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Catching Up On The Weekend’s Audio

| April 8th, 2024

Last Friday saw the latest Bear With Us launch, covering Caleb Williams and the #9 overall pick…

And then over the weekend, Jeff and I caught up on what he’s hearing about #9 overall (plus a full mock of the craziness that may lead up to Chicago’s pick.

More Nine at #9 tomorrow.

Your Turn: Does the draft still feel far away? Or does it finally feel around the corner?

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Grading Chicago’s Final Exam: Nobody Passed

| January 8th, 2024

If the Bears’ visit to Green Bay was intended to represent a benchmark for their 2023 season’s progress, they failed their final exam quite emphatically.

Chicago’s report cards are currently under review and will be returned to our students throughout the next week. Until then, let’s review yesterday’s season finale one last time.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

The Good:

  • The Silver Lining… is that there is no Silver Lining. There’s no easy excuse for why Chicago lost — after all, the ball bounced the Bears’ way early and often:
    • Packers’ K Anders Carlson missed an early Field Goal
    • Green Bay’s rookies allowed the clock to run out on the 1st half before picking up extra points
    • Packers’ WR Bo Melton dropped a sizzling TD pass that hit him in the hands
    • A Packers’ DB dropped an end-zone INT as Chicago rallied
    • And then on 4th & 1 I thought the officials credited Chicago with a first down they may not have actually gotten.
  • Still, despite all of this, Chicago lost an emphatic 9-17 game. George McCaskey, Ryan Poles, and Kevin Warren are going to have to look this loss in the eye — they have no one to blame for it but the players in the locker room and the coaches that lead them. Do they think this plan would’ve worked if the team had more talent on it? Do they think this Quarterback gives them their best chance at success going forward? These questions felt easier to answer last week than they do now… and that’s likely for the better. If they can’t beat Green Bay, what’s the point?
  • Tyrique Stevenson, have a day. The Bears’ 2nd round pick felt like the only reason the game remained close during the first half of yesterday’s game — his pass deflection in the endzone robbed Green Bay of 7 points, then he stole another 3 points just before the first half ended. As if that wasn’t enough, he created the game’s only turnover as well by dislodging the ball from Jordan Love’s grasp in the mid-3rd quarter — He came to play.
    • On a day where Chicago’s DBs struggled to compete with Green Bay’s receivers, Stevenson stole downs back for the Bears throughout the game and I loved watching him do it. Hopefully the All-22 paints as rosy a picture of his performance as watching the game seemed to.

The Bad

  • Same song, different verse. Chicago opened the season with a game-plan in mind: stop the run with our front 4, play Cover 2 & Cover 3 behind them, and make opponents grind their way down the field. Early in the year, that’s exactly what opponents did.
    • Then, as the defense delivered one underperformance after another, the defense pivoted to running more Man Coverage defenses paired with blitzes up front — this worked, shutting down the offenses in the middle of the Bears’ schedule. As Chicago dominated lesser offenses, they rode this mix of Man Blitzes and Zone-Drop looks to becoming the NFL’s leader in Interceptions.
    • But then, for reasons I cannot explain, it is as if Matt Eberflus grew tired of the risk involved with his pressure packages and reverted back to his early-season game plans — after all, the media was so mean to him about Justin Jones dropping into coverage that one time, how could he possibly call plays like that again?
    • Thus, the door opened for Green Bay to exploit holes in soft zones with a quick-hitting pass game paired with a wide-hitting run game and, unsurprisingly, Matt LaFleur had no issues walking through that door. The vaunted Bears defense gave up 400+ yards, including a 6-minute backbreaker of a drive that closed the game, as Matt Eberflus’ best-laid plans unwound in front of his eyes.
  • Luke, I think it’s over. A Week 18 performance with less than 200 yards of offense feels like it should seal Getsy’s fate in Chicago. His tenure has been mired by poor communication across the offense, an inability to adjust to mid-game defensive changes, and a seemingly frayed relationship with the Bears’ signal caller… but at least we got a few nice opening game scripts.
  • Coffee is for closers only. Maybe I’m writing this out of frustration, maybe I have a point, honestly it’s hard to tell. But yesterday would’ve been a great day for Justin Fields to make a statement with his play in the 4th quarter. Instead, his two final drives resulted in a would-be interception and the final punt of the season.

The Ugly

  • The future seems far too uncertain. It’s easy for me, a writer, to write pretty words about the failings of Chicago’s head coach, but do George McCaskey, Kevin Warren, and Ryan Poles see things that way? Surely they can’t be satisfied with verdicts against quality teams always seeming to break away from them, but with Eberflus’ recent string of victories I can’t help but wonder if the front office is willing to move on. It feels like the perfect time to make a change to me, but I’m not the one signing the org’s checks. We’ll see what Black Monday brings.
    • With a new Quarterback likely waiting in the wings and a reset coming at both defensive and offensive coordinator, this feels like the perfect time for the Bears to pick a new direction at HC — either Jim Harbaugh, Bobby Slowik, Ben Johnson, or whoever else you may have in mind would then have the opportunity to customize the team to their needs via Free Agency before drafting a Quarterback that, theoretically, would become the best QB in Chicago’s history given the environment Ryan Poles may craft for him using free agent money and draft capital. But is the front office willing to fire Eberflus ‘one year early’ rather than ‘one year late’? Only time will tell.

Postgame Podcast:

Nick and I recorded a podcast where we talked through the ups, the downs, the ins, and the outs of Chicago’s latest loss here:

Your Turn: How do you feel about yesterday’s game?

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Previewing a Christmas Eve Dance with the Desert Birds

| December 21st, 2023

The playoff push may have ended before it started, but with 3 games remaining on Chicago’s schedule backs are truly against the wall now — Matt Eberflus now has three late-game collapses in a 2023 season where, had Chicago taken care of business with all three fourth-quarter leads, he’d have firm control of the NFC’s 6th seed & might be a weekend away from clinching a playoff spot.

It’s hard to imagine the powers that be at Halas Hall aren’t every bit as disappointed as we fans are, leaving three critical weeks for Eberflus to make his final statement — if his team finishes the year with three strong wins, they might just save their coach’s job.

Eberflus’ final stand begins this Sunday as he takes on a hapless Arizona Cardinals team that should be easy prey… but this is the NFL. Nothing’s ever easy, is it?

Nick and I dove deep into this matchup and the state of the Bears within the latest episode of Bear With Us, including discussion topics like…

  • What was Luke Getsy doing throughout that game in Cleveland? What could he have done better?
  • Who played well on defense last week? What went wrong at the end?
  • Where do the Bears match up well with Arizona on defense? What weak links in the Cardinals’ offense can they exploit?
  • How does Chicago’s offense match up with Arizona’s ragtag defense? Should this be a big day for Chicago?
  • A review of Matt Eberflus’ defense against the Lions, including the driving forces behind Chicago’s success.
  • Holiday chatter & fan Q&A
  • And much, much more…

It’s one of our best episodes yet — check it out and let me know what you think!

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Previewing a Regime-Defining Trip to Cleveland

| December 14th, 2023

Four weeks ago, I wrote the following about the Bears’ trip to Detroit: “This game in Motown may be one of Matthew Eberflus’ last chances to show Chicago’s powers-that-be that the Bears are in good hands.” Since then, he’s shown exactly that.

This defense is playing with their eyes on fire, both by blitzing the QB fearlessly and dutifully executing assignments in coverage. It’s a beautiful thing to watch.

This Chicago offense sputters at times, but between each sputter Justin Fields, DJ Moore, and Cole Kmet are producing explosive plays that move the ball down the field in the chunks they need to set up points for their defense.

Add the two units together, and you’ve got yourself a winning recipe. Because of that, against all odds, these Chicago Bears are in the playoff hunt.

But with a 5-8 record at this point in the year, the Bears need to win every game from here on out if they want to have any hopes at a playoff run — luckily, this weekend they face a Cleveland Browns team that’s been ravaged by injuries. As you’ll see below, they’re a team in rough shape.

Matt Eberflus has a chance to send Chicago into a frenzy by beating a weakened team on the road and kickstarting a playoff push — everything is on the line for Eberflus from here on out, and I expect him to coach like it. That should make for some exciting Bears football, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.

Nick and I dive into this topic and plenty more within the latest episode of Bear With Us, including…

  • Where do the Bears match up well with Cleveland on defense? What weak links in the Browns’ offense can they exploit?
  • How does Chicago’s offense match up with what’s left of Cleveland’s defense? How well does the Bears’ offense really need to perform?
  • A review of Matt Eberflus’ defense against the Lions, including the driving forces behind Chicago’s success.
  • A look at what Justin Fields was (and wasn’t) during last Sunday’s game
  • An outline of Chicago’s playoff scenarios, including the teams you’ll need to root for outside of Cleveland this weekend.
  • And much, much more…

It’s one of our best episodes yet — check it out and let me know what you think!

Your Turn: How do you feel about this weekend?

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A Big Game Looms Sunday — What Happens Next?

| December 7th, 2023

As we inch ever closer towards Sunday’s game, the Chicago Bears stand a pivot point — the results of these next 5 games may very well decide the direction of the biggest Bears offseason in recent memory, and if Head Coach Matt Eberflus wants to be on the safe side of that decision he’ll need to start winning games soon.

Could the Bears spark a win streak off of a divisional home defense? Cole Kmet seems to think so, but with a hungry Detroit team visiting town on a day that’s slated for snowy, cold weather, all we should expect is a knock-down, drag-out fight.

Anything could happen — after all, if Chicago manages to finish the season 9-8 they may very well land an NFC Wild Card spot. But before us fans dare to dream of the playoffs, first Chicago must force these Lions to settle a debt Detroit incurred only a few weeks ago. The Bears had the Lions within their grasp but let them slip away… if they’re to surge this season, they’ll have to start by winning on Sunday.

There’s enough within this game to unpack that Nick & I managed to record our longest Bear With Us episode yet — in this episode, Nick and I dive into…

  • How can we work to talk about Justin Fields as rationally as possible? What does he need to show by the end of the year?
  • What on earth has happened to the Lions’ defense?
  • Where are the Lions winning on offense? Where are they losing?
  • How does a healthy Bears team match up with this Detroit squad?
  • What does this game mean for every Bear involved
  • What have we learned about defense in the NFL from Eberflus’ 2023 season?
  • Is the league as down on Luke Getsy as most Bears fans are?
  • And much, much more…

I know I say this often, but this really is one of our best episodes yet — check it out and let me know what you think!

Your Turn: How do you feel about this weekend’s contest?

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There’s Not Much Going On. It’s Fine (and Healthier) Not to Click.

| April 15th, 2022

For 18 of the 32 NFL teams, there are 348 days without football.

And that’s just too much time.

Too much time to gallantly scroll the witless wasteland of Twitter, engaging in unwinnable debates about whether a young player might be good in the future. Too much time antagonize other fan bases on Facebook or TikTok or Reddit or OnlyFans because, you know, their team stinks and your team doesn’t. Too much time to bemoan every free agent signing, no matter how little the investment, and study every draft “prospect”, even when 95% of those prospects have no chance of being a viable professional player.

It’s not the fault of the fans. Fans love football. But do they really love football that much more now than they did when the draft was held on weekend afternoons and when free agent signings were only known because you’d read about them in the paper a day or two after they happened? An overwhelming majority of NFL fans are not even on Twitter – a fact often forgotten by those of us who seem to spend our lives on the platform.

Truth is, there is now far too much media covering the sport (and sports generally) and that media is forced to operate on a 365-day calendar. There is no vacation from the clicks business. The newspapers need you to click and they’ve learned mock drafts are click gold. The Athletic needs new subscribers: that is their entire value proposition. CHGO needs to find their foothold in the marketplace. The only way to do these things is constant engagement. The only way to successfully engage is to launch “takes” into the sports atmosphere.

And my god, EVERYBODY HAS A PODCAST. LITERALLY, EVERYBODY. Well, there is one Bears-related entity that doesn’t have a podcast: me. “The Weekend Show” was fun to produce but it was always far more of an audio variety show than an actual Bears pod. (That sometimes sums up this entire enterprise.) I’ve been asked to do a podcast a hundred times. I’ve been asked why I don’t do a podcast two hundred. My answer is simple: I don’t have that much to say. And when I have something unique that requires my voice, I do one of those Twitter audio things and get it done in two minutes. Also, I’m not that interested in the stuff that doesn’t tangibly happen on the field.

You know, those other 348 days.

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Zimmerman Podcast: Draft Analyst E.J. Snyder [AUDIO]

| April 19th, 2019

Highlights:
  • The schedule is out. Bill and E.J. discuss key games, oddities about the schedule and the misnomer of having a hard schedule based on last year’s strength of schedule and how little that really means.
  • Snyder, draft analyst from Windy City Gridiron, breaks down the running back prospects in detail, plus some key prospects to look out for at safety, corner, edge and tight end.
  • Bill and E.J. breakdown draft strategy – should Ryan Pace look to trade up or trade down? Should he take a running back at 87 regardless?
  • A full discussion on how to approach the kicker position.

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