NEWSLETTER
The game plan was clear for the Bears on Sunday night and involved a heavy dose of David Montgomery running the ball against the Packers. Why not, right? Minnesota picked up 126 yards on the ground against the Packers in week one on 28 carries, good for 4.5 yards per carry. In a vacuum, the plan was sound.
And, hey, David Montgomery did run for 122 yards on 15 carries (8.1 YPC), while Khalil Herbert picked up 38 yards on four attempts (9.5 YPC). The Bears’ only touchdown of the game came on a Justin Fields scramble, and the closest they got to another was another Justin Fields scramble.
The key problem (among a few)? That’s ALL the Bears had going and all they tried to do. In a year where the development of the quarterback should be paramount, Justin Fields throwing the ball 11 times just doesn’t add up to me.
Former NFL quarterback Trent Dilfer said something on 670 The Score on Monday that makes a ton of sense to me:
“Great play callers look for a way to take the burden off the quarterback for about 8 to 12 completions a game. There was none of that, so, as a quarterback, you never feel like you’re getting into a rhythm. You won’t know what Justin is until we give him a chance to have a 26 to 33 play pass game that is balanced passes, that is not all 3rd & 7’s, the hardest down to play in football.”
In Luke Getsy’s defense, there’s a possibility that the Bears’ new regime wants to work their way up to that type of game plan for Fields. So, I’m inclined, for now, to give them the benefit of the doubt on this one.
I think that the flea flicker on the first drive of the game was a good example of one of those plays that Dilfer talked about where Getsy schemed Fields a completion.
After three straight hand-offs to open the drive, Getsy dialed up the flea flicker, making it appear that David Montgomery was getting a fourth straight touch, only for Montgomery to flip it back to Fields, who has a wide open Equanimeous St. Brown downfield.
Fields did a nice job of giving ESB ample time to get space and delivers a strike even with Preston Smith barreling down on him. That’s a strong play and probably the biggest favor that Luke Getsy did Justin Fields all evening.
Of course, we know that Fields is an elite athlete and dangerous with the ball in his hands and open space, so it’s no surprise that he was able to beat Green Bay for this touchdown to cap the opening drive.
It’s worth noting that Fields could have hit David Montgomery and likely still had a touchdown. Still, I think that criticizing his decision to take it himself from that distance might be splitting hairs in a game where there are more significant decisions to analyze.
There isn’t a lot of room for positive marks in the film on this one, but this was a nice decision by Fields.
With Green Bay’s defense out of position, Fields takes advantage with a quick snap, and while it appeared to be a potential free play, Fields still does an excellent job of finding Ryan Griffin. Fields sees that Griffin will get by the defender in zone coverage right around the Packers 41 yard line and delivers a strike between the numbers to Griffin, who finds space between a trio of Packers defenders for an 18-yard gain and a first down.
I could include the first down run for Fields that set up the series of downs that would eventually end in Fields being stuffed (maybe) at the goal line or even the scramble and near touchdown that preceded the goal line failure, but we know that Fields can make teams pay with his legs, and they both turned out to be inconsequential after the goal line miss.
As I said, it’s a thin week for Fields highlights, and since we already covered two completions that accounted for 48 of his 70 yards, we can move onto some of the plays that Fields will want back moving forward.
We’ll get the most noticeable miss of the night out of the way first. The first third down of the second half, at which point the Bears were trailing 24-7 and in desperate need of a big play. Fields drops back and makes a mental mistake that if he didn’t, the game’s trajectory could have gone significantly different. Fields never sees Equanimeous St. Brown beat his defender and get downfield with space for what could have been an easy touchdown.
Fields couldn’t have asked for an easier touchdown pass than this one. Clean pocket, wide open receiver streaking. He even had Dante Pettis on the opposite side with enough space for a big gainer. He stared down the safety valve on this play and never deviated from that read. St. Brown provided some more context after practice on Monday, saying that he was running a curl, but broke past the corner, which is something that the Bears have practiced, but this is the first time it’s happened in a game.
So, yeah, a massive mistake by Fields. Still, it’s important to remember that it’s one lousy rep and not a reason to write the kid off.
Then there was this, a mental mistake by Fields that can’t happen. On 3rd & 10 during a second-quarter drive, Fields does an excellent job of escaping a sack and moving up past the collapsing pocket, and he even finds Equanimeous St. Brown in space over the middle. The problem is that he was well past the line of scrimmage, and Fields has to be more aware. That’s a silly mistake that cost the Bears a down and yardage.
On the second to last drive of the game (downs at the goal line), Fields took a bad sack on a 1st & 10 where he had three receivers open to his left, where the play brought his eyes first, but he saw Preston Smith coming fast and panicked. I discussed last week the internal clock and knowing how much time you actually have in the pocket. This one should have been a completion.
All in all, it was a night to forget for Justin Fields and the Bears. I don’t think Fields was terrible despite the box score painting an ugly picture. I believe that Luke Getsy did him an injustice in the game plan, but again, that may be by design and something that will change over time.
It’ll be interesting to see what the game plan looks like this week against the Texans; a perfect opportunity to get Fields comfortable and throwing downfield against a putrid Houston defense.
