Fox Does Not Commit to Glennon as Starter
Teething is a bitch.
My one-year-old son already has seven teeth, all of which he toughed his way through with little complaint, but now he has molars coming in and it has been a struggle.
He has one big, dull tooth bulging into into the back of each side of his mouth. It’s created all kinds of problems. He’s had ear infections, boogers all over his face and just doesn’t seem to want to eat sometimes. The most puzzling part is when he fusses for no apparent reason.
But there is going to be an end to this. He’s going to have all of his teeth and proceed through his life like a normal, growing boy.
In a lot of ways, this Bears season has reminded me of my son’s teething. It’s been painful, but there are signs that things are going to turn around. Whether or not they’re able to finish the job is another story.
Last week was a big win. Things didn’t go their way with the officials, a defensive back made a stupid blunder and they got nothing from their quarterback. But they won. They won because they have a pretty good defense that took a significant step against a pretty good offense. They won because they have two studs in the backfield and a coach who is creative enough to know how to use them.
It was the first September win of the Fox regime. They showed there are things they can do well. The next step is consistency. I don’t know what this Bears season will end up being, and I don’t know what the Fox regime will be, but this was a step.
Now let’s see if we can get another tooth to pop through.
Here are three POSITIVE points Adam made in the Sun-Times:
4. The Bears missed linebacker Nick Kwiatkoski (four tackles on Bucs’ first drive). Christian Jones missed Jacquizz Rodgers in the backfield on his one-yard touchdown run.
Kwik looked terrific when this game began. He was firing at the line of scrimmage. And then, injury. Because it’s totally normal for a starter and his backup to both tear their pec muscles in consecutive weeks. Remarkable how many rosters are already being decimated just two weeks into the season.
8. Want a positive? Bears rookie safety Eddie Jackson was strong in run support. He’s made a concerted effort to improve his tackling.
9. One more positive? Bears nickel back Bryce Callahan rebounded from his tough Week 1 and nearly had two interceptions. He was active and very close to big plays.
Jackson, Callahan and Kyle Fuller are all playing at a solid level and I expect all three to improve as the season progresses.
Literally found my eyes wandering from the Bears game during the second half Sunday. So I saw quite a bit of the league.
(1) Dak Prescott is really a poor thrower of the football. I think he has enough intangibles to have a successful career in the league but that arm is never beating anyone from the pocket.
John Fox said it.
I heard him.
He said it.
Sunday’s loss was not on Mike Glennon. Nope, Glennon’s constant throwing behind receivers was not the problem. Glennon blowing off an open Adam Shaheen to throw the ball to a linebacker was certainly not the problem. Glennon fumbling the football because he has the least amount of pocket awareness in the history of professional football was clearly not the problem. Glennon’s awful pick-six, predicted seconds before it happened from a New York City bar stool, was definitively not the problem.
Sure, the Bears made a ton of mistakes yesterday and were more than likely not winning even if they received adequate quarterback play. But they didn’t receive adequate quarterback play. They received the type of quarterback play anybody who has studied the tape of Mike Glennon’s career would expect. This performance was not surprising. It wasn’t abnormal. It is exactly who Glennon has always been.
And when a reporter dared to ask John Fox if Mitch Trubisky will be starting next week against Pittsburgh, Fox answered with a simple “No”.
Next week, and every week Glennon starts, the Bears will lose. Not because they don’t have good enough players to compete but because the organization has chosen to do so. The Bears have selected failure. People wonder why this space has been obsessed with Glennon since the start of training camp? Yesterday you saw why. He renders the team non-competitive.
And worse, he renders the games unwatchable. And I really, really like watching Bears football. At least I did until September 2017.
If the Chicago Bears want to sell their fans on the current regime leading the team back to glory, they better start making progress. Because last Sunday was decisively not progress. It was more of the same.
With their top two receivers out and the decision to play a terrible quarterback made, the defense has to be the center of John Fox’s sales pitch to stay in the job. What I saw last Sunday was pretty much the same thing we’ve been seeing for the last two years.
The third bullet point is the most frustrating.
We are now 33 games into the Fox/Fangio defense. Some facts:
Those rates are absolutely insane. For two defensive minds as accomplished as Fox and Fangio, how is it possible that their teams are never prepared to start games? Here’s the kicker: in games they managed to fight off their opponents until the third offensive possession, the Bears are 6-6. That’s six of the nine wins of the Fox regime.
The official start of the season should be an exciting time for NFL fans all over the country, but Bears fans are almost unanimously unexcited.
The reason for this is pretty clear. With their present quarterbacking situation, the starting of Mike Glennon, they’ll need perfection from pretty much everyone else on the roster. Have teams done it? Sure. But most teams in this situation end up picking in the top 10 of the draft.
That said, the Bears do have more going for them than a standard three-win team and there are a few reasons to be excited.
Here are five:
It’s been a minute since the Bears have had even an adequate defense. Under Lovie Smith, they ranked in the top half of the league in scoring defense eight times in nine seasons and in the top five four times.
Since Smith was fired, they haven’t cracked the top twenty and finished in the bottom ten three times.
This year should be different.
There is no question that John Fox actually believes he can win with Mike Glennon. That’s Fox’s reality. But in actual reality, even when Glennon is at his best, he will limit what the team can do offensively. The coaches know it, the fans know it and — worse yet — the players know it. If the Bears struggle with Glennon, Fox could lose the locker room. Once that happens, he’s gone.
Glennon deserves credit. It looked as if he needed to play well to keep his job and he did. But Glennon playing well still only gave the offense 10 points against an awful defense. It would’ve been 14, but he missed an easy throw for a touchdown. Glennon is always going to miss throws. His ball placement is terrible. At his best, he’s just a guy who won’t kill you. He’s never going to make the kinds of plays that win games.
The rest of the Bears are good enough that they’ll win seven games that way if they stay completely healthy. They’ve already lost their top receiver and have a quarterback who can’t use either Kevin White or Markus Wheaton on anything aside from bubble screens and quick slants. More realistically, the Bears will end up with five or six wins if Glennon starts all 16 games. Fox probably isn’t keeping his job if they only win five or six games and he sure as hell isn’t keeping it if he loses the locker room along the way.
When Mike Glennon was asked if he’s now embroiled in a competition for the starting quarterback job, he didn’t hesitate. He didn’t ponder the question for a few moments and deliver a vague, locker room friendly response. You know, something like “Everybody is out here competing for their job every day. Quarterback is no different.”
Glennon didn’t do that. He looked forward and somewhat defiantly said, “No.”
Is Mike Glennon good at playing quarterback? No. But he’s not stupid. Hell, I don’t know the guy, he may very well be stupid, but he’s not oblivious to what’s happening around him. The only argument for keeping Mitch Trubisky on the bench was the sort of unprovable “he’s not ready”. That argument died yesterday. By giving Trubisky time with the ones in practice and announcing he’ll play with them again Sunday, John Fox made it abundantly clear he believes Trubisky is ready to play in the NFL. Coaches value practice reps the way the narrator of Looking Glass’ Brandy (You’re a Fine Girl) valued the sea. “Brandy,” that man says, “You’re a fine girl. What a good wife you would be. But my life, my love and my lady is the sea.”
Coaches don’t go handing out first-team reps to projects. They are the single most important evaluative element of the off-season.
Trubisky: “I’ve showed them what I can do. I think I’ve progressed faster than they expected I would, but I’ve still got a long ways to go.”
— Adam Hoge (@AdamHoge) August 23, 2017
Listen, these were never going to be navigable waters for Glennon. The talent gap between he and Trubisky is simply too wide. Glennon’s best hope to hold down the starting job for 2017 season required several factors. He needed to perform well in practice. (He hasn’t.) He needed to move the offense well in the preseason. (Not even close.) Subsequently he needed to let a notoriously conservative head coach take a conservative route with his rookie quarterback by providing a stable option at the top of the depth chart. (Nope.)
The question was asked and the question was answered.
Reporter to John Fox: Will Trubisky play with the ones this week?
Fox: “We’ll meet on that, we’ll talk and we’ll keep you guys posted.”
— Zach Zaidman (@ZachZaidman) August 21, 2017
The follow-up was asked and the follow-up was answered.
. @MarkPotash : Is there a way to work Trubisky in with 1s without it being an “affront” to Glennon?#Bears coach John Fox: “Probably not.”
— Adam Jahns (@adamjahns) August 21, 2017
The Chicago Bears have a chance to do the right thing for the 2017 season. They have a chance to admit their mistake – acknowledge giving Glennon 18 million anything was insane – and take an important first step towards the future of this franchise. They can do it Sunday in Tennessee.
(AP Photo/Jack Dempsey)
I’ve seen a lot of speculation this offseason that John Fox is on the hot seat with the Bears in 2017. There were even some rumors that he might be fired following a disastrous 2016. But now his job is widely believed to be on the line should 2017 not show significant improvement.
With that in mind, I wanted to look at what history says about Fox keeping his job beyond 2017 based on similar situations around the NFL. Since this will be Fox’s 3rd year on the job, I looked at coach success in the first three years.
Coaching turnover happens fast in the NFL. From 2000 to 2016, there were 142 coaching hires, an average of just over 4.4 per team. Thus in the last 17 years, the average head coach has lasted just under 4 years on the job.
Looking at the current list of 32 NFL head coaches, that 4 year marker also proves to be significant. Exactly half of the coaches are entering at least their 4th season, with the other half all entering their 3rd season or less (full data here). What do those 16 head coaches who have been around for 4 or more years have in common? All but one of them made the playoffs sometime in their first three seasons, with the lone exception (Jason Garrett) achieving that feat in year 4 after 3 straight 8-8 seasons that indicated the Cowboys were close.
It appears the achievement needed for John Fox to keep his job past 2017 is clear: guide the Bears to the playoffs.
