The Chicago Bears are gearing up to face the Los Angeles Rams in their season opener Sunday night at SoFi Stadium. The teams have met in each of the previous three seasons with the Bears winning at home in 2018 but dropping road games in 2019 and 2020. It has been a horror show for the offense in all three games — the Bears managed just two touchdowns on 35 possessions. That won’t cut it this weekend if Matt Nagy’s group hopes to pull off an attention-grabbing upset and return home at 1-0. As the prime-time test nears, here’s the inside slant on three notable storylines.
Progress report
Whether he realizes it or not, Bears Chairman George McCaskey has been given an order for the 2021 season. For months now, an edgy and disgruntled fan base has expressed its worry about the franchise’s long-term direction, pleading for McCaskey to become more honest with his evaluations, more harsh with his criticism and less Pollyannaish with his outlook for the future.
Sure, much of that angst was shoved into a closet in late April when the Bears cashed a draft-weekend lottery ticket, trading up in the first round to select Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields. That move — serendipitous, stirring and significant — generated a welcome surge of euphoria. Those vibes lasted deep into training camp. But now, in a remarkable twist, the Bears seem to have lost a sizable chunk of that positive energy from the outside world. Without having played a meaningful game.
Go figure.
The belief in Fields, who will start his career in a backup role, hasn’t dissipated. To fans, coaches and players alike, the rookie’s performance through training camp and in three preseason games only strengthened the belief that he has all the talent, poise and drive to be a damn good starting quarterback in the NFL. For a long time. That, obviously, is a promising step forward at the most important position in the sport.
Yet as the Bears head for a challenging opener against the Rams on Sunday night, the Fields excitement suddenly has been displaced by a familiar sense of angst.
Follow the staircase upward.
Many fans worry that the team’s plan for Andy Dalton to steer the offense deep into the regular season while Fields develops behind the scenes is misguided and impractical.
They are worried coach Matt Nagy might never make good on a yearslong promise to establish an identity for his offense while transforming the Bears into one of the more productive and entertaining attacks in the NFL.
They are worried the current roster general manager Ryan Pace has constructed is too old and too cluttered with Band-Aids and that future efforts at improvement will be constricted by a troublesome salary-cap situation.
They are worried that team President and CEO Ted Phillips doesn’t have enough football acumen or focus on on-field happenings to truly conduct a sophisticated evaluation of his GM.
And they are worried that McCaskey can’t see the big picture clearly, too respectful of his subordinates and too trusting in them to demand accountability or enact true change when failures occur and expectations aren’t met.
That’s why this indirect edict has been floating out there, this push for McCaskey to express a vision for 2021 and beyond, to establish clear-cut goals. Heading into the opener, it’s only sensible for the man at the top to lay out unambiguous expectations so that a passionate fan base at least feels it has a clue about where the bar is being set.
McCaskey, of course, hasn’t met with the media since an awkward January Zoom news conference that seemed to confirm for many in the outside world that the Bears remain as directionless and oblivious as ever.
To many around the league, the Bears seem either incapable of recognizing mediocrity or unwilling to do anything about it when they have it identified.
Since 2000, the franchise has cycled through five coaches, four general managers and 23 starting quarterbacks. The Bears have had a .491 winning percentage during that span. And their three playoff victories over the last 21 seasons top only the Washington Football Team, Miami Dolphins, Cincinnati Bengals, Buffalo Bills, Cleveland Browns and Detroit Lions.
Pedestrian at best, right?
And while Fields’ arrival might be a catalyst to change those fortunes, he won’t create landmark success instantly.
That’s why McCaskey must express clarity in what he’s looking for out of this season and communicate it to the masses.
What exactly must Pace and Nagy accomplish to retain belief from above?
At what point does Phillips’ oversight of this consistent mediocrity need to be questioned more?
What should these 2021 Bears be hoping to achieve?
To those questions, we still only have McCaskey’s answers from mid-January. “We need to see improvement,” he said then. “We need to see progress.”
But what does that really mean? What are the benchmarks for judging improvement and progress? What achievements will indicate to the biggest decision maker at Halas Hall that the franchise is heading in the right direction?
This was McCaskey in January: “All four of us will know whether there’s been sufficient improvement or sufficient progress to continue past 2021.”
Added Phillips: “We’re going to know whether we’re heading in the right direction or not. That’s how we feel about it.”
See where this gets so tricky? This is where the target becomes too blurry to make out an actual bull’s-eye.
With McCaskey’s next Q-and-A session with the media still stamped as “TBD,” it seems imperative to press Pace and Nagy on how they’ll define progress and improvement for 2021.
The general manager’s response remains direct. “To me,” Pace said last week, “it all goes back to winning football games. And getting in the playoffs. And then winning once we’re in the playoffs.”
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Pace is headed into his seventh season with the Bears owning a 42-54 regular-season record during his tenure. They have yet to win a playoff game.
Still, credit him for at least setting an ambitious target for 2021, especially with a team widely believed to hover around .500 for the next four-plus months.
As for Nagy, when he was asked Monday how he would define progress in 2021, he stressed a need to show consistent and mostly uninterrupted growth. That will be particularly critical on offense.
Said Nagy: “You want to be able to say, ‘Hey, as an offense, identify-wise we want to grow. And by Week 4 or 5 or 6, you want to feel like you know what you have.
“More so, as a team in general, you want to feel like, hey, we’re playing complementary football. Offense, defense, special teams. That’s probably my biggest thing. It’s understanding, ‘Let’s get better every week. And let’s play complementary football.’ “
Noted.
In other words, a standout defense can’t be held back yet again by an offense that so consistently fails to carry its share of the load. Measure this team and the men who lead it accordingly.
To be crystal clear, Bears brass set a bar for the 2020 season too. In the days after the team’s maddening 2019 season ended, Phillips said he “absolutely” expected the Bears to be championship contenders in 2020. “We should be able to turn it around,” he insisted.
Eight months later, during Week 1 of that potential turnaround season, McCaskey stressed he was eager to see whether the 2020 Bears would be more like the 2018 team that won 12 games and a division title or more like the 2019 team that sputtered to 8-8.
The Bears followed with another 8-8 season, backed into the playoffs as the NFC’s No. 7 seed and were quickly removed from the postseason party the way a housefly is smushed with a rolled-up newspaper.
Almost nothing about 2020 felt like 2018. Yet when McCaskey’s bar wasn’t cleared, there were few ramifications. Little of significance was done.
McCaskey struggled to explain why there were few major consequences for the team’s continued struggles. When he was asked directly what he saw within last season that indicated the Bears were making meaningful progress toward winning a championship, he quickly noted how the team landed receiver Darnell Mooney in the fifth round of the draft. “We need to keep doing more of that.”
McCaskey also emphasized that there was minimal drama or dysfunction during the Bears’ excruciating 55-day stretch between victories last fall.
“Usually when you go through a losing streak like that, people start pointing fingers, people start casting blame,” McCaskey said. “That just didn’t happen with our team.”
We don’t need to relive that entire January fiasco again. But that’s why it seems important for McCaskey to refresh his outlook, to communicate with Bears fans about how the team is progressing toward a future where success can be sustained.
Still, in a somewhat uncomfortable way, perhaps this season shouldn’t necessarily be about a victory total or playoff success. Once Pace and Nagy were given the green light to take another big swing at fixing the quarterback position, that responsibility should have come with substantial freedom to see their plan through.
Fields’ arrival has been a big deal, a gift, really. Now it’s up to the Bears to do something with it. And in the grand scheme, 2021 should be defined largely by how the rookie quarterback’s development progresses.
If the Bears roll into January with clear evidence that Fields is every bit as good as everyone believes he can be, then should it really matter if the Bears win 10 games and slide back into the playoffs or lose 10 and are dropped from the NFC’s “In the Hunt” graphics in early January?
Nagy, who sees playoff potential in his team, has emphasized since training camp that he wants his players and coaches to have a laser focus, locking in on each day without devoting attention to future hypotheticals.
On that front, Nagy was pressed on how he’ll balance that microfocus with an understanding that, above everything else, the Bears need to begin establishing long-term stability at quarterback.
In the current plan, Nagy insisted Dalton and Fields have “both done exactly what we’ve asked.”
“Andy has come in here from the start and been a great leader and been a great teammate,” Nagy said. “(It’s about) being able to take the offense and get us going. And he understands that. But when you talk about the future of this franchise and the quarterback we have, that’s where I’m at peace in my heart knowing what Justin has done and what he’s exemplified in this short time. I feel really, really good about that.”
Retaining that feel-good vibe might be challenging, however, particularly in a season in which the 18-week forecast says “partly cloudy.” Still, the Bears need to have a sharp understanding of what this season is really about.
Much of that starts with how McCaskey views everything from above. For right now, though, the outside world doesn’t know what that outlook is.
One strange trip
Matt Nagy’s sly smile hinted at a deeper secret Thursday.
“Yeah,” Nagy said. “I do remember where I was at.”
Jan. 30. Late on a Saturday night.
Word began to leak out, first in NFL circles then to the masses: Veteran quarterback Matthew Stafford was about to join the Los Angeles Rams in a blockbuster trade with the Detroit Lions.
“I was in Cabo,” Nagy said. “So yeah.”
Wait … what?
Stafford was in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, that night.
So, too, was Rams coach Sean McVay.
When the trade was completed, Stafford, McVay and their wives connected for a late celebratory dinner at the resort where they were staying. Just happened to fall together that way. McVay’s friendship with Buffalo Bills receivers coach Chad Hall provided a valuable link. (Hall is Stafford’s brother-in-law.)
What a convenient twist of fate. Or so the story goes.
Yet little by little, peculiar side details have continued to surface. San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan, for example, was also in Cabo that weekend with his wife. And Shanahan just happened to be searching for potential new options at quarterback at the time.
New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton, according to Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer, also was in Cabo around that period. Same goes for Drew Brees, whose retirement from the Saints became official six weeks later.
Nagy, apparently, was on vacation in Cabo at that time too. Just decompressing with his wife before really putting the pedal down on the Bears’ 2021 quarterback search.
Crazy that Stafford — one of the many potential targets Nagy and Bears general manager Ryan Pace discussed in detail right after last season — happened to be in Cabo at the time.
“It might have been a coincidence,” Nagy said Thursday, his grin growing.
And no invite from Stafford or McVay to grab a bite?
“No,” Nagy said. “I went to dinner with my wife.”
Shanahan, meanwhile, was staying at a different resort than Stafford and McVay, who is one of his close friends. On a podcast this summer with McVay and NFL Network’s Peter Schrager, Shanahan acknowledged the disappointment he felt when the Rams landed Stafford. Shanahan said he had spent a couple of weeks intensely studying video of Stafford.
“He’s better than I realized. He was the man,” Shanahan said on the podcast. “He’s actually underrated to me. … I know how good he is at play-action. I know how smart he is. Not only does he just have a big arm, but he’s got touch. He knows where to go with the ball. So I was trying to get involved.”
But on that Saturday night, even with assurances that no trade for Stafford would be complete until the following day, Shanahan learned Stafford was California-bound. Only to LA.
“That,” Shanahan said, “was frustrating.”
The Jared Goff-for-Stafford trade was the first major transaction in an offseason full of large-font quarterback headlines. As the regular season begins, the Bears and Rams will head to the starting gates with new starting QBs.
Nine other teams either drafted, signed or traded for a new starter or potential starter this offseason. Beyond that, the Philadelphia Eagles promoted Jalen Hurts to a starting role after dealing Carson Wentz to the Indianapolis Colts, and the Saints replaced Brees with Jameis Winston.
No wonder Week 1 will be filled with so much added intrigue. And the curiosity is especially high in Los Angeles, where the results of the Stafford-McVay union should be fascinating to track.
Before revealing his Cabo secret Thursday, Nagy spent a few minutes of his morning news conference expressing admiration for Stafford’s skill set while also commending the offense McVay runs.
“Sean does a great job at putting guys in great positions and having an identity with what they do,” Nagy said. “He’s a really good teacher. You see his players really like him. So when you have a guy who’s a good teacher, who has good schemes and (whose) players like him, you’re going to have success.”
McVay has. In four seasons with the Rams, he has won 43 games and gone to the playoffs three times. He propelled the Rams to the Super Bowl in 2018 with an offense that averaged 421 yards and 33 points per game.
But McVay hasn’t yet had a quarterback with the arm strength, experience and command Stafford brings. That’s why the opener against the Bears becomes captivating with the curtain rising on a Rams offense that might be able to take things to a new level.
Bears defensive coordinator Sean Desai acknowledged Stafford’s arm strength, field vision and ability to manipulate coverages and knows the connection with McVay has to be exciting.
“He’s a dynamic player who can change the game at a moment’s notice,” Desai said. “He plays well under pressure and he plays well in prime-time games.”
Stafford, who is 11-11 in 22 career starts against the Bears, can’t wait to get started and figure out how to match his talent with McVay’s system.
“I’m still going to continue to learn and try to be better in this offense as I go,” he said. “But it definitely feels like it’s time to go play football too, which is a lot of fun. … I want to go play some football and do it with a group of guys who in a short period of time I’ve grown to just absolutely love and respect.”
Maybe one day, every detail of that January weekend in Cabo will be uncovered and a complete puzzle can be put together. As it stands, Nagy said Thursday that he never spoke with Stafford while he was there.
Strange trip, huh?
“It was great. It was really good,” Nagy said. “There weren’t many people there either, I know that.”
‘Adjust to us’
A sense of urgency? Of course. For Bears outside linebacker Khalil Mack, that feeling is always there heading into a season. But it seems to elevate a bit each year. And now Mack, beginning his eighth season overall and fourth with the Bears, knows he has entered his 30s and has still yet to win a playoff game.
“Charles Woodson told me a long time ago, ‘You cannot waste time,’ ” Mack said on the opening day of training camp in July. “This (expletive) is very valuable.”
Seems like it was just yesterday that Mack popped up at Halas Hall for the first time, igniting a division-championship in 2018 with an All-Pro season. But that’s a distant memory now. And Mack has designs on again becoming an elite pass rusher and a consistent game-wrecker in 2021 under new coordinator Sean Desai.
For as much praise as Desai has received at Halas Hall for creating energy within the defense and crafting ways to use all his players in ways that accentuate their strengths, Mack said he appreciates Desai’s understanding of opposing offenses combined with his confidence in what the Bears’ defensive identity should be.
“(It’s) having them adjust to us more than we adjust to them,” Mack said.
Desai understands one of his biggest responsibilities will be to unlock Mack’s full potential. The quickest way to play great defense, after all, is to have your best players making game-changing plays on a regular basis.
“That’s the challenge, right?” Desai said. “As a coordinator and I think as coaches (in general), you try to get everybody’s potential unlocked to the maximum of their ability. We’ve got to be creative in the ways we try to do that. And the players have to trust our process in trying to do that within the scheme.”
Mack seems to light up whenever he talks about Desai, perhaps sensing increased opportunity to really be at his best under a coordinator who values his input and fully understands who he is as a player.
Said outside linebackers coach Bill Shuey: “It’s one of those things where Sean listens. But it’s also difficult to make everybody happy all the time. What our guys understand is that Sean is trying, within certain restraints, to do his best to move opportunities around within the calls as best he can.”
Over the past few months, Shuey has sensed heightened engagement from Mack in his desire to know the reasons behind everything the Bears defense is trying to do.
“He is taking more of a leadership role in the outside linebackers room,” Shuey said. “He’s mentoring. He’s speaking up when there are opportunities to speak up. And that’s good for everyone. It’s good for our younger guys, because his voice carries a lot of weigh. But I also think it’s good for him.
“Everybody learns differently. Some guys learn best by looking at it on a page. Some guys need to see the film. Some guys learn by doing it. And now this is often overlooked, but some guys can learn more by teaching it. And right now, for Khalil, that’s become a good tool for him. He has taken a leadership role in some of the film work and some of our drills. And when he does that, he’s teaching. And it helps to embed things deeper for him.”
For a low-key guy who prefers to let his production do the talking, a teaching role might seem to be outside of Mack’s comfort zone. But to Shuey it also shows growth. It shows purpose. It shows Mack isn’t willing to coast as the proverbial clock ticks in the back of his head.
“Time is of the essence,” Mack said.
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