The anguish inside the Chicago Bears locker room was palpable Sunday night following a 19-13 loss to the Houston Texans at NRG Stadium.
It wasn’t just that the Bears lost. After all, they entered the night as 6.5-point underdogs against the reigning AFC South champions.
It was more about the way the team played on a prime-time stage, particularly on offense with penalties and turnovers and execution miscues defining the night and preventing the Bears from starting the season 2-0 for the first time in four years.
As the Bears try to regroup for a Week 3 trip to play the Indianapolis Colts, Tribune reporters Colleen Kane and Dan Wiederer talk through four key topics from Sunday’s loss in true-or-false format.
True or false: The Bears’ biggest issue right now is protection for Caleb Williams.
Dan Wiederer: True. We were careful with the phraseology of this one, meeting Bears coach Matt Eberflus at least halfway with his insinuation that the offense’s current protection problems aren’t entirely an offensive line issue. “I believe protection is everybody,” Eberflus said during his postgame news conference Sunday. “Protection involves the tight ends, the runners, the offensive line. It’s the quarterback. It’s everybody involved.”
Still, this is a problem Eberflus and offensive coordinator Shane Waldron need to troubleshoot in a hurry. All hands on deck.
Williams was sacked seven times Sunday night — two on scrambles for no gain — and hit 11 other times. He had very few moments to feel relaxed and patient in the pocket. And as the game progressed, the Texans continued dialing up more pressure to increase the disquiet for the Bears offense. The result was a second half in which Williams went 11-for-22 passing for 83 yards with two interceptions and five sacks after halftime with the Bears managing only three points on eight possessions.
Whether it’s shoring up the offensive line issues, establishing a more reliable running game, altering the play calling or whatever, the Bears have to find a better approach in Week 3 to settle things down offensively.
Colleen Kane: Exactly. The Bears knew it was going to be a tough test going up against Texans defensive ends Danielle Hunter and Will Anderson Jr., and they didn’t pass. NFL Next Gen Stats had Hunter and Anderson combining for 17 pressures.
And sometimes it was a Bears offensive lineman getting beat. But as tight end Cole Kmet told reporters Monday at the weekly day-after news conference, it might also be receivers not running the right routes, causing Williams to hold onto the ball too long. It might be a miscommunication issue up front or protection adjustments not being made properly to address the opponent’s pressure.
“I don’t think it’s necessarily a talent issue up front,” Kmet said. “I don’t think we were necessarily getting overmatched totally physically up front. But I think us getting on the same page, mentally speaking, can lead to those adjustments, and we can kind of see those sacks come down a little bit.”
I think you are right in putting it on Eberflus, Waldron and their staff to find solutions to this problem and to the run-game issues.
The latter is also a major problem. Through two games the Bears are averaging 77.5 rushing yards per game and 3.52 yards per rush, ranked 28th and 29th in the NFL. And Williams has 59 of their rushing yards.
There’s a lot to figure out in the days ahead.
True or false: The Bears defense looks like a playoff-caliber unit.
Kane: True. I’m not saying the Bears defense is perfect, but they turned in another darn good performance, especially in the second half, against a strong Texans team.
The Bears defense obviously wanted more takeaways than the one it had Sunday, but that play came at a huge moment, with the Texans threatening to make it a two-touchdown game late in the fourth quarter.
Running back Cam Akers got the ball at the Bears 4-yard line and defensive tackle Andrew Billings knocked it loose. Safety Kevin Byard said Sunday that the ball changed hands a few times under the pile, but he came away with it.
The Bears probably wanted to get to quarterback C.J. Stroud more too, instead totaling three sacks and four quarterback hits. And they obviously want to correct the breakdown that allowed Stroud to hit Nico Collins for a 28-yard touchdown pass in the second quarter.
But they held the Titans and Texans to three total points in the second halves of those games. And what I found exciting is that the plays continued to come from many different defensive players. Where it was T.J. Edwards, Jaylon Johnson and Billings last week, it was Tremaine Edmunds, Jaquan Brisker and Kyler Gordon this week.
They looked sharp in many instances Sunday, and that intrigues me about what they can do against the Indianapolis Colts in Week 3.
Wiederer: That forced fumble by Billings was exactly the kind of “no quit” effort Eberflus was lauding from his players after the game Sunday and again Monday afternoon. As you mentioned, the Texans were on the doorstep of a win-sealing touchdown with first-and-goal from the Bears 4-yard line. Even a field goal there probably drives the nail into the coffin.
Instead? A 311-pound nose tackle in the Texas heat dug deep late in the fourth quarter to make a play in the clutch and Byard quite literally had to dig deep to pull the ball out of the pile. That’s exactly the kind of competitive edge and playmaking prowess that has this defense on the verge of becoming undeniably great.
Through two games, the Bears defense has been on the field for 14 possessions in the second half — excluding Sunday’s game-ending kneeldown by the Texans — yet has allowed only three points while creating four takeaways.
That’s one metric that speaks to a unit equipped to be the engine of a playoff team. Now it’s about stacking such performances consistently.
True or false: The officials’ failure to penalize Azeez Al-Shaair in the second half on Sunday night was inexcusable.
Wiederer: True. In a game where 23 penalty flags were thrown — including two for infractions that were declined — it’s incredible Land Clark’s crew missed not one but two opportunities to penalize Al-Shaair during the same sequence in the third quarter. The hit the Texans linebacker put on Bears quarterback Caleb Williams along the sideline during a second-half scramble was borderline. By the letter of the law, it may not have registered as a late hit but certainly seemed to qualify as unnecessary roughness with the force Al-Shaair delivered to Williams’ upper body as the quarterback was running out of bounds at the end of a 10-yard gain. (Let’s be frank. Most quarterbacks get that call in this league.)
Far worse, though, was that the officiating crew missed Al-Shaair’s right uppercut to the face of Bears running back Roschon Johnson during the ensuing fracas, a punch that would have given the Bears a first down at their own 34-yard line instead of immediately needing to punt.
You can bet the league office will have its say with a nice fine letter sent to Al-Shaair this week, a punishment that will cost the Texans linebacker outside of game action.
Al-Shaair acknowledged that his punch was “unacceptable” and vowed to take accountability for his flare-up. But he also said he took exception to the way the Bears surrounded him after the hit on Williams.
“There are some things that you say that have to answer for,” he told reporters after the game. “I feel like there were some crazy things said. Obviously I’m trying to get up and dudes are pushing me on the ground. So for me, it was more so I see a swarm of orange (jerseys) and I’m trying to protect myself. Because people are saying all types of things to me. Where I’m from? Stuff like that, you don’t take it lightly.”
Your thoughts, Colleen?
Kane: I can see where Al-Shaair maybe felt cornered when he was surrounded by Bears players after the hit on Williams or angry at their words, but I imagine they felt the need to defend their quarterback. And as Al-Shaair said himself, it obviously was “unacceptable” to pop right up and punch Johnson and keep going after Darnell Wright.
The Bears absolutely have the right to be annoyed at the missed call by officials.
Later, when Al-Shaair took down Williams for only a 1-yard gain, he stood and stared at the Bears sideline for several seconds, pointing and seemingly talking trash.
That only added to Bears fans’ ire.
True or false: Sunday showed Caleb Williams has a long way to go to reach C.J. Stroud’s level of rookie success.
Kane: True. But that’s something we already knew heading into Sunday night’s game.
Stroud’s rookie season, in which he threw for 4,108 yards, 23 touchdowns and five interceptions on the way to being named offensive rookie of the year, is more the exception than the rule when it comes to first-year quarterbacks.
As we’ve said before, Williams always was going to go through some growing pains this season. It just so happens that with running game problems and protection issues making life more difficult, those pains have been very evident in the first two games.
When Williams was asked postgame what bothered him the most about the performance, he pointed to not being able to pull out the win in the end and he pointed to his two interceptions, which he said “is not really my thing.” One of the interceptions was what Eberflus called a “50-50 ball” to DJ Moore that Derek Stingley Jr. made a nice play on. But the other interception was underthrown and off the mark into heavy traffic instead of where only Kmet could get it.
Williams’ accuracy improved Sunday, but it still was off in some instances, one of many things he continues to work through.
This isn’t to say Williams can’t get to Stroud’s level at some point. He just has a lot of work to do on the way.
Wiederer: Don’t forget, Williams had a third interception in the game: A third-quarter throw to Rome Odunze that was easily picked off by Kamari Lassiter after the Bears quarterback climbed the pocket and slid to the right side but then forced a leaping throw to the left sideline 35 yards down the field. That was, to put it bluntly, a horrible decision.
For the Bears, that turnover was mercifully negated due to a holding call against linebacker Henry To’oTo’o. Yet it was a reminder of the learning experiences Williams will continue to endure over the next four months as he finds his way in the NFL.
On the bright side, Williams showed several encouraging signs of growth from Week 1 to Week 2 with the passing attack, most notably during the Bears’ two first-half scoring drives.
Still, Stroud seemed to be operating with a far greater level of comfort and command. The Texans quarterback was rarely shaken and took care of the football all night. He went turnover-free and was sacked just three times. And most impressively, he made a handful of big-time plays to lift the Texans to points. His 28-yard touchdown pass to Collins came on second-and-24.
He also needed only 26 seconds and two completions to position kicker Ka’imi Fairbairn for an end-of-half field goal, a poised and purposeful response after the Bears scored their only touchdown.
In time, the Bears will be looking for Williams to make such winning contributions on a more regular basis. For now, it’s about mastering the baby steps process early in the journey.
