Grading the Bears

To the starving man even haggis represents fine dining.

The 3-7 Bears chowed down Thursday night with exuberance after their 16-13 ugly win.

In a year and a coach gone by, it would have been cause for Club Dub. This was more like Club Stub.

The Bears kept stubbing their toes with strange and definitely debatable penalties, like offensive pass interference without contact and false starts for too many eye blinks on a field goal.

They inched out the offense with short completions, as rookie quarterback Tyson Bagent failed to throw to open receivers downfield while taking shorter throws. He saw some open players downfield—Tyler Scott on one—but didn't throw there. He learned from the previous week about the pitfalls of late and over the middle even if the only Panther in sight this time was coach Frank Reich on the sidelines.

In the end, new Bears like Montez Sweat, DJ Moore and D'Onta Foreman, old Bears like Cole Kmet and Cairo Santos and even former Bears like Ihmir Smith-Marsette and Eddy Piniero could come away heads held high.

Can’t wait to go to Detroit and watch JF1 trash the Lions. ⁦@omarqadir01⁩ #BearDown #DaBears pic.twitter.com/EegEKhbPPU
— Will Wright (@willwright06) November 10, 2023

Maybe Piniero's head was a little less high. His 59-yard field goal with less than two minutes left didn't come close. He had a kickoff that bounced over the crossbar earlier in the game and he had a better chance of getting three points from that one than from the 59-yarder.

Even coach Matt Eberflus laughed and joked afterward with media about an in-game comment to the Amazon Prime network about having something up "his sleeve."

All he really had up there was an arm, as the most tricky Bears play might have been that quarterback kneel-down at game's end.

At least they did make this look tricky.

Foreman false-started on that difficult maneuver, just as Cody Whitehair was said to have on Cairo Santos' 49-yard field goal that became 54 yards. The current Bears kicker got it right anyway, and at game's end the Bears simply lined back up after Foreman's gaffe, knelt down and won the game and then it was off to celebrate 3-7.

Here are grades for this irrepressible group in pumpkin orange helmets and uniforms.

Running Game: B-

They've certainly enjoyed better results in the past from Foreman and Roschon Johnson than 3.8 and 3.6 yards a carry respectively, and did this against a team ranked 28th in run defense, playing without their best player on their defensive front. However, it got the job done. The 37 carries proved far more significant than the 3.6 yards a carry overall because of the possession time provided. Teven Jenkins and Lucas Patrick had to contend with a man mountain in the middle in the form of Derrick Brown and found moving him difficult. The Panthers also shot any number of blitzes their way and crowded the line of scrimmage to make sledding tough. This is how opponents play you when the quarterback doesn't complete a throw longer than 16 yards.

Passing Game: C

Nothing long from Bagent. Patrick Scales did complete six 15-yarders but was throwing them backwards from between his legs to Trenton Gill and that doesn't count. The rookie wasn't really lighting it up but didn't do anything stupid, either. Eberflus pointed out afterward how one of the great traits Bagent had was avoiding sacks. Give the offensive line some credit here, but Bagent did take a few hits and as he was dodging or getting hit on several throws. They resulted in floating footballs in the night sky and the Bears came away fortunate none were picked off. This was a night where receivers earned their money by turning short passes into 16-yard gains like Moore did, or making an extremely tough 7-yard catch before absorbing a big hit to clinch the game like Darnell Mooney.

Run Defense: A+

The Panthers became so discouraged with their 2.7 yards per carry that they quickly abandoned all attempts at establishing a ground game, running it only six times in the second half. Justin Jones, Andrew Billings, Montez Sweat, T.J. Edwards and Co. had the line of scrimmage from the first snap. Kyler Gordon became a mad man out of the slot, bursting in for two big tackles near the Panthers goal line to set up difficult down-and-distance situations. The Panthers were tackled for loss six times, which isn't easy to accomplish when they run only 16 times.

Pass Defense: A-

Only a second straight strangely officiated game kept this from being a higher grade. The zebra crew kept calling holds or illegal contact when, as Jaylon Johnson said later, his hands were "open." Holding Young to 185 yards was more like what the Bears expect from their secondary and it shouldn't have been surprising considering they finally had their full starting group playing through a complete game for the first time this season. The safeties disguised well in back to confuse the rookie passer and about the only mistake made was Jaquan Brisker beaten for a 45-yard reception by Michael Strachan. The best sight was Sweat barrelling in on Bryce Young for three QB hits or flushing him out of the pocket into incompletions. The entire line looks bolstered as the multiplier effect was apparent from Sweat's presence. They had three sacks by other linemen, a total representing 30% of their production for the entire first nine games.

Special Teams: D-

The 54-yard field goal by Santos salvaged a grade above "F" for this group and also saved Whitehair some embarrassment after his false start on a 49-yarder, although it looked like they flagged the Bears lineman for having too much hair on his shaved head waving in the wind. One unpardonable sin on special teams is allowing a punt return for a TD and they did this right away, embarrassingly enough to one of their former players who had been cast off for letting a ball be stolen out of his hands from behind. When Josh Blackwell wasn't missing open-field tackles of Smith-Marsette to trigger a 79-yard return, he had a decent night returning from IR with a special teams tackle and combining with Noah Sewell to flatten Smith-Marsette on one punt. Trenton Gill's night included one of the most feeble tackle attempts by a punter at Soldier Field since Todd Sauerbrun whiffed trying to tackle Devin Hester in the open field, the difference here being Smith-Marsette isn't quite as ridiculous as the Windy City Flyer.

Coaching: A-

Nothing fancy in the game plan, as they stressed not turning over the ball. When they finally called a play for Bagent to stand and deliver a hard throw over the middle on third down, he did it with all the authority of a starter to Tyler Scott for the first down on a play that had been an interception a week earlier. Offensive coordinator Luke Getsy moved Bagent plenty to keep him out of harm's way and the bootlegs and moving pockets proved huge in spacing out the field for a few key yards after catches. Some deception in the secondary by Eberflus in his calls was no easy tactic to devise because Panthers coach Frank Reich knew all the tricks his former defensive coordinator had up his sleeve. At least someone knew this. The media couldn't find out what the trick he had up his sleeve was afterward.

Overall: B

It seems a bit high for so ugly an effort, but enjoy. They receive extra credit because they made it easier for the Panthers to finish with the worst record in the league, which, of course, means the Bears could get the top pick in the draft.

Twitter: BearDigest@BearsOnMaven