There has been and will continue to be a great deal of talk about how the Bears need to add at least one stud wide receiver to their roster this off-season. Everybody wants a Julio Jones or Antonio Brown, with good reason, and the Bears are in desperate need of an upgrade in talent at the position after a season in which they finished last in the NFL in both passing yards and touchdowns, 25th in yards per attempt, and 26th in passer rating.

The Bears are going to add more talent at WR. But what exactly do they need? Should they look for one great player, two good players, or three plus capable players?

In an attempt to answer this question, I looked at how top passing offenses split their production among targets in recent years. After all, that’s the ultimate goal for the Bears, right? They want to become one of the top passing offenses in the NFL.

Accordingly, I looked at top 10 passing teams according to Football Outsiders’ DVOA for each of 2015, 2016, and 2017 and tracked how many receiving yards each of their top 5 leaders in that category had for the season. While this DVOA stat is not a perfect metric, it is an attempt to measure the efficiency of a passing attack instead of volume, which you would get from just looking at passing yards. The full list can be seen here.

No Clear Pattern

The first thing that jumps out is that there is no single defined way to have a top 10 passing offense. Some teams did it with one clear stud and a bunch of secondary weapons. Others had two dominant targets. Some had no clear dominant target at all.

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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.

• They can’t get turnovers.
• They can’t get off the field on third down.
• They start slowly.

The third bullet point is the most frustrating.

We are now 33 games into the Fox/Fangio defense. Some facts:

• 21 times they’ve given up scores on the first two possessions.
• 16 of those have been touchdowns!
• In 14 of those games, they gave up scores on the first possession itself.
• 11 of those were touchdowns!

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.

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Last Thoughts on Glennon

Many have spent countless Twitter hours arguing I am wrong to be rooting against Mike Glennon. I am not rooting against Mike Glennon. I hope he wins every start of his Chicago Bears career. I simply believe Mitch Trubisky – even right this very second – gives the Bears the best chance to win football games.

And the Bears should be all-in on winning football games in 2017. They have a good defense, great running attack and solid specials. If they get production from their passing attack they are going to have an opportunity to play in the postseason.

With Glennon, offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains needs to be perfect. Because if the play breaks down, the play is dead. With Trubisky, the play breaking down is simply an opportunity for a great talent to showcase his ability.

I’m just hoping the Glennon-led Bears don’t put the 2017 team in too big of a hole.

Adam Jahns does a far better just illustrating this point in the Sun-Times. Read his column by CLICKING HERE.

Long Snapper For Long Snapper

I’m told #Bears are expected to sign long snapper Jeff Overbaugh after a tryout at Halas Hall this morning.

— Brad Biggs (@BradBiggs) August 28, 2017

And if you want to see the most boring workout video in the history of man, look no further!

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Yesterday was an exceedingly positive day coming out of camp. But all that really matters is how many times the cart comes out.

• Adam Jahns does a nice job breaking down the drama surrounding Kevin White in these early days of Bourbonnais. For my money, WR coach Zach Azzanni made a major mistake here. Why is a position coach calling out a player, insinuating he’s lost confidence, on the second day of padded practice? Why is John Fox allowing a first-year position coach to create a storyline that doesn’t actually exist? It’ll be surprising if Azzanni is so forthcoming moving forward.
• Of course, Adam Hoge makes the exact opposite argument for WGN. With White being Wednesday’s star, Hoge believes Azzanni may be “pushing the right buttons.”
• Amazing how hung-up on the quarterback pecking order fans seem to be. Let me clear something up. Mark Sanchez can’t play any more. If he’s on this roster in September – and he shouldn’t be – it’ll be in a break-glass-for-emergency/mentor role. Why wouldn’t Sanchez make my final 53? Because if you need him in October, he’ll be there, sitting at a bus station in Naperville, checking his cell phone repeatedly.

More practice today!

“Wow! Who threw that?” Is the question my wife asked in our first real exposure to Mitch Trubisky at Saturday’s training camp practice.

It was a day in which everyone wanted to talk about the fumbled snaps but even a football novice like my wife could see that there was a definite difference in what Trubisky had to offer versus that of Mike Glennon and Mark Sanchez.

I don’t mean to minimize the snap issue. If a team can’t complete the snap, they can’t run a play. But there hasn’t been a quarterback in the history of the league who hasn’t figured out how to take a snap from the center. Let’s repeat that. There hasn’t been a quarterback in the history of the league who hasn’t figured out how to take a snap from the center.

The rest of that practice should have Bears fans excited.

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Kevin White, Struggling?

Adam Hoge is not an alarmist. So when he opens a column with Kevin White’s early “struggles” there is reason to pay attention.

“He’s not where I want him to be or where we need him to be,” Bears wide receivers coach Zach Azzanni admitted Monday. “He’s a work in progress. He’s had a good three days. Good first day, OK second day, much better today.”

Azzanni was just referring to the three days since pads went on and Sunday’s quiet practice prompted the wide receivers coach to pull out some of White’s tape from West Virginia.

“He forgets about (West Virginia) sometimes because of the battle he’s had the last two years,” Azzanni said. “I wanted him to see how he used to go up and just grab that ball out of the air and he’s starting to do that again. I know he had a drop in one-on-ones the other day. The other thing is, he’s a prideful kid and he lets that beat him up and you cannot do that.”

White needs two things: (a) sustained game action and (b) success. And I’m a believer that achieving a will directly lead to be b. But tentativity from a player like White is understandable when he must be thinking that every cut in the middle of the field could be the one that ends his season. White’s not going to be confident and explosive on Day 3 in Bourbonnais. The Bears need to hope he is both of those things come Week 8 in New Orleans.

The One Throw Column

There’s a new trend developing with camp coverage across the league. Because media is limited to both what they’re allowed to see and what they’re allowed to cover – Pat Finley has resorted to drawing plays on what seems to be napkins – writers are turning in copy wherein they draw major conclusions from minor moments. Rich Campbell did so yesterday in the Trib, writing about singular moments from Glennon and Trubisky.

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Ryan Pace exited the 2015 NFL Draft process with a really good wide receiver. Does it really matter if that player is an undrafted free agent or the seventh overall pick?

I’m not giving up on Kevin White – it is impossible to reach any conclusion on the first rounder – but Cam Meredith’s play last year has me wondering how much White’s health and development will actually play into the Bears plans and how much flak we should give Pace if he missed on the pick.

Meredith was the Bears leading receiver with 66 catches, 888 yards and four touchdowns, but the numbers are more impressive when you add context.

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Jose M. Osorio/Chicago Tribune

It was insane.

Kevin White missed an OTA practice that wasn’t relevant enough to conclude anything about this Bears squad and both media members and fans started writing him off as a bust.

I agree with WGN’s Adam Hoge that the Bears could’ve helped the situation. John Fox could’ve been clear that White wasn’t injured; that it was just a day off for any reason he wanted to give. Fox’s vague responses can’t be trusted, so he really should’ve said something to ease concern.

But should he have to do that for people to not jump off the deep end?

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I’ve tried to calm myself down and think about the loss to the Cowboys logically. But I can’t help but come to the same conclusion I came to while watching the game: this team is suffering from coaching malpractice.

Any team missing their three best defensive players and starting quarterback is going to struggle. Add to the fact that those three defensive players were all playing in the front seven and they were going against the team with the best offensive line in the league and a blowout makes sense.

But I don’t give a shit about any of that.

The Bears should’ve been blown out several times last year, but they weren’t.

They weren’t because they fought.

They weren’t because they either had a sound game plan or adjusted well.

They weren’t because their coaching was a legitimate advantage.

That isn’t the case right now and I’m not sure what the answer is.

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