The Chicago Bears are a bit of a joke.
The Bears may still be alive in the NFC with a record of 4-4, but this team was expected to do a lot more than just be “average.” My Super Bowl prediction may have been a stretch, but the playoffs were not out of the question.
These Bears are nowhere near that good. They flashed promise with an early season victory against the Pittsburgh Steelers, but since that point they have shown quite the Achilles heel. It is one that, if not addressed, will prevent the Bears from competing for a Super Bowl for some time.
It’s not their obvious offensive flaw. The Bears are lacking in receivers and until they remedy that situation, Jay Cutler will not live up to the standards he set in Denver. Make no mistake about that, the Bears need to improve on the offensive front. While the Bears offense doesn’t need to be taken behind the shed and given the Old Yeller treatment like the Rams offense ¬— who have a league-low 77 points through nine weeks — it does need some tweaking.
What they need to fix is their defense. The Bears defense has been skating by on name value alone this season. The Bears are traditionally a strong defensive team that can stop even the most formidable of offenses, but this season they have been anything but that.
The pass defense for Chicago is a complete joke. While it has done a respectable job of limiting the total number of yards — allowing only 207 yards per game on average — it has done a horrendous job of allowing the other team to throw touchdowns. The Bears are 28th in the league with 16 passing touchdowns allowed. To put that into perspective, both Cleveland and St. Louis have allowed fewer passing touchdowns with 10 and 11 respectively.
They are also not forcing enough turnovers. The Bears are league average in the number of interceptions with 8, but when a team surrenders that many passing touchdowns, it should probably take the ball away a little more to help even it out.
Before the abomination that was the Bears loss to the Cardinals, fantasy experts could be heard saying to avoid certain Cardinals wide receivers this week. The Bears had a ‘solid’ pass defense. Solid is the new term for flimsy, apparently. Most people do not realize how bad the Bears are at stopping the pass because of the reputation they have, but the team needs to realize its problem.
Seriously, it seems like every single third-and-long situation, the opposing quarterback will find somebody open. The Bears are 26th in the league in third down stops. They have allowed 46 first downs after forcing a team to a third down. That does not sound like an elite defense.
The Bears have surrendered 159 total first downs on the season, with 94 of those being converted on the pass. Clearly, something needs to be done here because just having a reputation as the Monsters of the Midway is not enough.
Sure, the run defense could be better. It is 20th in yardage allowed with 956 yards, but right now the glowing weak point is the pass defense. I realize the Bears are missing a big part of their defense with Brian Urlacher out, but even with him gone, their defense should not be this putrid.
The offense should be easy to fix, just add a couple of receivers and it will be golden. The passing defense needs to be blown up.
