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No Bears QB Change, No Change of Play Caller

The Bears will be status quo for at least two major offensive positions of importance heading into preparation for the Saints on Sunday

There will be no drastic changes coming out of the first Bears road loss of the season, or at least none coach Matt Nagy wants to discuss.

A change in the play caller and a change back to quarterback Mitchell Trubisky so not appear in the plans, and if the Bears offense is to find its way out of the current misery it will have to occur through improvement at practice and better execution.

The lack of a running game and problems getting the ball downfield haven't soured Nagy on either quarterback Nick Foles or the approach this season.

"We have a lot of confidence and I have a lot of confidence in Nick right now with where he's at," Nagy said. "Again, this is a process for us to work though, and it's not just one person. It's really not.

"And I know from yesterday, decision making-wise and where he's at, I thought he did a good job. I thought he made some good throws. He missed a couple as well, but again, it's a team sport, so there's some other reasons for that as well. Just keep rolling through that and working through it."

Nagy had several decisions on offense come under scrutiny, such as the fourth-and-1 gamble with a quarterback sneak for a first down from the Bears own 19 but wound up negated by a false start on Rashaad Coward.

The rut the offense has fallen into hasn't convinced Nagy to let offensive coordinator Bill Lazor take his shot at calling plays.

"You know, like I said, I look at all that," Nagy said. "That's the very first thing I look at is that. I talk to our coaches and we talk through that whole process. I'm really honestly not opposed to, there's no opposition from me if we feel like that that's what the issue is. And so we look at that.

"Right now, where we're at, that's not where we think it's at. But at the same point in time, I'll always continue each week to look at it. I'll say this, too. When you're in a little bit of a rut like we are now you have to look at everything. And sometimes even if it's just a little bit of a change somewhere, too, you have to be able to do that. No one here, coach and/or player, has too big of an ego to think that it's not them as a player or a coach. We talk through those kinds of decisions. We'll just keep evaluating and rolling and seeing where we're at."

The big problem seems the offensive line, especially blocking the run. The franchise of Walter Payton, Gale Sayers and Matt Forte is now 2 yards away from being last in the NFL in rushing. They're averaging 3.75 yards per rush, which is 30th in the league. Their two rushing touchdowns are last in the NFL.

The line has also caused some of Foles' issues in the passing game. In Monday's loss another second to throw on one play could have resulted in a touchdown bomb to Darnell Mooney.

"It's going to affect any quarterback and, again, I think that's natural," Nagy said. "The greatest quarterbacks to ever play this game, when there is some heat and some pressure, here's probably the biggest thing to look at for everybody and just for myself playing quarterback my entire life; when quarterback is hard is when you can't step into your throws. That's when quarterbacking is hard."

Nagy pointed out tackles can struggle to pass block when there are too many throws from deep pockets.

"We're working on all that right now and it's a little bit of a process and we are fighting through it and we're going to continue to work each and every day to get as best as we can at that quarterback position doing that and at the tackle position doing that," Nagy said.

Beyond a better running game, it was obvious the offensive coaches, Foles and the rest of the offense all need to be in better sync.

The Bears were forced to call timeouts twice on the same first-half drive, once because they lined up with a running back out of position and were about to run the play that way, and the other was part of what Nagy called a "communication error."

"Ultimately I gotta play better and help our team out in these situations," Foles said Monday night after the game. "And we have to figure out how to run the ball effectively.

"I think the big thing is finding a rhythm of who we want to be and this situation, we’ve gotta continue to work. We’ve really gotta assess who we want to be and find that identity."

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