Context is king. It doesn’t always generate clicks, views, engagement, or impressions. But it always hashes out the truth at the end of the day. Context wears the crown. Full stop.
So I didn’t think much of it when Chicago Bears Offensive Coordinator Luke Getsy said he thought the offense did “a lot of good things” against the Green Bay Packers in Week 1 because it was a snippet of a sentence that was part of a larger thought. To my surprise, Getsy saying he thought the Bears offense did good things against the Packers went viral and the context got left in the dust. But let’s give it the proper context it deserves, via Bear Report’s Zack Pearson:
“I think we did a lot of good things. I think our execution was obviously a little bit more reflective of Game 1 than we would want it to be. Felt like we left a lot out there. Obviously, when you don’t win, things will get criticized more but we always look at it under the microscope and make sure that we’re coaching every single person to the best of our abilities and getting the details right. Our details were not good enough and that is kind of the underlying fact that showed up.”
OK, so the full quote probably won’t leave you feeling any more inspired going into Week 2. It’s not as if Getsy went into full detail into what went well for the Bears offense. However, the full quote leaves us feeling better about Getsy’s willingness to give an honest assessment and fix the concerns at hand.
One of our biggest issues with the last regime was that it acted as if things were fine when they clearly weren’t. Getsy saying it wasn’t good enough is as much about the players and execution as it is about him. To be clear, it is insulting to me that the Bears already have issues with the finer points. However, at least getting smacked around by Green Bay at home in Week 1 should serve as a wake-up call. Then again, no team should need a wake-up call when playing their arch-rivals in their own building. But that is water under the bridge now. We’re on to Tampa Bay.
The first step toward fixing Luke Getsy’s broken offense
I’m not at a point where I feel as if Getsy’s offense is as broken as Matt Nagy’s scheme was in 2020, but I’d like to avoid getting anywhere near that point. So … how can the Bears do it? Well, Getsy left some inklings with some of his quotes from Thursday’s press conference. And the one quote that stood out most to me was:
“The negative plays are what really crushed us: our momentum, our drives. I think when we had four drives that started off past the 30, I think we scored on all four of them. The ones that were behind the 30, even if we got started, we stumbled, usually it was a negative play.”
“The negative plays are what really crushed us” feels like the understatement of the week. But the numbers support him, as the Bears’ four possessions that began past their own 30 or better resulted in four scores. The other drives resulted in four punts, a fumble loss, an interception, and a turnover-on-downs when the game was all but in the books. Getting quality field position is a great place to start rebuilding this offense. But doing good work early is what will truly help most in capitalizing on that field position.
Sure, we’re cognizant of how Green Bay racked up 7 tackles-for-loss and 4 sacks on quarterback Justin Fields. But it felt like a lot of the Bears’ issues were mistakes they made on their own. And it felt as if a bunch of the self-inflicted damage came early. For instance, the Bears gained 0 yards, 1 yard, lost yardage, or committed a penalty on the first play of eight of their 10 drives. That’s just not going to cut it. Clean it up, gang. Do the little stuff better on the early downs and don’t put yourself behind the chains early (or at all).
Of course, this is just one piece of the puzzle. But trying to fix it all at once would be a fool’s errand. With 16 games left on the schedule, the Bears need to do it right. Otherwise, things could get worse for the offense before they get better.
For more from Bears OC Luke Getsy, check out the video below:
