New Bears Tight End Demetrius Harris [VIDEO]
The Bears’ offense was one of the worst in the NFL in 2019 for a variety of reasons. I have already highlighted issues with personnel at right guard, quarterback, and tight end, as well as problems with how coaches chose to use the personnel available to them.
Today I want to look at down and distance tendencies to see what we can learn about Matt Nagy’s situational play calling. With that in mind, I looked at how effective Chicago’s offense was in various situations compared to the NFL as a whole in 2019. All statistics are from the NFL Game Statistics and Information System and Pro Football Reference’s Game Play Finder.
The table below compares their performance on first down to the NFL as a whole. Success rate data is from Sharp Football.
A few thoughts:
When it comes to 2nd down, context is needed.
A 3-yard gain is great on 2nd and 2, pretty good on 2nd and 5, and awful on 2nd and 10. With that in mind, I split the data into 4 groups based on the distance required to get a 1st down. The table below shows the results. Numbers in parentheses indicate the NFL average for that group.
Here’s what I know.
The Chicago Bears are currently fixated on trying to improve the quarterback position for 2020. But like any other position, the ability to achieve that improvement is dependent on availability. What players are on the trading block? What is the upside at the position in the second round (and later) of the draft? How much will the veteran free agent options cost? It’s all well and good to WANT to get better. But the opportunities still have to be there.
In recent days, a name has started to emerge: Derek Carr. From The Athletic’s Vic Tafur:
…$2.9 million of Carr’s $18.9 million 2020 base salary became guaranteed on Feb 5. The remaining $16 million is not guaranteed, which is a large part of the reason why there has been so much speculation about Carr’s future.
Here are my thoughts on the potential deal.
“The Quarterback Questions”
Do we trust in Mitch?
Is that even possible?
How much will Carr cost?
“A Healthy Rush”
If ninety-six plays,
The pass rush will regain health.
Just add one more piece.
“Pace”
This year will brand Pace,
defining his Bears tenure.
The year has begun.
Quarterback
Right guard.
Tight end.
Those are the positions that will be talked about until they’re addressed. Cornerback, inside linebacker and safety are positions where the Bears have decisions to make. But those aren’t the only positions the Bears should look to address this offseason.
Here are a few positions that the Bears shouldn’t hesitate to upgrade if they have the opportunity this spring:
When the Bears used a fourth round pick on Riley Ridley it was treated as if they were adding to an embarrassment of riches. Less than a year later, it really feels like they need another player there.
Ridley barely played as a rookie, which seemed like it was just a matter of the Bears having too many good players at the position early on. But as Taylor Gabriel suffered two concussions and Anthony Miller/Javon Wims struggled to produce early, Ridley wasn’t able to replace gain traction.
Gabriel seems likely to be a salary cap casualty, if he’s even able to play again. He’s a good player, but not a good fit for a quarterback with accuracy issues. Wims should’ve been a good fit, but still only caught 46.2 percent of the passes thrown his way, the worst rate on the team. He had a couple solid games, but averaged just three catches a game when he played more than 85 percent of the snaps and had just 10.3 yards per catch with nearly 20 percent of his season total coming on one 37-yard catch.
Earlier this offseason, I suggested the Bears could release Cordarrelle Patterson to free up just under $5M in cap room. A number of people responded that Patterson was the best kick returner in the NFL in 2019 and thus was worth the money. I wasn’t sold that any kick returner was worth that much, but set out to figure out just how much value they add.
Here’s the general setup:
Based on that approach, here’s what I found the average points expected for drives off of kickoffs that started in a variety of field positions.
This generally matches expectation, as teams are expected to score more points the closer to the opposing end zone they start. By the time they’re inside the opponent 40 yard line, the expected points are higher than a field goal.
Using this data, I then looked at the Bears’ starting field position off of kickoffs in 2018, when they did not have Cordarrelle Patterson vs. 2019, when they did.
Sign Phil Rivers.
There, I said it.
Here’s why.
(1) Rivers is only one year removed from one of his best seasons as a professional. (4,308/32-12/105) Is it possible he can no longer perform at the professional level? Sure. It’s possible. But it’s unlikely. Hell, in his “terrible” 2019 he threw for more yards in a single season than any Bears quarterback ever has.
(2) Rivers’ career is lacking only one thing: a title. It could be the thing that keeps him out of Canton. Wouldn’t he be motivated to reach deep and find it for one run, especially for a team that wouldn’t require him to put 40 on the board to win games?
(3) This offense needs some personality. It needs some leadership. It needs some pissed off, especially since Kyle Long’s demise. Rivers never shuts up on the field. He’s a pain in the ass. He’s downright annoying. But what Bears fan wouldn’t deal with that annoyance for 4,000+ yards and 10 wins?
Sign Phil Rivers.
Take a shot.
Worst case scenario, Trubisky is back on the field by Week 6.
Phil Rivers, 2019. 4,615 yards. 23 touchdowns. 20 interceptions. 88.5 rating.
Andy Dalton, 2019. 3,494 yards. 16 touchdowns. 14 interceptions. 78.3 rating.
Marcus Mariota, 2019. 1,203 yards. 7 touchdowns. 2 interceptions. 92.3 rating. (Benched)
Mitch Trubisky, 2019. 3,183 yards. 17 touchdowns. 10 interceptions. 83 rating.
Many will argue, especially in the coming weeks, that signing an available free agent QB to compete with Trubisky is a futile exercise. “He’s not an upgrade,” they’ll argue, citing the statistics above. But one thing fans must be reminded of is that Trubisky’s issues went far beyond the statistics. Trubisky’s issues began well before the football was snapped.
Does Rivers still have the arm strength to light up a good secondary at Soldier Field in December? Probably not.
Does Dalton have the ability to eliminate the big interception? His career suggests he doesn’t.
Does Mariota have the ability to be consistently accurate with the football? The Titans sure don’t think so, and they’re right.
But all three of these quarterbacks are smart players. All three can read defenses. All three are savvy enough to get into the right protections. Do they all come with physical limitations? Yes. But Trubisky combines severe physical limitations (see: accuracy) with mental incompetence (see: pretty much everything).
As has been reported here, and elsewhere, Matt Nagy became increasingly frustrated with Trubisky over the course of the 2019 season. Not because he refused to his use legs at the appropriate time, or handed the ball off at the wrong incorrectly on RPOs, or missed wide open receivers down the field for big plays. He became frustrated with Trubisky because the quarterback proved incapable of running his offense mentally.
That’s why the free agent quarterback market will be so appealing to the Chicago Bears in the coming month plus. Because if Nagy is going to fail as a head coach, he’d at least like to fail with his offense and not with some dumbed-down, elementary version of it, restructured for a overwhelmed quarterback.
The Bears don’t need great quarterback play to compete for a championship in 2020. But they need at least a mid-table performance at the position. There are guys they can pay to achieve that.
Monday I was at the gym. (Humble brag.)
On the television set was a program called Get Up. As someone who never turns on ESPN for a non-sporting event, I had never heard of this program, nor did I recognize the individuals at the desk until I saw Mike Greenberg, the show’s host. The debate topic? Mitch Trubisky, of course. This segment was a response to the above video, Prince Amukamara’s passionate defense of the Bears quarterback. The debate was being framed as how the Bears should approach the position, not Trubisky specifically.
Being at the gym, I couldn’t hear any of it. But the panelists seemed fired up. Over the next three days we’ll take a big picture look at how the Bears will address the quarterback position this off-season.
Today: Possible approaches.
Tomorrow: Looking beyond the numbers.
Friday: DBB-endorsed path.
Truth is, the Bears do not have a lot of approach options at quarterback for 2020 because there are only three ways to attain a player in the league. Sign. Trade. Draft. And two aren’t very good for this coming season. Let’s take them in reverse order.
Draft.
Will the Bears use one of their picks on a quarterback? It’s possible. But this is not an offense rookies pick up quickly. The best quarterback in the league needed a year on the bench behind Alex Smith to get comfortable. (And has admitted how important that year was.) Trubisky is a smart kid and was the second pick of the draft and he’s still struggling with it.
Drafting a quarterback is a smart move for the future of this franchise. But the likelihood it’ll help this team win in 2020 is minimal.
How should the Chicago Bears solve their tight end problem?
Sign Eric Ebron?
Draft Brycen Hopkins?
[Editor’s Note: Sometimes I think Andrew makes up players to trick me and I certainly didn’t think that name, with that spelling, was a real person. Turns out he is!]
Both?
In an ideal world the Bears would know that Trey Burton will be healthy at the start of the 2020 season, with a rookie being groomed to replace him. But the Bears offense is far from an ideal world and they have no idea if Burton will be available and have to plan as if he won’t be.
There isn’t much of a question as to what kind of player Burton is when he’s healthy, but if he can be healthy is anyone’s guess. In the season-ending presser, GM Ryan Pace indicated that he expects Burton to be good to go when the team goes into training camp next year, but they expected that last year too. And, as Pace also indicated, they won’t leave it up to chance this time around.
Twelve months ago, most people thought the Bears had a backup option in case Burton wasn’t healthy in Adam Shaheen. Now we are certain Shaheen isn’t capable of filling that role and the Bears don’t have another capable option on their roster.
So, now what?
