

swift is not a particularly good running back. all the analytics show that. detroit replaced him w/ montgomery, then philly decided he wasn't good enough. herbert did better behind this line. swift is here because of his receiving ability. probably fits waldron's system better, for whatever THAT's worth

once again, the bears line is NOT a substantial issue. upgrades can be made, of course, and almost certainly will be, but don't expect the offense to suddenly start humming unless caleb takes a big step forward next season

I still don't trust these stats. I find it very hard to believe our line is 5th best in the league in run blocking. How can they measure that, anyway? But the metric MADVILLIAN posted above, Swift is getting contacted about twice as fast as Gibbs is in DET. I guess that could be on Swift, but it's more likely on the line, IMO.

[Bandit King]

Swift has been the lone bright spot for the bears.

[fleet]

When Lovie Smith was fired, he gave the Bears a gift, but....

When Houston drafted Stroud #2 overall, they fired Smith and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC

When the Skins drafted JD #2 overall, they fired Rivera and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC.

What did Poles do? (And don't forget the Bears held the #1 pick in both of those drafts).

I think Flus has to go 6-3.....maybe 5-4 with some tough, close losses to keep his job IMO.

If the Bears finish no better than 6-11, I think Poles should be let go...maybe even 7-10 is worth moving on. If not, he would be on the lava seat regardless.

let alone the next offensive head coach, I don’t know how George could let Poles hire any more OCs, minimally. 2 strikes is enough. Too much at stake with the quarterback development. But he probably will.

[jnrjr79]

When Lovie Smith was fired, he gave the Bears a gift, but....

When Houston drafted Stroud #2 overall, they fired Smith and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC

When the Skins drafted JD #2 overall, they fired Rivera and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC.

What did Poles do? (And don't forget the Bears held the #1 pick in both of those drafts).

I think Flus has to go 6-3.....maybe 5-4 with some tough, close losses to keep his job IMO.

If the Bears finish no better than 6-11, I think Poles should be let go...maybe even 7-10 is worth moving on. If not, he would be on the lava seat regardless.

let alone the next offensive head coach, I don’t know how George could let Poles hire any more OCs, minimally. 2 strikes is enough. Too much at stake with the quarterback development. But he probably will.

Do you mean Poles or Flus? Flus hires the OC.

[fleet]

When Lovie Smith was fired, he gave the Bears a gift, but....

When Houston drafted Stroud #2 overall, they fired Smith and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC

When the Skins drafted JD #2 overall, they fired Rivera and paired their prized rookie QB with a good HC/OC.

What did Poles do? (And don't forget the Bears held the #1 pick in both of those drafts).

I think Flus has to go 6-3.....maybe 5-4 with some tough, close losses to keep his job IMO.

If the Bears finish no better than 6-11, I think Poles should be let go...maybe even 7-10 is worth moving on. If not, he would be on the lava seat regardless.

let alone the next offensive head coach, I don’t know how George could let Poles hire any more OCs, minimally. 2 strikes is enough. Too much at stake with the quarterback development. But he probably will.

Do you mean Poles or Flus? Flus hires the OC.

Don’t think for a second Poles isn’t heavily involved. And his oversight obviously stinks. Poles is responsible for everything that happens on his team

[jnrjr79]

let alone the next offensive head coach, I don’t know how George could let Poles hire any more OCs, minimally. 2 strikes is enough. Too much at stake with the quarterback development. But he probably will.

Do you mean Poles or Flus? Flus hires the OC.

Don’t think for a second Poles isn’t heavily involved. And his oversight obviously stinks. Poles is responsible for everything that happens on his team

Sure, Poles is ultimately responsible (and the rest of the way up the chain, for that matter). But the OC being bad is a bigger indictment of Eberflus than Poles, in the scheme of things.

[fleet]

Do you mean Poles or Flus? Flus hires the OC.

Don’t think for a second Poles isn’t heavily involved. And his oversight obviously stinks. Poles is responsible for everything that happens on his team

Sure, Poles is ultimately responsible (and the rest of the way up the chain, for that matter). But the OC being bad is a bigger indictment of Eberflus than Poles, in the scheme of things.

Poles is supposed to understand the capacity of his people to do their jobs well or not. If he can’t do that, he is just as indicted, only in a different way. And Poles signs off, ostensibly because Poles is qualified to sign off competently. All these coaches are interviewed by Poles btw.

[jnrjr79]

Don’t think for a second Poles isn’t heavily involved. And his oversight obviously stinks. Poles is responsible for everything that happens on his team

Sure, Poles is ultimately responsible (and the rest of the way up the chain, for that matter). But the OC being bad is a bigger indictment of Eberflus than Poles, in the scheme of things.

Poles is supposed to understand the capacity of his people to do their jobs well or not. If he can’t do that, he is just as indicted, only in a different way. And Poles signs off, ostensibly because Poles is qualified to sign off competently. All these coaches are interviewed by Poles btw.

Again, I get it, but it still falls on Flus to hire and fire his staff and Poles is less culpable (not *not* culpable) for Flus’s hiring decisions.

In any event, I assume they were aligned on Waldron due to his job with Geno Smith. TBH, I think Waldron has been ok - not good or horrible - so far. There is a lot of blame to go around re: the middling offense - some on Waldron’s play-calling, some on personnel (mainly the o-line), some on Caleb seemingly being prone to occasional jitters and looking for big plays rather than taking free cheese, etc.

[dice]

Swift has been the lone bright spot for the bears.

say what?

[biggestbullsfan]

Read on Twitter

Not looking good

[Dresden]

After watching Chase Daniels breakdown what went wrong with the Bears offense v. AZ, I'm not so sure Waldron is the culprit here. The biggest problems he highlighted were all the times Caleb had a man wide open underneath that he ignored in favor of trying to find something farther downfield, which most of the time was unsuccessful. Daniels reiterated over and over again that you have to take the completions when they're there.

Other problems he pointed out were miscommunications, dropped passes, inability to call the correct blocking scheme based on what the defense was showing (which sounded like was the QB's responsibility- I didn't know QB's did that), Caleb not throwing on time, and occasionally sub-optimal play design. But by far the biggest culprit was Caleb not taking the 5-7 yard completion when it was there.

And the first thing he mentioned was: "Cole Kmet: 0 targets, 0 receptions, 0 yards...how do you let that happen?"

So it sounds like it's not really Waldron's play calling or design that's bad- guys were getting open, and Caleb just wasn't finding them, chose not to throw it to them, or threw it to them too late. He said he thinks Caleb will still be a find QB. But he needs to be coached more to throw the ball quicker, and to take those short completions. "Brady and Peyton made their living hitting those kinds of passes".

Watch on YouTube

[Dresden]

Read on Twitter

Not looking good

That doesn't make much sense- all the dysfunction is largely around the HC, which Johnson would be replacing. Unless he's talking about the years of futility the Bears have had on offense. But I'd see that as more of a challenge.

[jnrjr79]

Read on Twitter

Not looking good

That doesn't make much sense- all the dysfunction is largely around the HC, which Johnson would be replacing. Unless he's talking about the years of futility the Bears have had on offense. But I'd see that as more of a challenge.

I largely agree. If the Bears job opens up, it's likely to be one of the more appealing ones (good roster, Caleb to develop etc.). The reason you wouldn't take it is if you think there is dysfunction at the FO level, which I don't think is a big league-wide perception. The other reason, I suppose, is the Bears might not meet his salary demands.

[fleet]

After watching Caleb all year, and watching the conversation on ESPN about Caleb’s “regression”, I have a feeling the Bears screwed Caleb up in this moment by putting too much responsibility on his plate and not simplifying his options. The other teams with rookie QBs made the right decision on development by taking a more traditional approach, KISS. The Bears did not. They seem to want to let him take his lumps and pull through. But that’s unnecessarily risky.

Normally I DO NOT place blame on teams for players under their care not developing. Either they can play, or they can’t in my book. But I do actually believe that Caleb is not currently doing well under the Bears plan for him in part because he can’t handle it well at this stage of his career. Maybe this is a case where the Bears will be shown as being smart if Caleb starts to put it all together. He is in the weeds right now unfortunately. My main point is that there is different quantum universe outcome for Caleb where the Bears are getting more out of him by putting less on his plate.

[Dresden]

Read on Twitter

Not looking good

That doesn't make much sense- all the dysfunction is largely around the HC, which Johnson would be replacing. Unless he's talking about the years of futility the Bears have had on offense. But I'd see that as more of a challenge.

I largely agree. If the Bears job opens up, it's likely to be one of the more appealing ones (good roster, Caleb to develop etc.). The reason you wouldn't take it is if you think there is dysfunction at the FO level, which I don't think is a big league-wide perception. The other reason, I suppose, is the Bears might not meet his salary demands.

I can't think of too many more attractive offers. Maybe the Eagle if they fire Siriani, or of course Dallas, but then you have to deal with Jerry Jones. But that is a premier job.

[Dresden]

After watching Caleb all year, and watching the conversation on ESPN about Caleb’s “regression”, I have a feeling the Bears screwed Caleb up in this moment by putting too much responsibility on his plate and not simplifying his options. The other teams with rookie QBs made the right decision on development by taking a more traditional approach, KISS. The Bears did not. They seem to want to let him take his lumps and pull through. But that’s unnecessarily risky.

Normally I DO NOT place blame on teams for players under their care not developing. Either they can play, or they can’t in my book. But I do actually believe that Caleb is not currently doing well under the Bears plan for him in part because he can’t handle it well at this stage of his career. Maybe this is a case where the Bears will be shown as being smart if Caleb starts to put it all together. He is in the weeds right now unfortunately. My main point is that there is different quantum universe outcome for Caleb where the Bears are getting more out of him by putting less on his plate.

Aside from Jayden Daniels, who are these other QBs that are doing so much better? Maye has been a bit better, but not by that much, and he's been up and down lately. Nix isn't doing that great in DEN.

After watching that breakdown from Chase Daniels, it seems like a lot of this is on Caleb not making the right decisions. Maybe some of that is on the coaches for not emphasizing enough to him that he has to take those shorts throws when they're there. Caleb is also a little younger than Nix and Daniels, and I think Maye, too, so maybe he's just a little behind in his ability to recognize defenses.

Before we hit the panic button on Caleb, I think we should let the season play out. Sometimes a light goes on, and suddenly everything falls into place.

[molepharmer]

After watching Caleb all year, and watching the conversation on ESPN about Caleb’s “regression”, I have a feeling the Bears screwed Caleb up in this moment by putting too much responsibility on his plate and not simplifying his options. The other teams with rookie QBs made the right decision on development by taking a more traditional approach, KISS. The Bears did not. They seem to want to let him take his lumps and pull through. But that’s unnecessarily risky.

Normally I DO NOT place blame on teams for players under their care not developing. Either they can play, or they can’t in my book. But I do actually believe that Caleb is not currently doing well under the Bears plan for him in part because he can’t handle it well at this stage of his career. Maybe this is a case where the Bears will be shown as being smart if Caleb starts to put it all together. He is in the weeds right now unfortunately. My main point is that there is different quantum universe outcome for Caleb where the Bears are getting more out of him by putting less on his plate.

Aside from Jayden Daniels, who are these other QBs that are doing so much better? Maye has been a bit better, but not by that much, and he's been up and down lately. Nix isn't doing that great in DEN.

After watching that breakdown from Chase Daniels, it seems like a lot of this is on Caleb not making the right decisions. Maybe some of that is on the coaches for not emphasizing enough to him that he has to take those shorts throws when they're there. Caleb is also a little younger than Nix and Daniels, and I think Maye, too, so maybe he's just a little behind in his ability to recognize defenses.

Before we hit the panic button on Caleb, I think we should let the season play out. Sometimes a light goes on, and suddenly everything falls into place.

Could partially be due to the priorty of receiving targets for a specific play being wacky right now. If the number one option is 10+ yards downfield, Caleb may be doing his best to force the ball to that first priority option, which is understable in that there's more yardage to be gained. But maybe re-working the priority for a few games, such that the underneath stuff is the first option will help get Caleb into rhythm quicker and open up the deeper stuff later.