Week 5 Grades

[adam]

What a win! This was a signature Chicago Bears victory. Great defense and an efficient running game. This is also setting up Fields for some opportunities in the passing game down the road. Teams are now going to have to commit an extra defender to the box to stop the run. The difference is we now have a QB that can hit the deep to intermediate throws. 

Offense Post:

QB - I would give QBs a B-. I was expecting a little more out of the passing game, but no turnovers (INTs or fumbles) is great to see. The injury scare was enough to give me a small heart attack, but luckily Fields is ok. Hopefully there aren't any long-term nagging effects from the hyperextension. The Bears actually passed for more 1st Downs than they rushed for, and 3rd Downs were much better. That is an improvement from last week. The Raiders literally had 7 defenders in coverage which made it really hard to pass, so the Bears took what they gave them and gashed them on the ground. I still would have liked to see more than 119 yards passing. 

RB - This was easily an A, filling in for Monty, Williams and Herbert combined for 139 yards on 34 carries. I was hoping for 20-25, so to get 30+ is awesome. Herbert looks perfectly suited for a zone-blocking scheme. His ability to see the cutback lane is amazing. I don't know what the Bears will do with Monty next season and going forward, but a Monty/Herbert two-headed monster would be a formidable duo. I expect to see a lot more Herbert going forward, even when Monty comes back. 

TE - This is such a hard group to grade, but I will go with a C. When given the opportunity, they produced. Horsted caught Fields' first career TD pass, Kmet had a nice catch for a first down and Graham may have had the run block of the game. Still, I would like to see a few more passes go their way and maybe a few to Graham in the Red Zone. 

OL - B, this unit is now exceeding my expectations, only two sacks on Fields, one his fault, and this unit mauled for almost 150 yards on the ground. Would like to see a little better pass pro, but the difference between this game and the Cleveland game is night and day. Daniels took the soul of a poor Raiders defender, I like the line's nasty. They are starting to play with an attitude that is needed in the trenches. I think Peters is rubbing off on them. We haven't seen this type of stuff since Kyle Long's prime:

 

[adam]

Defense Post:

It is hard to give any bad grades to a unit that only allowed 9 pts and one TD. 

DL - C+. This unit is clearly missing Hicks, you don't hear many of their names called during the game, but you don't hold Jacobs to 3.2 a carry without the DLine clogging holes. The biggest name was Edwards getting two penalties, one that negated a huge TFL. Hopefully Hicks is back next week for GB. 

Edge - A, Mack gets his revenge game, a sack, a ton of pressures and another sack on the 2-pt conversion (that doesn't count in the stats book). Gipson had another sack where he manhandled a TE. I didn't realize how big he is. Quinn had a quiet game, but was playing against the Raiders best O-Lineman, so I will give him a pass. The constant pressure had Carr jittery all game. 

ILB - A+, Roquan Smith is a beast. Danny T with his first game back. This unit was really solid. They didn't allow and big runs, helped in coverage to contain Waller and Renfrow and you could tell no one wanted to go over the middle the way Smith was crushing people. With Trevathan back, Ogletree now becomes an A+ sub instead of a B- starter. 

CB - B+, Outside of one or two plays, this unit had arguably their best game. Tackles were made and you didn't hear their names called for bad plays. That to me is a win for this unit. Shelley and Vildor played very solid. 

S - C+, If I am grading Gipson, Houston-Carson, and Bush, this unit got an A. Jackson got an F. Gipson had a sack, and DHC had a huge INT. Out of all the players on the 53-man roster, Jackson is the most worthless. I have no clue why they keep running him out there. Don't do it because of his damn contract. If he is not playing up to par, bench him. I have never seen an NFL safety avoid contact like him. If you have a chance, watch the entire game and key on him on every play. He just runs around near the action but not quite close enough to impact the play unless it is right at him. He literally can't tackle a tackling dummy, has had one impact play the entire season (5 games), 0 passes defended, and has now gone 21 games without an INT. 

ST - A, Santos with 2 huge FGs, keeps his streak going, and I was pleasantly surprised by Grant who had a nice punt return in his first game. 

[madlithuanian]

Great analysis Adam.

I'm going for a broader brush stroke for grades...

I thought the Offense got a C+.  They didn't do much except early on.  Fields made critical 3rd down plays when we needed them most at the end.  Scoring just 20 points against a team struggling like the Raiders did yesterday is not swell.  A really strong team would easily come back and snatch victory from us like has happened many times before in the past.  Especially w/ GB.  Running game was solid.  Herbert is a pleasant surprise and pack for "urgency" in hi play than Williams.  However, these 2 guys couldn't pick up hard short yards if their lives depended on it.  This is where we miss Monty.  Maybe this is where you give the ball to Nall?  Or even Horsted?  We need power.

Defense eared a solid A.  Your points above say it all..  Basically, if you hold a professional team under 10, that's a damn A.

Special Teams gets an A- The kicking game gets an A+, but the return game wasn't as great as I was hoping from the new guy. Work in progress.

Coaching gets a C.  This staff shouldn't be judged on a curve.  It was light years better than the first 3 weeks, but getting 20 points isn't good enough.  It's acceptable.  Average.  Too conservative.  Tried running up the guy on short yardage w/ back who couldn't do it.  They need to do that w/ Monty, but not with any of the other guys.  Again, evidence of lack of adaptation to your players' skills. 

Overall grade average is a B.  Like old Bears football.  Strong running, strong D, solid specials, suspect coaching.  Fields will be the x factor.  Without some of his late 3rd down conversions, the defense was either gonna get gassed for a cheap one or have to do something epic.  I'm excited to see him grow and progress and become a real factor.

 

[adam]

1 hour ago, madlithuanian said:

Great analysis Adam.

I'm going for a broader brush stroke for grades...

I thought the Offense got a C+.  They didn't do much except early on.  Fields made critical 3rd down plays when we needed them most at the end.  Scoring just 20 points against a team struggling like the Raiders did yesterday is not swell.  A really strong team would easily come back and snatch victory from us like has happened many times before in the past.  Especially w/ GB.  Running game was solid.  Herbert is a pleasant surprise and pack for "urgency" in hi play than Williams.  However, these 2 guys couldn't pick up hard short yards if their lives depended on it.  This is where we miss Monty.  Maybe this is where you give the ball to Nall?  Or even Horsted?  We need power.

Defense eared a solid A.  Your points above say it all..  Basically, if you hold a professional team under 10, that's a damn A.

Special Teams gets an A- The kicking game gets an A+, but the return game wasn't as great as I was hoping from the new guy. Work in progress.

Coaching gets a C.  This staff shouldn't be judged on a curve.  It was light years better than the first 3 weeks, but getting 20 points isn't good enough.  It's acceptable.  Average.  Too conservative.  Tried running up the guy on short yardage w/ back who couldn't do it.  They need to do that w/ Monty, but not with any of the other guys.  Again, evidence of lack of adaptation to your players' skills. 

Overall grade average is a B.  Like old Bears football.  Strong running, strong D, solid specials, suspect coaching.  Fields will be the x factor.  Without some of his late 3rd down conversions, the defense was either gonna get gassed for a cheap one or have to do something epic.  I'm excited to see him grow and progress and become a real factor.

 

The Chargers only scored 28 on the Raiders. I would've liked to have seen another TD instead of FG, but they got 4 scoring drives, just like the Chargers did against the same defense. The Bears did it on the road where the Raiders defense should've had the edge. They also did that without Monty who has been a huge percentage of the offense. On the short yardage plays, I thought they were bad play calls, but the overall grade was fair. 

Grant had a 21-yard and a 17-yard punt return while Webster had 4 for a total of 13 yards. How much better could he have been on those? O'Donnell averaged 50 per punt with 5 of 5 inside the 20. Renfrow was only able to return 1 for 9 yards. Drake had 3 kick returns and averaged 17.5. All in all, Grant had 107 return yards and the Raiders had 44. I don't think you can ask for a better game from your special teams unit.

I agree on the offensive coaching, but this is really just Game 2 for them with Lazor calling the plays. How about defensive coaching? Does Desai get any credit for the defensive resurgence? I feel like he is scheming pressure. Also, even though the Raiders had a TD drive, that was one of the toughest to get I have seen in a while. It took them 16 plays to go 74 yards and only come away with 6 pts. They burnt the clock on themselves. Same thing with their FG, 13 plays and 69 yards for 3 pts. That is some super-efficient defense right there. 

It is definitely another B game. The good part is they still have room to improve in a lot of areas, but are still winning. That is a great sign.

 

 

[Stinger226]

I think we need to praise Pace when the good things he did shine.  first Herbert and Williams- way better than normal backups. Bringing in Grant. Quinn is a stud , playing like what we thought should last year. Pace's imprint is all over the roster. Keeping Horsted around- he needs more playing time. 

I think Desai is growing and getting better. The CBs dont look as weak as we originally thought. Quinn and Mack are flying. Smith is a all pro stud. Far from perfect but definitely becoming a top 10 defense in the league. 

The OL is looking better with finding a running attack that promotes physicality. James Daniel and Jason Petters were serving pancakes yesterday. As they open  the offense up more, we will see more chunk plays downfield.

Its getting better as we wait for Fields to come into his own. 

 

[killakrzydav]

Wow, who made that defensive play

[adam]

17 minutes ago, Stinger226 said:

I think we need to praise Pace when the good things he did shine.  first Herbert and Williams- way better than normal backups. Bringing in Grant. Quinn is a stud , playing like what we thought should last year. Pace's imprint is all over the roster. Keeping Horsted around- he needs more playing time. 

I think Desai is growing and getting better. The CBs dont look as weak as we originally thought. Quinn and Mack are flying. Smith is a all pro stud. Far from perfect but definitely becoming a top 10 defense in the league. 

The OL is looking better with finding a running attack that promotes physicality. James Daniel and Jason Petters were serving pancakes yesterday. As they open  the offense up more, we will see more chunk plays downfield.

Its getting better as we wait for Fields to come into his own. 

 

Pace's biggest issue was cap management, but the cap situation looks much better with how Quinn is playing. The worst contract right now is ARob as the highest-paid player on the team with a $17.9M Cap hit. Then you have Goldman at $7.8M who hasn't done much. Foles is getting $6.6M as QB3, Graham is $5.3M for 1 reception, and Eddie Jackson is getting $5M to be the worst player on the entire roster.

For 2022, Jackson's jumps to $15M which is scary. Goldman's jumps to $11.8M (if he doesn't improve, he is an easy cut), and Foles jumps to $10.6M. They need to move any, if not all 3 for anything they can get. Cap relief enough would work. I would not even oppose trading Jackson with a draft pick just to take him off our hands. There are teams with enough cap space who could use a better draft pick. 

 

[madlithuanian]

2 hours ago, adam said:

The Chargers only scored 28 on the Raiders. I would've liked to have seen another TD instead of FG, but they got 4 scoring drives, just like the Chargers did against the same defense. The Bears did it on the road where the Raiders defense should've had the edge. They also did that without Monty who has been a huge percentage of the offense. On the short yardage plays, I thought they were bad play calls, but the overall grade was fair. 

Grant had a 21-yard and a 17-yard punt return while Webster had 4 for a total of 13 yards. How much better could he have been on those? O'Donnell averaged 50 per punt with 5 of 5 inside the 20. Renfrow was only able to return 1 for 9 yards. Drake had 3 kick returns and averaged 17.5. All in all, Grant had 107 return yards and the Raiders had 44. I don't think you can ask for a better game from your special teams unit.

I agree on the offensive coaching, but this is really just Game 2 for them with Lazor calling the plays. How about defensive coaching? Does Desai get any credit for the defensive resurgence? I feel like he is scheming pressure. Also, even though the Raiders had a TD drive, that was one of the toughest to get I have seen in a while. It took them 16 plays to go 74 yards and only come away with 6 pts. They burnt the clock on themselves. Same thing with their FG, 13 plays and 69 yards for 3 pts. That is some super-efficient defense right there. 

It is definitely another B game. The good part is they still have room to improve in a lot of areas, but are still winning. That is a great sign.

 

 

The Raiders seems off yesterday.  It was a shorter week, the Gruden email stuff, etc.  They were riper for the pickens than they were against the Chargers I think.

Thanks for correcting my on Grant!  I must've forgotten those due to fine gin and tonics I was consuming during the game! 

I think Desai should get huge credit.  I kind of glossed over that because of the "defensive grade"   I think that would change my grade more to a B-. 

I love the win, I like what I'm seeing from Desai.  Lazor is an upgrade.  But Nagy should still be fired as season's end.  He's not it.