Is this what it's like to play AGAINST the Bears?

That is the note I wrote down after Jay's second INT. All these turnovers and a defensive score on top of a special teams score sure are tough to overcome. And yet, somehow we did. This offense is so much fun to watch. The scary part is that it's still a new offense being learned. The potential here is very exciting.

On the other side of the ball, you have to love the job we did against A.P. today. But what happened to the pass rush? Corey Wootton spent some time in the backfield early, but Minnesota consistently had a clean pocket as the game went on. Have to hope that we can get more pressure moving forward.

Other notes I jotted down during the game included:

"Bushrod makes me nervous sometimes". You too?

"Hester has lost a little speed, but DAMN he looks good again!!"

"LOVE the move on 2nd and 2 from the 3 yard line to spread the field and then run up the gut. If Bush is in for that play, he scores." I'm as big a fan of Matt Forte as anyone, but he is clearly an inferior short yardage back and I hope we utilize Bush more in these situations.

On the very next play... "LOVE the call on 1st and goal to throw out of a big, bunched set. That's an easy TD if Jay puts some air under that pass."

"Tim Jennings has been a STUD ever since he was benched in week 16 of 2011 for dropping 2 potential INT's the week before". I HATED the move to bench him at the time (it directly helped contribute to a torching by Aaron Rodgers), but I'm loving the results now. Thanks Lovie. Truly a great move.

The personnel breakdown looks similar to last week. Here it is:

As you can see, we're still about 2:1 passing out of 11 personnel and 4:1 passing out of 12 personnel. Almost identical to last week, we ran the ball at a 3:2 ratio out of 21 personnel this week. We'll likely stop charting these week by week, especially if they remain similar, and will instead begin to focus on 4-week averages, since that is what NFL teams focus on as well. Be assured, though, that if anything out of the ordinary happens, we'll be sure to discuss the strategy of those moves here.

We're Back!!

Alright, boys and girls, we are back in action! Had a lot going on and got sick of tracking the same predictable nonsense from Tice last year (pass out of 11 personnel, run out of 12...), but we're happy to be back! It's great to have Bears football again and it's hard to remember a more exciting time as a Bears fan. The Marc Trestman era is here and with it comes exciting potential. Let's start with this before we get into breaking down this week's game.

By now, we all know a bit about Marc Trestman's offense. West Coast ideals, get the ball out fast, RB involved in the passing game, spread the defense out horizontally, etc. What nobody has discussed, however, is the effect that Trestman will have on the defense. I mean indirectly, of course, as he has effectively left the defense in place. Our defense is still predicated on the Tampa 2. It's basically the same thing that it has been. So what the hell am I talking about? Well, think about it for a minute. What is the primary function of the Tampa 2? It is to take away the big play. Keep everything in front of you. Force the opposing offense to sustain long drives if they are to score. Now let's take it a step further. In what situation will this defense be most effective? Well, with a lead of course. After all, forcing the opposition to dink and dunk their way down the field while chewing up the clock doesn't do too much good when behind in the game. With a lead, however, this defense becomes suffocating. This leads directly to my point. For as good as Lovie Smith's defenses always were, the offenses were never able to sustain periods of potency. There were about 7 weeks of offensive production in '06. Remember? That offensive production coupled with this defense had the entire nation talking about a possible 16-0 season. The media was ready to crown our ass. As we soon found out, though, that offensive production was not sustainable. Marc Trestman in the past has proven that his offenses can sustain production throughout an entire season(s). So we should be excited about not only the extra points which this offense should deliver, but also what those extra points will mean for this defense.

So, now onto the win over the Bengals. Lots to like about this game. During the game, I jotted down the following; "why is the offense so conservative?" After the game, we found out why. Marc Trestman said that his biggest priority through the first half was to keep Jay Cutler clean. He did that. The quarterback whisperer apparently realizes the importance of Jay's confidence in the pocket. We've all seen how his footwork deteriorates when he starts taking hits and apparently Coach Trestman has seen this as well. So, between getting the ball out quickly and great play by the O-Line, Cutler displayed good footwork the whole game and his comfort in the pocket was clear. Let's hope that this keeps up all season.

Before we move on, how about a quick word about the line play? When was the last time anyone can remember our O-Line playing better than our D-Line? Kyle Long is a beast. Plain and simple. I don't think I could name 10 offensive guards in the NFL I'd rather have. He did make a couple mental mistakes (once picking Forte on a dig route), but these should quickly be cleaned up. It's also hard not to be impressed by fellow rookie Jordan Mills at RT. I'm not sure if he's really as good as he looks, but he played well at Louisiana Tech and at the Senior Bowl, so he definitely has the potential.

As for our D-Line, what was that? Peppers looked genuinely dis-interested during the first half. He even appeared to be avoiding contact. It was very strange. His intensity did pick up in the second half, though his production did not. Stephen Paea, however, was quite disruptive. He was consistently getting pressure up the middle and his tremendous strength seemed to finally be evident in his play on the field. It is just one week, so let's not get too excited just yet, but if his play this week was representative at all of what we can expect moving forward, then this D-Line could be truly elite.

The rest of the defense (other than the flu-ridden Charles Tillman) seemed to struggle a bit as well. There was sloppy tackling (including a couple missed tackles by Lance Briggs, which was very surprising) and a consistent failure to get off the field on 3rd down. When it mattered the most though, we stepped it up in the second half and allowed the offense the opportunity to complete the comeback and get the W.

Finally, here's how we did it:

Now, a couple notes about the chart. First, I left off the last 6 plays when we were trying to run out the clock. These were all runs. Second, this doesn't distinguish whether or not we were in the shotgun formation, but Coach Trestman clearly loves the shotgun. We were in the shotgun 27 of the 55 plays listed here. We ran the ball on 6 of those 27 plays. Anyway, we clearly threw the ball more than we ran it. This is to be expected. I was pleased that we remained unpredictable out of 21 personnel and the run/pass ratio was about the same whether we were in 11 or 12 personnel. This will help keep defenses off balance.

When it's all said and done, it was just one week. But it was a great win and this could be a sign of great things to come. Let's get this winner against the Vikings to get to 2-0. We'll be back next week with more detail. Bear Down!!

Bears defeat Rams 23-6

Good to get out of Dodge with a win.

That's how I felt after today's game.  That game today is kind of how I would imagine the game would look if it were played in St. Louis.  The defense played very well but the offense just looked off, as if seriously affected by crowd noise in a dome.

In any case, we ran the ball pretty well today (you wouldn't know it looking at the box score, but it was a definite improvement).  Other than the win itself, that's the best news from the game.  Chilo Rachal needs to clean some things up (those penalties are unacceptable), but he did have a few impressive blocks today in the running game.  Hopefully, we'll have Matt Forte back for next Monday's game in Dallas. If not, though, I think that Michael Bush showed enough burst and power in the running game that Dallas would likely still key on stopping the run first and foremost and that should open up some opportunities in the passing game.

As always, we will have more analysis (including our personnel breakdown) as the week progresses.

2-1.  Bear Down!!!

First Sack Review

Here is the first play of the game from the Packers debacle on Thursday.  Let's analyze why the breakdown happened.  Here is the pre-snap look:

Now, watch the gaping hole created by Spencer's down block followed by Webb's kick-out:

Now, look back at where Forte started.  Look at his feet.  He's on the hashmark.  Notice here that after "taking" the play fake, he's practically in the middle of the field.  The point here is that his weight is moving to his left in order to take the play fake.  At the same time, the blitzer is able to immediately cut across Forte's body because of all the space created by Spencer's movement to his right.  Also notice in the next picture that Forte is unable to cut immediately to his right to square up the defender because Jay is still in the way.

The next three pics show the block itself.  We can see here why Forte led with his shoulder instead of remaining squared up at contact.

Lastly, this is where Forte needs to do a better job.  Even though he was put in a bad position, he needs to stick with the blitzer and drive him away from the pocket instead of getting cradled up as he does here:

So, though Forte does need to do a better job than this, I definitely expect Tice to put his guys in a better position to succeed than this.  Not helping the situation is that Chicago had 8 guys in to block while the 2 receivers both basically ran go routes.  Adding to the madness was that neither of the tight ends or the running back released as an outlet for Jay when (not if) he got pressured.

More analysis of the game (specifically on all of the sacks) to follow.

Packers debacle - personnel review

Well, as I anticipated, going back and watching that game for the second time was almost as painful as the first.  What a load of crap.  Before anything else, here's the personnel chart from the game:

A couple things to note regarding the chart:

• There were a total of 22 run plays and 36 pass plays.  Much of that was due to the fact that we were behind as we had 21 runs and 22 passes through 3 quarters.
• The disparity between runs and passes out of 11 personnel continues.  It's even worse when you consider that 2 of the 9 runs out of that grouping were draw plays on 3 and 19+.  I also noticed (I don't have an exact count) that many of the plays we ran out of 11 personnel were out of the shotgun formation.  All of this adds up to a near complete lack of unpredictability for an opposing defense to worry about.

Here are the rest of my notes from the game:

The lack of desire to establish a running game early was incredibly disturbing.  This offensive line in completely incapable of protecting Jay if the opposing D-Linemen are allowed to pin their ears back and attack.  How the Bears coaching staff was unaware of this (especially after 2 years of Martz) is amazing.

Evan Rodriguez needs to play more.  Kellen Davis needs to play less.  Matt Spaeth needs to play even less than that.  He is brutal.

Cutler needs to get rid of the ball.  It's tough enough that the line can't protect, but when they DO give time, he needs to find someone or get rid of the ball.  Eliminate these negative plays.

We'll be back in the next couple days after going over the "All 22" film with more analysis.  As always, please feel free to comment below.

Bears - Colts Personnel Review

Here's my review of the Colts game from a personnel standpoint.  First, though, to new readers of Bears Playbook and anyone unfamiliar with the terminology, let's go over a quick description of the different personnel packages.

Personnel packages are identified with a two-digit number.  Obviously, there are 11 players on offense.  One is the QB and 5 are the offensive linemen.  This leaves 5 skill players on the offensive side of the ball.  This group is composed of RB's, WR's and TE's.  In naming the personnel group on the field, we list the number of RB's followed by the number of TE's.  Adding these numbers together and then subtracting from 5 tells us the number of WR's on the field as well.  It sounds like a lot, but it's very easy in practice.  For example, if there is 1 RB in the game and 2 TE's, that is called 12 personnel (1 for the # of RB's, then 2 for the # of TE's).  Since there are 5 skill players on the field, this leaves 2 WR's on the field in this situation.  Got it?  What if there was 1 RB, 1 TE and 3 WR?  That's 11 personnel.  1 RB and 0 TE?  That's 10 personnel.  Lastly, a 5 WR set is called 00 personnel (0 WR, 0 TE).

Every NFL team tracks the personnel that the offense sends on the field.  They also track tendencies that a team may show about how often they will run or pass out of each personnel group.  In preparing for an upcoming game, they will track the other team's last 4 games personnel tendencies.  So, finally, here is the chart for this week's game.

The totals for the game were 40 passes and 29 runs.  This doesn't seem like too bad a balance.  Look, however, at what the Bears did out of 11 personnel.  With this personnel group on the field, the Bears passed 20 times and ran only 5.  This is a whopping disparity.  So, when the Packers see the Bears trot out this personnel group onto the field this week, you can bet they'll be anticipating pass plays.  I am very curious to see if Mike Tice tries to use this to his advantage by running more often out of this personnel.  This fact also helps explain some things that I saw during the game.

For example, at 6:15 in the 2^nd quarter, Bears faced a 3^rd an 11 at the Indy 24.  They ran a draw play to Michael Bush.  I hated the play call at the time but now, after charting the personnel packages, I like it.  At that point in time, the Bears had run 11 plays out of 11 personnel and EVERY ONE was a pass play.  On 3^rd and 11, Indy would be expecting a pass of course.  In addition, the Bears had shown that they love throwing the ball out of 11 personnel.  So, although it didn’t work in the end, that play had a great chance to catch Indy off guard and succeed (it almost did.  We gained 8 yards on the play despite poor execution by Bush who ran straight into Garza).  

So, while you watch the game this Thursday, pay attention to what the Bears do when you see 1 RB and 3 WR's on the field.  This may provide significant insight into Tice's ability to maintain (or exploit) balance in his playcalling.

Bears Off to Fast Start

What an opening to the 2012 season!  It definitely looked a little dicey at first, but when we got settled in (an effort clearly expedited by the injury to Dwight Freeney) we looked downright dangerous.  It had a little bit of everything we have been waiting (and hoping) for.  Here are some of my quick feelings after the game:

There was great running by Matt Forte.  When we came out throwing and the O-line couldn't protect, we started handing the ball to 22.  The result?  We marched down the field, scored a touchdown and that seemed to settle the whole team down.

Speaking of that touchdown, we converted in the red zone.  We scored touchdowns where we used to kick field goals.  Michael Bush is a great acquisition.  Never mind the towering receivers.  That TD to Marshall was just too easy.

Brandon Marshall.  Beast.  In case anyone wasn't yet aware, Cutler LOVES throwing to this guy.  Doesn't matter whether or not he's covered.  That will get us in trouble at some point, but I believe it will work in our favor more often than not.  This guy is ridiculous.

The rookies.  Alshon Jeffery continues to impress.  On that TD pass, Cutler audibled to have Marshall occupy the safety to free up Jeffery on the post (don't even get me started on how great it is that Cutler can audible!!).  Evan Rodriguez had some nice blocks and continues to develop and Shea McClellin had some nice pressure.  I very much like that they aren't shy about moving McClellin to RDE at times (this used to be Peppers' call, he has the right to line up wherever on the line he wants... not sure if this is still the case).  I continue to like this rookie class more and more as time goes by.

As for the defense, I felt it was a good job overall.  I was fairly pleased with the amount of pressure we got from the D-Line (I stated during the preseason that I felt that Henry Melton would soon be talked about as one of Chicago's elite defenders.  This game made that look like a real possibility).  Awesome game by Tim Jennings.  Good game by Chris Conte.  Urlacher was pretty ineffective (to be expected) and I was happy to see him pulled early.

All in all, it was a great start to the 2012 season.  We're on a short week this week with the matchup in Green Bay looming, but I will have a breakdown of our personnel usage and playcalling in the next few days.