The Real Flashpoint for Bears Season

There will be great apprehension over the Bears offense leading up to this season because of the addition of Justin Fields' new target, DJ Moore.

The offense and Fields always get all of the national attention and shouldn't.

One national media assessment of the coming season stands out from the rest because the focus for their improvement is, for once, put on the other side of the ball. The flashpoint is not Fields and Luke Getsy's offense, according to NFL.com analyst Bucky Brooks in an article calling the NFC North the league's closest race. It's defense and more specifically if they find a way to generate a pass rush.

"Despite the buzz created by the Bears' offensive potential, Matt Eberflus' squad will only realize its playoff dreams if the unheralded defense plays up to the standard in the Windy City," Brooks wrote.

The comments aren't supported by Brooks with extensive fact but it's a very easy argument to back with details from both sides of the football.

Justin Fields Already Made a Jump

For one, Fields and most of their offensive players already are battle-tested. Fields should be better because he made great strides last year starting out with the first Minnesota game and running through until the week before his season ended with the Week 17 41-10 rout at Detroit.

In those 10 games he played, Fields compiled a 96.9 passer rating with 14 touchdown passes, six interceptions and 65.65% completions. That one game when both he and the entire offense and defense were horrible against the surging Lions at Ford Field then took his stats down a peg, and he was done for the year after that game.

Fields averaged only 23 passes a game in those 10 weeks but while his passing stats were remarkably better it doesn't even take into account his spectacular running. He truly did carry the team on his shoulders by running for 864 yards on 116 attempts then.

Critics who perpetually hammer Fields, like analyst Michael Lombardi, haven't even looked at this stretch of games closely when he made a very clear advancement. Or, if they have, they choose to ignore it because it doesn't fit their narrative.

What was more impressive is how Fields and Bears offensive players went against some of the league's best defenses.

Fields Tested by the Best

Fields and the Bears offense went against the best defense in the league in the opener and won. San Francisco ranked No. 1 last year. They faced the second-best defense when they lost to the Eagles and stayed in the game, 25-20. They faced the third-best defense, the Washington Commanders. They faced the No. 4 defense, the Jets, although Fields didn't play in that one. They also played the sixth-best defense, the Bills, and the eighth-best when they routed the Patriots 33-14. They went against five of the top eight defenses in the league.

Those were the ranks of the overall defenses they faced. They also played against Green Bay twice and the Packers had the sixth-best pass defense. And they played Dallas, which had the eight-best pass defense.

So their offense is well-tested to go against a schedule this year that includes seven games against defenses ranked top 10 against the pass last year. They should be able to do it because besides being tested, they have a legitimate receiver. In fact, they also have Darnell Mooney and he wasn't available to Fields in the rout at Detroit or in losses to the Packers, Eagles and Bills or the passing stats in that stretch of games could have been even more impressive.

No, the real question about the Bears is the pass rush because it's largely unaddressed. Saying you're going to produce an interior rush to make up for lack of a dominant edge rusher, as GM Ryan Poles and coach Matt Eberflus have done, is something they need to prove works before anyone can treat it like a strength.

"GM Ryan Poles signed linebackers Tremaine Edmunds and T.J. Edwards in free agency to add more speed and playmaking potential to the unit, but the lack of an established pass rush could limit the duo's impact," Brooks wrote.

It works this way for their whole secondary. The young Bears secondary ranked ninth in the league against the pass but quickly dropped off after Eddie Jackson's season-ending injury. Not having support from a rush the entire season took its toll. It's always been rush-and-cover with the Tampa-2 style defense like they play, and they never had a rush.

The Bears were last in sacks with 20 and only 6 1/2 of those came from defensive ends. Their answer was bringing in two defensive ends who never had more than seven sacks in any season for their career. In fact, DeMarcus Walker had more than 4 1/2 sacks only once and Rasheem Green more than four sacks only once.

"Until Chicago solves its pass-rush dilemma, the one-dimensional team faces an uphill climb to the top of the division," Brooks said.

Brooks is right. The one dimension they have is an offense battle-tested against good defenses, with a top-level new receiver and a quarterback who carried the team against the toughest schedule in the league last year, according to opponents' winning percentage.

What they don't have is someone who scares the wits out of an opposing passer. Whether they can find anyone at this point who does in the form of a free agent or trade is questionable, because they all have flaws if they haven't signed.

There are a few who could give opponents cause for concern, though.

BearDigest@BearsOnMaven