Wk 5 // CHICAGO BEARS "@" OAKLAND RAIDERS OF LONDON

[wab]

The thing about an OL. It's often a sum greater than its parts. If you have five average players, that understand and trust where their line mates are going to be. An group of average offensive lineman can operate as a VERY effective squad. So now we need to look at the Whitehair/Daniels move as probably the primary culprit as to why the line is under performing, or more specifically why Leno is really struggling. Is it possible that Leno and Whitehair just can't get on the same page. That they aren't trusting each other? Daniels could also be struggling, because Long has been complete dogshit. Daniels may feel like he's being left out on an island when it comes to that side of the line.

Is it an easy fix? Maybe. I think that in the short term you need to do the following;
1. IR Kyle Long and thank him for his service.
2. Move Whitehair back to C, and Daniels to LG.
3. Move Coward into the RG spot.

Try that combination over the bye, and see if they can develop a chemistry. One thing is for certain. If Nagy comes out of the bye, with Long still at RG. We're in a lot of trouble.

I said it in another thread, but Long is hurting Daniels, and by extension, Whitehair. Daniels is constantly leaving blocks early to help Long. That makes Daniels look worse than he is, and leave Whitehair alone on combo blocks.

I honestly don't think the Whitehair/Daniels thing is a problem. Kyle Long's complete and total ineffectiveness is the cause if the interior line issues.

Leno is getting exposed because of the new emphasis on holding and hands to the face. He's done it forever, even if it was subtle.

[Boris13c]

I do have to say though... That game losing interception Daniel threw was as abysmal as it gets. I get it... Miller cut off his route and you expected him to run a go. But there were 3 defenders beyond him. Even if he had gone where you expected, you should never EVER have thrown it in between 3 defenders. And they were there the whole time. When he came off the field afterward, I saw Nagy ask him "what did you see?". I'd like to know the answer to that. That's why Chase Daniel is a backup.

as soon as he saw 3 defenders to 1 receiver, he should have looked elsewhere ... maybe he didn't have time?

I know Wims was open to his left, but that would have meant throwing across the field and not sure he has the arm to have made that ... that might also have been picked

was just a crap play made worse by a crappier decision

[Xee]

Yeah, but based on the coverage Miller did the right thing. He had two safeties and a corner over the top and broke off underneath the coverage. and would have had a first. Daniels, all 5'9 of him, couldn't see him break the route off. If you watch Daniels when he comes off the field he says something like "My bad, I couldn't see".

Man, that's almost as bad as Henry Burris throwing passes with his eyes closed. Maybe this is a stupid question but if he couldn't see where he wanted the ball to go, why did he even throw it? Is that something QB's do? I've heard of throwing to a spot/area which means there's some open grass along a receiver's route and you throw it there and kind of lead him to getting open, but you need to actually see that area. This sounds more like he winged it, hoping *someone* would catch it.

[Mikefive]

Yeah, but based on the coverage Miller did the right thing. He had two safeties and a corner over the top and broke off underneath the coverage. and would have had a first. Daniels, all 5'9 of him, couldn't see him break the route off. If you watch Daniels when he comes off the field he says something like "My bad, I couldn't see".

Man, that's almost as bad as Henry Burris throwing passes with his eyes closed. Maybe this is a stupid question but if he couldn't see where he wanted the ball to go, why did he even throw it? Is that something QB's do? I've heard of throwing to a spot/area which means there's some open grass along a receiver's route and you throw it there and kind of lead him to getting open, but you need to actually see that area. This sounds more like he winged it, hoping *someone* would catch it.

Someone did.

[UOK]

Yeah, but based on the coverage Miller did the right thing. He had two safeties and a corner over the top and broke off underneath the coverage. and would have had a first. Daniels, all 5'9 of him, couldn't see him break the route off. If you watch Daniels when he comes off the field he says something like "My bad, I couldn't see".

Man, that's almost as bad as Henry Burris throwing passes with his eyes closed. Maybe this is a stupid question but if he couldn't see where he wanted the ball to go, why did he even throw it? Is that something QB's do? I've heard of throwing to a spot/area which means there's some open grass along a receiver's route and you throw it there and kind of lead him to getting open, but you need to actually see that area. This sounds more like he winged it, hoping *someone* would catch it.

He panicked, and there's no two ways about it. He screwed up and threw the game away.

[Bearfanuk]

Ok thoughts from my viewpoint at the game. Have not watched film as the game still stings
Chase is your typical one read quarter back. If the first read isn’t there you physically see him tense and turn into the deer trapped in headlights. So it’s all ok if 1st read is there..if it’s not then normal something bad happens. A sack of INT rarely see him Chuck it away and move on

Pick 1 he pre determined it was going to Robinson. He didn’t even bother to try and look elsewhere.

Last pick again he pre determined didn’t react to the change in coverage and threw it up.

Predictable on offence. Subtle changes to the playbook are needed

For one we missed Gabriel and the speed threat yesterday that just takes the top of defenses. If T.G can't go how about you send Cohen deep occasionally? Threaten them with the deep ball and get the defence backing off from the L.O.S. Every throw to Cohen always seem to be behind the L.O.S and it's crazy predictable. Can Cohen run crisp routes..probably not. Has he got speed. Yes. Can he run a straight go route..it's a straight line of course he can. Threaten and if they don’t respect lay it out there

Robinson is a beast...use that to the advantage by not throwing to him occasionally. If every fan in the stands can see the QB isn't going to look off him on a 3rd and 6 then why would the defence? Take A.Rob and clear him out along with his double team creating space for one of the other 6 wide outs we have in a group that’s was supposedly so deep in August

On defence if your struggling to stop the run get creative I don’t care how but play with three middle linebackers at times. Bring your best run defender in (Kwit) and force the opposing qb to make a 5 step drop with Mack coming for you. Make adjustments if you get burnt then you get burnt but doing the same stuff is just dumb

[Xee]

Man, that's almost as bad as Henry Burris throwing passes with his eyes closed. Maybe this is a stupid question but if he couldn't see where he wanted the ball to go, why did he even throw it? Is that something QB's do? I've heard of throwing to a spot/area which means there's some open grass along a receiver's route and you throw it there and kind of lead him to getting open, but you need to actually see that area. This sounds more like he winged it, hoping *someone* would catch it.

He panicked, and there's no two ways about it. He screwed up and threw the game away.

Alright, than that was just a stupid decision. He was dinking and dunking his way down the field, we were almost in field goal range, and we still had two time-outs. I was watching the game with my brothers and that whole possession I was just repeating over and over until they got sick of it "Play it safe. Stay calm. Don't throw a turnover." There was absolutely zero reason to make a risky throw.

[UOK]

He panicked, and there's no two ways about it. He screwed up and threw the game away.

Alright, than that was just a stupid decision. He was dinking and dunking his way down the field, we were almost in field goal range, and we still had two time-outs. I was watching the game with my brothers and that whole possession I was just repeating over and over until they got sick of it "Play it safe. Stay calm. Don't throw a turnover." There was absolutely zero reason to make a risky throw.

In the interviews since the game, he's basically said the same thing: "I wish I had that one back." He said he should've checked down, but hindsight is 20/20 and all that.

[G08]

Some of the holds called on Leno have been bullshit. He is grabby, which is a focus this year, but he's gotten his head across on some of those flags and is getting screwed.

Still, he's not playing well and I'm on board with having a message sent to both Leno and Long moving forward.

[The Marshall Plan]

Some of the holds called on Leno have been bullshit. He is grabby, which is a focus this year, but he's gotten his head across on some of those flags and is getting screwed.

Still, he's not playing well and I'm on board with having a message sent to both Leno and Long moving forward.

The funny part of the whole Leno debacle is that he gets called for holding, but the guys that have been putting Mack into full nelsons all season don't get flagged for 90% of the crap they do.

[Bears Whiskey Nut]

Some of the holds called on Leno have been bullshit. He is grabby, which is a focus this year, but he's gotten his head across on some of those flags and is getting screwed.

Still, he's not playing well and I'm on board with having a message sent to both Leno and Long moving forward.

The message to Long is, "you're done." The guy is immobile and has lost a lot of lower body strength with his prolonged ankle and hip injuries. If you're injured, you can't lift weights as effectively, or at all for that matter. The dude is done.

[G08]

Biggs reporting that the Patriots offered to sign Alex Bars to their 53 man roster, and Bars declined. Got a nice pay raise from us though... Curious to see if he takes Long's job.

[G08]

Some of the holds called on Leno have been bullshit. He is grabby, which is a focus this year, but he's gotten his head across on some of those flags and is getting screwed.

Still, he's not playing well and I'm on board with having a message sent to both Leno and Long moving forward.

The funny part of the whole Leno debacle is that he gets called for holding, but the guys that have been putting Mack into full nelsons all season don't get flagged for 90% of the crap they do.

Right? It's fucking preposterous.

[wab]

Biggs reporting that the Patriots offered to sign Alex Bars to their 53 man roster, and Bars declined. Got a nice pay raise from us though... Curious to see if he takes Long's job.

Interested to see if he makes his way to the Bears 53 over the bye week.

[Bears Whiskey Nut]

Biggs reporting that the Patriots offered to sign Alex Bars to their 53 man roster, and Bars declined. Got a nice pay raise from us though... Curious to see if he takes Long's job.

Interested to see if he makes his way to the Bears 53 over the bye week.

My guess is Bars told the Bears, and they said, "don't go anywhere, you're in our immediate plans." I would guess that Long is getting the bad news this week.

PFF said Long was the lowest graded Bear in the Raiders game, at 45-something. He was in the 20's for the Redskins game. He can't move, and he's lost all of lower body strength.

Maybe a new front five of; Leno Jr. - Daniels - Whitehair - Bars - Massie is in our immediate future. With Coward as the swing T. Maybe swap Bars and Coward. But Long's time as a Bear needs to be over.

[IE]

Biggs reporting that the Patriots offered to sign Alex Bars to their 53 man roster, and Bars declined. Got a nice pay raise from us though... Curious to see if he takes Long's job.

Interested to see if he makes his way to the Bears 53 over the bye week.

Appreciate your insight into Long's impact on the rest of the line. It is weird I feel like I can tell when I guy is playing fairly well but can't really tell as much when they're not unless they're a complete matador out there. And then as you can see there is a lot of confusion out there because Daniels' helping of Long isn't something you hear much about but is of course a problem.

On Bars... I was shocked that they even waived Bars back in August - even though they moved him around a lot and may have figured there wasn't enough tape on him. To me there was. I thought he looked beyond just competent even at LT.

Question about the PS... I thought it worked differently. I thought teams had to claim a guy from the Bears and unless the Bears wanted to lose him they had to elevate him to the 53 for at least 3 games. Maybe NE contacted Bars' agent to guage interest before claiming him?

[Bears Whiskey Nut]

Interested to see if he makes his way to the Bears 53 over the bye week.

Question about the PS... I thought it worked differently. I thought teams had to claim a guy from the Bears and unless the Bears wanted to lose him they had to elevate him to the 53 for at least 3 games. Maybe NE contacted Bars' agent to guage interest before claiming him?

I think that's probably what happened. The Patriots told his agent they were going to claim him from the Bears, Bars went to Nagy and said that The Patriots were going to take him, and Nagy said, "hold on there big fella." To me that says changes are coming on the OL over the bye.

[Bears Whiskey Nut]

I watched some of the footage from the game. Specifically looking at Kyle Long. There were several plays where he just blew his assignment. Others where he missed a stunt, and a subsequent blocking switch. Most of the pass blocking was serviceable at best. He stands straight up, and blocks with is arms and upper body, with almost no lower body bending/anchoring. In some cases he's able to overcome the DT on pure arm strength. It just looks like he has no flexibility in his hips, and almost no lateral movement ability.

[Moriarty]

Interested to see if he makes his way to the Bears 53 over the bye week.

Appreciate your insight into Long's impact on the rest of the line. It is weird I feel like I can tell when I guy is playing fairly well but can't really tell as much when they're not unless they're a complete matador out there. And then as you can see there is a lot of confusion out there because Daniels' helping of Long isn't something you hear much about but is of course a problem.

On Bars... I was shocked that they even waived Bars back in August - even though they moved him around a lot and may have figured there wasn't enough tape on him. To me there was. I thought he looked beyond just competent even at LT.

Question about the PS... I thought it worked differently. I thought teams had to claim a guy from the Bears and unless the Bears wanted to lose him they had to elevate him to the 53 for at least 3 games. Maybe NE contacted Bars' agent to guage interest before claiming him?

Pretty sure players never have to sign somewhere they don't want to (even with the rookie draft or franchise tag, all the NFL can do is limit their alternative options).

However, Bars is nuts to pass on a definite spot, pay bump from 136 to 495, and move to a real contender, unless the Bears very specifically guaranteed something was happening in the next few days.

(And they should be doing that - Long needs to be on IR and the Bears need another healthy body to fill in)

[southdakbearfan]

Don’t think for a minute that players don’t see how the bears took care of miller and how they are still paying sowell and that it doesn’t matter when you are talking non guaranteed contracts.

[Funkster]

Going into this game it had an eerie feeling. The focus was basically Mack’s revenge game. That never happened. Gruden put on a masterful game plan to take Mack totally out of the game.

From the first kickoff the bears were outmatched in the trenches, the bears dominate defense looked slow and lethargic. The bears O-line didn’t look any better, penalties and poor blocking had the offense facing unmanageable situations.

Going into the half down 17-0, my thought was “well we’re going to see what this team is really made out of”. Whatever was said during halftime worked, they came out a new team and turned the game around rather quickly. For anyone questioning Nagy, stop, he has built a winning culture and the players respond to him. The bears clawed their way back and even had the lead late in the game.

Loosing is never good but we saw something on Sunday that we haven’t seen in a long time, a team down many star players rally and get back into the game. Even on a bad day they were in the game at the end.

The expectations are very high for this team, however, we have to remember this is just the second season under Nagy with new pieces on both sides of the ball. Sitting 3-2 at the bye isn’t all that bad, last season they were 3-1 and look how they finished, there is A LOT of football to play.

[wab]

Good point...

I thought there was no way in hell that the Bears could come back from 17 down. They did impress me with their resiliency.

[southdakbearfan]

Weird stuff can happen with a backup QB and super long travel.

Just putting this here

[Umbali]

Ok...so to summarize

Say Long is the problem? Do we IR him? Let his injuries have time to heal? Not sure cap wise how he would affect things?
Then do we add Bars?

Do we not over react and hope we come back from this like we did from the loss to the giants and dolphins last year?

Honestly I have no clue at this point as this year has totally not started like I thought it would

[Bears Whiskey Nut]

Ok...so to summarize

Say Long is the problem? Do we IR him? Let his injuries have time to heal? Not sure cap wise how he would affect things?
Then do we add Bars?

Do we not over react and hope we come back from this like we did from the loss to the giants and dolphins last year?

Honestly I have no clue at this point as this year has totally not started like I thought it would

I think you have to IR him. His injuries are not going to heal enough to make him even 80% of his former self. Worse yet, because of the injuries, and surgeries, he has lost physical strength and flexibility. That is clear just watching him try to play. You IR Kyle, promote Bars, and put Coward at RG. Got to.

[G08]

I don't know if you IR him, especially if he's "healthy" enough to play. That's a tough swallow for a guy like Kyle Long. That being said, you can inactivate him and spin if such that his hip isn't 100 percent. That way if Bars or whomever sucks we can still fall back on Kyle.

Either way, something has to change. We need to get this fucking running game going.

[Richie]

He panicked, and there's no two ways about it. He screwed up and threw the game away.

"Play it safe. Stay calm. Don't throw a turnover." There was absolutely zero reason to make a risky throw.

Dude, same here.

I was told to stop bringing the negative vibes... but I just felt that whole time like he was going to make a mistake and throw a really dumb ball... or he was going to not feel a rush and get strip-sacked.

We got to the brink of field goal range and I just... still was not feeling it.

[The Marshall Plan]

"Play it safe. Stay calm. Don't throw a turnover." There was absolutely zero reason to make a risky throw.

Dude, same here.

I was told to stop bringing the negative vibes... but I just felt that whole time like he was going to make a mistake and throw a really dumb ball... or he was going to not feel a rush and get strip-sacked.

We got to the brink of field goal range and I just... still was not feeling it.

I was convinced that we were going to win. There was simply no covering Robinson. Yet Daniel had him uncovered underneath earlier in the drive and went elsewhere. Then for some reason the asshole decides to go to Miller and into triple coverage on top of it. When your #1 WR is playing lights out why you don't go to that in crunch time is beyond me. Just needed to get into field goal range.

My hatred for Chase Daniel has reached new heights (or lows). Well at least he "knows" the offense.

Daniel is not a doer. He's a teacher. The world needs both I'm not trying to elevate one above the other.

Biscuit is a doer. He's not a teacher.

OK fine, in a final exam scenario about this offense with the #2 pencil and the answer sheet where you have to fill in the bubbles, Daniel probably schools Biscuit easily.

In a game scenario I have no doubt that Biscuit is the better doer. That drive at the end vs the Raiders played right into Biscuit's strengths and with Robinson being who he is I have no doubt we would've won.

Biscuit has Nagy, the OC, the QB coach and the tablet to teach him the offense. He doesn't need some Obi Wan figure to show him the ropes. Get a backup QB with some ability. Figure it out. Because ultimately we can't flush another legendary defense down the crapper because our QB situation is fucked.

[Bearfanuk]

Do you know what winds me up the most about Daniel?
He has a cap hit of 6 mill this year. That’s a huge chunk of change just for someone who knows the offence.
Bray could play just as badly and be on less.

In reality Chase is here out of loyalty from Nagy. It’s that type of loyalty that creates a good culture but it stinks right now.

We could easily name at least 5 free agent qbs who would fir this system and be on less

[skamanfrank]

We could easily name at least 5 free agent qbs who would fir this system and be on less

I'm not disagreeing/trying to be contentious, but out of interest... what 5 would you name?