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Bear Digest

Bears Addressing Two Huge Problems with Varying Degrees of Success

Training camp started to pick up in pace on Friday and the Bears went to work correcting two of the problems their offense had last year.
Gene Chamberlain|
With Colston Loveland (84) and Cole Kmet (85) as targets the Bears shouldn't have problems scoring in the red zone.
With Colston Loveland (84) and Cole Kmet (85) as targets the Bears shouldn't have problems scoring in the red zone. | IMAGN IMAGES via Reuters Connect

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Chicago Bears

The Bears had two really perplexing issues last year on offense they have begun to address.

There are promising early returns with one. With the other, they need time in pads to work at it.

The first was how they struggled so much in their two-minute drill, not at the end of games but at halftime. The other one they look to have a better grasp of was Caleb Williams' passing passing in the red zone.

At Friday's practice, they simulated a two-minute drill before the half, went right down and scored with 15 seconds remaining on a Williams 14-yard pass to Colston Loveland. It was well executed considering last year Williams had a 74.2 passer rating in the final two minutes before halftime but 98.4 in fourth quarters when within a touchdown or leading.

"Anytime we score the ball at end of half, that's big for us," tackle Darnell Wright said. "Something we really need to work on. Something that we really need to improve on from last year. It's good that we are starting that and getting better."

Scoring before halftime

The Bears talked about this problem at a team meeting Thursday night.

"Oh man, yeah, you hit that nail on the head," coach Ben Johnson said when this discrepancy was brought to his attention. "It's a huge point of emphasis for us. We were not good two-minute, end-of-half. We weren't very good in the second quarter in general. We didn't score as many points as the other quarters. We gave up more points in that quarter as well."

The Bears were 25th in second-quarter scoring at 5.5 points. Only four teams gave up more than the Bears' 8.1 points per game in second quarters.

"I do think, as I've said it to you for a year and a half now, anytime you put emphasis on something, you normally see good things happen because of it," Johnson said. "So our guys understand how important that is.

"It's a way for us to possibly steal a possession through the course of the game if we handle the before half procedure correctly. And of course, we want some more momentum going into halftime as well than what we did."

The Red Zone Issue

The problem with the red zone, itself, will take time, too. Williams was 12th in passing EPA last year among starters but inside the red zone he was 26th among starters. It's not as easy to work at this until Monday when they put on pads and are hitting.

Then they can incorporate the run into the attack better and the red zone work becomes more realistic when they can use play-action.

Their first real work inside the red zone at camp came Thursday and the backups had no problem at all, Tyson Bagent hitting wide receiver Kaden Davis for a TD at the back of the end zone. As for Williams, it was the only real area so far in three days of camp where he didn't look on-point and crisp. He wound up takings off platform repeatedly after he hadn't really done it much in the first two practices. They did eventually get the TD in rhythm to Loveland in the two-minute drill within the red zone but other bids were less successful.

Perhaps they'll need to do what Case Keenum did with the third team. The 38-year-old geezer scrambled for a touchdown.

Williams can definitely do that, especially now that he's 10-15 pounds lighter and supposedly moving well. It's better to get the passing game down, though. And with tall targets Loveland, Cole Kmet and Rome Odunze available, Williams should have plenty of easier targets to throw to near and in the end zone.

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Gene Chamberlain
GENE CHAMBERLAIN

Gene Chamberlain has covered the Chicago Bears full time as a beat writer since 1994 and prior to this on a part-time basis for 10 years. He covered the Bears as a beat writer for Suburban Chicago Newspapers, the Daily Southtown, Copley News Service and has been a contributor for the Daily Herald, the Associated Press, Bear Report, CBS Sports.com and The Sporting News. He also has worked a prep sports writer for Tribune Newspapers and Sun-Times newspapers.

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