This is the final installment of a 3-part series looking at Chicago’s 2023 pass rush.

• In part one, we learned that the Bears had one of the worst pass rushes in the NFL, though it improved a bit after trading for Montez Sweat, especially when they were willing to blitz.
• In part two, we saw that Montez Sweat is a good but not great pass rusher, while all of the other defensive ends on the roster are bad at rushing the passer.

Today, we’re going to end the series by exploring Chicago’s defensive tackles.

Overall Efficiency

We’ll start with a season-long look at how Chicago’s main defensive tackles performed when rushing the passer. The table below shows a variety of per-snap metrics, including how they ranked compared to the 98 DTs league-wide who had at least 200 pass rush snaps. A few quick notes:

• All data comes from Pro Football Focus (PFF).
• Win rate is the percentage of snaps where PFF determines that the rusher has beaten the blocker at any point in the snap. This is admittedly subjective, and thus should not be used on its own, but can be a helpful part of a larger picture.
• Pass Rush Productivity is a unique PFF stat that accounts for all sacks, QB hits, and pressures on a per-snap basis, with an added weight given to sacks; a higher value is better.
• True pass sets look only at plays that do not give offensive linemen a built in advantage: no play action, no screens, and the throw time has to be at least 2 seconds. This lets us see how effectively a player rushes the passer when they most likely know they are getting after the QB, and the offense knows they have to block for a while.
• Values in the top 25% are highlighted in green, while those in the bottom 25% are highlighted in red.

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We’ll pick up right where we left off yesterday — let’s review the rest of the Bears draft class, stopping only once we reach the players that have yet to log meaningful snaps.

Zacch Pickens:

• Overall: Pickens has underwhelmed in the eyes of some, but I can’t help feeling like he’s better described as a player miscast within this defense — at South Carolina, Pickens was a reliable 1-gap run defender with a quick first step that flashed nuanced hand-usage when rushing the passer at the Senior Bowl. He’s a lighter defensive lineman (listed at 300lbs by Chicago) better suited for quick penetration than he for holding up against double teams… but why then have the Bears asked him to be the backup Nose Tackle? It doesn’t make sense, though I continue to hope that one day it will.
  • The weight difference between Andrew Billings (listed at 330lbs) and Zacch Pickens (listed at 300lbs) tells the whole story, especially since Billings and Pickens are likely heavier & lighter than their listings respectively. It’s no surprise Pickens is struggling, especially against double-teams, but when he’s allowed to do the job I think he better fits he flashes reps like the Tweet below.
• Where he’s surprised me: His first step was always good in school, but I’ve been surprised at how many plays (~3 come to mind) he’s made in limited action due to his first step alone. Also, we did see Pickens anchor a few times successfully in the preseason — that was a nice surprise. Rooting for him.
• Improvement area: A player like Pickens can always use more refinement with his hands, though he flashed a wonderful long-arm pass rush against Washington that gives me hope for the future. Pickens is often used as the ‘set up man’ within stunts for his teammates, so he doesn’t get nearly as many opportunities as teammates like Dominique Robinson, Rasheem Green, or DeMarcus Walker — I’d love to see him get more pass-rush opportunities before I attempt to grade him further.

#Bears DT Zacch Pickens finally gets a rep at 3T and would you believe it he long-arms his G for a pressure.

Huh. Back to 1Tech I guess. pic.twitter.com/d5g1oEIuxe

— Robert Schmitz (@robertkschmitz) October 10, 2023

Roschon Johnson:

• Overall: Roschon looks like a young star. He runs hard, he catches the ball well, and he’s a reliable pass-blocker when picking up blitzes or assisting his defensive linemen. The RB position can be fairly self-evident, so I don’t know how much more there is to say — it’s a shame he’s currently injured, but he should be back soon. And as this offense gets healthier overall, he should get plenty of opportunities to create chunk plays.

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It’s Mini-Bye week in Chicago! With that in mind, let’s check in on the 2023 Bears rookie class — today, we’ll do the first & second round players, then tomorrow we’ll cover the rest of the class.

Darnell Wright:

• Overall: In my opinion, Wright has been about as good as you can ask a rookie tackle to be. He’s displayed natural power in his hands both as a run and a pass blocker, but it’s been his pass-blocking that’s stood out through 5 games so far. Wright is often left on an island with little to no help and fends for himself nicely — he’s been beaten at least once or twice in every game he’s played in, but that’s all part of playing tackle as a rookie.
  • The key is that he bounces back — getting beaten happens at tackle, but he doesn’t let bad reps snowball. Montez Sweat beat him early in Washington (just like Rashan Gary beat him early in Week 1) but he adjusted his kick-step in later reps and held Sweat off as the game wore on. I love seeing that from a young-gun.
• Where he’s surprised me: Wright is fast when he’s run-blocking on the move, which I didn’t expect based on his Tennessee film. That WR conditioning test clearly paid off.
• Improvement area: Wright’s kick-step can be sluggish off the snap, making him vulnerable to rushers that can bend the edge with speed. Players like Montez Sweat, Rashan Gary, Aiden Hutchinson and others will give him trouble until this is resolved, but I doubt this problem will persist for long. If the issue is still present closer to Week 11, we’ll take a deeper look.

Gervon Dexter Sr:

• Overall: So far Dexter has looked more raw than I expected him to at the NFL level, and my expectations weren’t particularly high for his rookie year — his Florida film showed a bully with the brawn to take on anybody, but NFL OL are taking advantage of Gervon’s naturally high pad level and have stopped him in his tracks.
  • He clearly spent the preseason working on his get-off (which doesn’t appear to be an issue anymore), but now he’s got to find a way to apply his natural power to reps more often — if he can, he’ll impact many more reps.
• Where he’s surprised me: Dexter did a much better job of landing strong hands on his OL matchups early in reps against Washington, leading to some of his first pass rush wins of the season. You can see his power flash in reps like the two clips below (second one is a reply to the first, so click the link to see it).
• Improvement area: Beyond Dexter refining his fundamentals and finding way to lower his pad-level, right now Gervon Dexter has a funky quirk as a pass-rusher — I’m not convinced he can rush to his left. Even going back to Florida, he’s always preferred to attack towards his right-hand side or drive through his OL, and while he did attempt a few left-side rush attempts against Washington, those reps looked much less dangerous than many of his other rushes in the game.
  • This could be an offseason project, but keep an eye out — maybe Dexter surprises us.

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For the first time in the Matt Eberflus era, Bears fans were forced to swallow the bitter pill of preseason defeat as Chicago fell to Indianapolis 17-24 over the weekend. The tilt saw both teams rest nearly all of their starters and many of their reserves, but a loss is a loss — with something like that hanging over fans’ heads, it’s a miracle that anyone loyal to the team made it into work today.

But setting aside the sting of defeat, what did we learn about the roster this weekend? I dove into the game’s All-22 tape and went spelunking — here’s what I found:

Guarding our Hearts:

Ja’Tyre Carter picked a great weekend to have another great weekend — with reports that Tevin Jenkins has suffered a leg injury that may shelve him for up to 6 weeks, quality OL depth looks more valuable than ever.

Carter’s form looks great in pass protection, but he’s making his hay as a run blocker and looks forceful as he does — below is a great example of Carter’s handiwork, and as Lucas Patrick continues to miss time in Training Camp I’m curious to see which young lineman the Bears turn to as the next LG.

#Bears Ja'Tyre Carter run blocks like he's got a personal problem with the defense, I love it pic.twitter.com/Ba0khwFQtz

— Robert Schmitz (@robertkschmitz) August 21, 2023

Dropping Anchor:

Zacch Pickens took a healthy step forward in his second NFL exhibition, but he did so in a way I didn’t see coming — I expected to see him utilize his length & first step to pressure the passer and knife into run gaps, but instead he dropped anchor twice on the goal line and stood up Colts double-teams on both sides of the defensive line. As the primary backup for Andrew Billings, Pickens couldn’tve shown off a more encouraging skill.

Click the clip below to see his 2nd rep in the replies — it’s impressive stuff from a rookie known to struggle doing exactly this in college. I’d like to see him win a few more reps in run defense this weekend before making any sweeping declarations, but in the meantime it’s nice to see the Bears helping their rookies hone key skills.

https://twitter.com/robertkschmitz/status/1693445818810781794

Breaking Down Bagent:

Tyson Bagent will be the subject for tomorrow’s (tonight’s) Dissecting a Drive, so I won’t go into too much detail here.

That said, I put together a quick breakdown on one of my favorite of Bagent’s throws — a simple quick screen that, upon further inspection, I think Tyson audibled into. Turn your sound on for this one:

Tyson Bagent made plenty of plays on his 17-play TD drive, but this quick screen to Dante Pettis stands out — if you look closely, you'll see that Bagent audibled into this after seeing the Colts show a CB Blitz.

I LOVE that the #Bears UDFA rookie is confident enough to make… pic.twitter.com/zPUBXqS1nk

— Robert Schmitz (@robertkschmitz) August 21, 2023

Also, given that the Bears’ QB2 looked like this on Saturday Night, Tyson’s calm demeanor couldn’tve been a more welcome sight. He’s a very fun young player to watch.

Here's All-22 of every PJ Walker pass/dropback from last night's #Bears game.

Honest take: There aren't many plays to be made on his snaps. He doesn't do himself favors w/ the sacks & the early stumble, but these snaps aren't much to analyze.

Stick with your eval from CAR tape pic.twitter.com/MIiSUdHgRi

— Robert Schmitz (@robertkschmitz) August 21, 2023

I’ll update this article throughout the day, so stay tuned!

Your Turn: What stuck out to you during Saturday Night’s game?

I’m in the process of working up a Braxton Jones video that I hope to have ready by Monday — in the meantime, here’s a breakdown I threw together yesterday about a funky formation wrinkle Luke Getsy used to catch the Lions’ linebackers flat-footed on subsequent plays.

Formation gimmicks are fun, hopefully we see Getsy use offensive design to press the advantage more often in 2023.

Here's a fun design wrinkle from #Bears OC Luke Getsy — after a bootleg run for a 1st down, Getsy shifted LT Braxton Jones to the right side of the OL and thus caught the Lions' defense over-adjusting.

Turn your sound on and I'll break down how a little WR motion goes a long… pic.twitter.com/AaqjVAYE2v

— Robert Schmitz (@robertkschmitz) July 13, 2023

Extra Media

As we get closer to training camp, something tells me we’re going to hear the terms “1-Technique” and “3-Technique” thrown around a lot when discussing Gervon Dexter Sr and Zacch Pickens — in case you don’t know what those terms mean, I’ve got just the video for you! And if you do know what they mean, here’s a nice ~10 minute reel of defensive lineman dominating.

Check it out!

It wasn’t a particularly interesting draft for the Bears, content-wise. They had lots of picks, and lots of needs. They used those picks to address those needs. Simple as that.

But we’ll start with our club.

• The Bears clearly have two elements required to be a successful franchise: an identity and a plan. They want to be fast and athletic (who doesn’t?) but they also want to be tough. They drafted a whole bunch of tough guys this weekend. Ryan Poles is not going to be swayed by popular perception. He stands pat, he trusts his evaluations, he makes his picks. It’s refreshing to see.
• As of now, the offensive line looks to be Braxton Jones – Teven Jenkins – Cody Whitehair – Nate Davis – Darnell Wright. Thoughts on this:
  • While many, including myself, wanted to see the Bears select a center, it is quite understandable that they didn’t see the position as a priority. Offensive lines need SOME veteran leadership and outside of Whitehair, the average age on the rest of this line is 24.
  • The offensive line was poor last year, outside of Jones and Jenkins. Ryan Poles has replaced the other three positions.
  • Lucas Patrick and Larry Borom can now fill their appropriate roles, with the former as swing depth inside and the latter as swing depth outside.
• The Bears were manhandled in the middle of their defensive line throughout the 2022 season. Look at the size they have added inside:
  • Andrew Billings is 6’1, 311
  • Rasheem Green is 6’4, 279
  • Demarcus Walker is 6’4, 280
  • Gervon Dexter is 6’6, 312
  • Zacch Pickens is 6’4, 300
• There is no reason to get overexcited about day three selections, but running backs tend to be the exception. And the Bears are wild about Roschon Johnson. Don’t be surprised if they give this kid an opportunity to be their starting running back.
• Tyler Scott is a speed addition, protection for Velus Jones’ struggles in 2022. Does this mean Velus’ roster spot is tenuous? It might. If Scott shows he can steal those jet sweeps and go routes, while also contributing on specials, Velus could find himself looking for a home this summer.
• The Bears are improved on both lines, hypothetically. If the hypothesis becomes fact, they’ll be playing meaningful football in December.

As for the rest of the league…

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Darnell Wright, OT

and the interview…

Gervon Dexter, DT

and chatting…

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