The Chicago Bears have emerged from their shortened off week to face a major challenge: a Week 12 trip to Lambeau Field to play the first-place Green Bay Packers.
Looking to snap a demoralizing four-game losing streak, Matt Nagy’s team might prefer an easier task than trying to slow Aaron Rodgers and a top-10 Packers offense that’s averaging 30.8 points per game.
Still, if the Bears hope to reestablish themselves as legitimate playoff hopefuls, they have to show they can hang with the big boys. Sunday night’s test in Green Bay might require the offense to play its best game of the season while challenging the defense to continue playing at a high level.
As the Bears intensify preparations for the rivalry game, here’s our look at the defense through the first 10 games.
What’s working
This isn’t 2018, when the Bears had the league’s most menacing defense, an every-week machine that piled up sacks and takeaways and end-zone celebrations at an exhilarating clip. The Bears led the league that year with 36 takeaways and 27 interceptions, totaled an NFC-best 50 sacks and scored six defensive touchdowns.
This year the Bears have only 11 takeaways, six picks, 21 sacks and one defensive touchdown. That production dip is enough to downgrade the defense from elite to very good.
Still, this defense is consistently playing playoff-caliber football and has allowed an average of just 20.9 points through 10 games, ranking sixth in that category and keeping the Bears in just about every game they’ve played.
Furthermore, the Bears have been consistently stingy in the red zone and on third down, leading the league in both categories. Opponents are converting one-third of their third-down opportunities, and the Bears have allowed 15 touchdowns in 34 red-zone trips by their opponents, a 44.1% success rate.
More splash plays are needed, no doubt. But it’s unfair to pin much of this skid on the defense.
What’s not
When the Bears guaranteed Robert Quinn $30 million in a five-year, $70 million contract in March, they expected the veteran pass rusher would produce a double-digit sack total and enliven the pass rush as a whole on an every-game basis.
General manager Ryan Pace, coach Matt Nagy and defensive coordinator Chuck Pagano were all enthused about Quinn’s arrival in the spring.
“He has excellent edge speed,” Pace said in April. “He has outstanding ability to bend the corner. I think we can take a position of strength on our defense and make it even stronger and more dangerous.”
Added Pagano: “Everybody just thinks (Robert) can rush the passer. But he’s relentless, he’s tough. He’s athletic, he’s physical. He’ll (also) play really well against the run.”
Through 10 games, however, Quinn has been a major disappointment. He didn’t practice much during an abbreviated training camp after experiencing, according to Nagy, “a personal issue” before August.
Quinn then missed the season opener in Detroit, another red flag in terms of his ability to contribute at a high level. His first snap in Week 2 against the New York Giants produced a strip-sack of Daniel Jones, but that’s his only sack all season. He has played 307 snaps since without recording another one.
The Bears have talked in vague terms about finding a sweet spot for the 30-year-old edge rusher’s game-day workload. But they obviously haven’t found the formula yet and certainly aren’t seeing a satisfying return on investment. And given the extra attention Khalil Mack and Akiem Hicks routinely attract, Quinn has to be much better at capitalizing on his one-on-one opportunities.
“He’s had plenty,” outside linebackers coach Ted Monachino said last week, “and he hasn’t been able to finish on some of the snaps he could have. … Robert has a real good idea and a real good (rush) plan going into every week. He has missed some opportunities.”
Monachino was as direct as he has been all year in stressing the need for Quinn to produce more consistently. In the nine games he has played, Quinn has been credited with just nine total tackles.
“He has to make one play in the passing game,” Monachino said. “Before he can make three or four, he’s got to make one. It’s been a long drought. Nobody’s feeling that any more than Robert.”
Reliable player
In the third quarter of the Week 10 home loss to the Minnesota Vikings, inside linebacker Roquan Smith made the most of a third-and-8 blitz, darting through the A gap, overpowering running back Dalvin Cook and dragging Kirk Cousins to the grass.
“I just went through the back and made a play,” Smith said.
It was another display of athleticism, instincts and timely playmaking from Smith, who’s enjoying the best season of his career and seemingly getting better by the week. Against the Vikings, Smith had a game-high 14 tackles, three of them for a loss.
Through 10 games, he has been credited with 96 tackles, the third-highest total in the NFL. His 15 tackles for a loss lead the league.
Said inside linebackers coach Mark DeLeone: “He makes plays in every game that amaze me. I don’t know if it surprises me. But they amaze me. … He plays like a crazed dog. He plays with relentless effort on every single play. It’s really easy to coach guys who love playing football like he does.”
Smith should be in line for a big contract extension next offseason. Finally, it appears, the Bears have a top-10 selection who will get a second contract with the franchise and become a long-term blue-chip standout.
Second-half question
Will a soft schedule over the final six weeks provide an opportunity for a hot streak?
Yes, the Bears face the division-leading Packers on Sunday night and again in the season finale Jan. 3. But sandwiched in between are four games against opponents with a combined 12-28 record.
Perhaps December home games against the Detroit Lions and Houston Texans and road games in Minnesota and Jacksonville will allow the Bears to find their groove, generate some confidence and momentum and go on a little run.
In another of those mind-boggling statistical realities, the Bears are 19-4 in the Matt Nagy era and 4-1 this season when the offense scores a first-half touchdown. It’s not like the defense is asking for much. Some early support and the chance to play with a lead would be nice.
Through 10 games this season, the Bears have led for only 144 minutes, 9 seconds out of 608 minutes, 24 seconds played. That equates to playing with a lead 23.1% of the time. Two years ago, on the joy ride to a 12-4 season and NFC North title, the Bears held the lead 60.2% of the time.
In short, if the offense can be simply ordinary or even just slightly below average over this next stretch, it might allow an already solid defense to take its game up a notch.
Best-case scenario
The vocal leadership of safety Eddie Jackson helps stoke the defense’s fire and that group continues to carry more than its fair share of the load over the final six games, igniting a stretch in which the Bears win more than they lose and stick around in the playoff hunt.
Jackson has made it abundantly clear that the Bears defense has no intention of falling into a self-pity trap and allowing the offense’s ongoing struggles to become a motivation killer.
“We’re going to accept this challenge to put this thing on our back,” Jackson said after the loss to the Vikings. “We have guys like Akiem (Hicks), (Khalil) Mack, Danny (Trevathan), me, Roquan (Smith), Kyle Fuller. We have a lot of guys who sit up here and hold each other accountable, and we accept the challenge. We don’t care what the offense does. We don’t care if they put no points on the board. All we know is if the opposing team doesn’t score, they don’t win.”
It’s highly unlikely Matt Nagy’s offense suddenly finds a magic bullet for the stretch run, particularly with the injuries and struggles on the offensive line and at quarterback. So the path to the postseason is as obvious as it is demanding. The defense will have to lead the way every week with drive-killing stops and game-changing takeaways.
It certainly isn’t backing down from that test.
Worst-case scenario
Mentally drained by the offense’s prolonged ineptitude and further dispirited by a lengthy stretch of losing — the Bears have dropped five of their last seven games heading into Thanksgiving — the defense runs out of gas and motivation and experiences a slight but noticeable drop-off over the final six weeks.
Aaron Rodgers carves them up at least once in two meetings. Deshaun Watson comes to town in Week 14 and reminds Chicago yet again what it missed out on by drafting Mitch Trubisky with the No. 2 pick in 2017. And the entire season deteriorates toward a sloppy and depressing end.
With no significant answers provided by the offense, the Bears finish at .500 or below, acknowledge that another window of opportunity has slammed shut and then face significant questions regarding the amount of high-level change that’s necessary at Halas Hall.
