Bear Digest

Bears' Week 14 good, bad, and ugly includes Rome Odunze injury news

Another odd injury and gambling with too much blitzing may have cost the Bears in their 28-21 loss to the Packers.
Gene Chamberlain|
Packers receiver Christian Watson beats Kevin Byard for the touchdown, making the Bears pay for another defensive gamble.
Packers receiver Christian Watson beats Kevin Byard for the touchdown, making the Bears pay for another defensive gamble. | Sarah Kloepping/USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

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Chicago Bears

The more Bears coach Ben Johnson kept saying it didn’t matter, the more he convinced everyone it made a huge difference not having slot cornerback Kyler Gordon available for his third game of the season in Sunday’s Bears loss.

"We adjust on the fly," Johnson said. "That’s no problem. That’s what we always do. We had a plan.

"(Defensive coordinator Dennis Allen) does a great job with that. The next guys  were popping up and they answered the call."

The next guys were C.J. Gardner-Johnson, and he did pick off a Jordan Love pass early in the game, but after that the Packers on third downs looked to find Christian Watson matched up on Gardner-Johnson because his strength in the slot is not speed, and Watson's is.

"We don’t miss a beat that way, but Kyler is a really good player and we are better when he is out on the field," Johnson admitted. "You do miss that, and when it happens in pregame like that it also takes you down a man going into the game too."

Of course, if the Bears had known Gordon would miss the game they could have had a practice player brought up but that player most likely wouldn't have been playing on defense. They would have been in on special teams.

"So, if you know that going into the game at least you can have someone else up on the active roster for you to fill in and be another body whether it is on offense or defense," Johnson said. "So, it is one of those things. It is a shame that it happens like it did. We will see the extent of it.”

The extent of it Sunday was mismatches in the secondary, whether it meant Gardner-Johnson facing someone tougher to guard or Nick McCloud coming into the game.  It was part of the reason the Packers went 8-for-12 on third-down conversions, something the Bears have been very good at doing.

Either way, there was confusion in the Bears' secondary when normally there is little. Bo Melton got open for a deep TD when there was no blitz and Christian Watson exploited the secondary for two long TDs, as well.

A groin injury at this time of the season, after Gordon missed almost all of the season with this issue, is not a positive whatever way the Bears look at it. And there are limits to Allen's wizardry.

The pregame injury was part of the bad this week in the Bears' good, bad and  ugly. Here are the rest.

The Good

Kyle Monangai's smashing success

Monangai and the Bears' running attack in the second half triggered their offensive success and they scored more points in the game than any Packers opponent has this season.

D'Andre Swift ran for 63 yards on 13 carries, Monangai for 57 on 14 carries, and Monangai ran so hard and hit so hard he broke off a piece of linebacker Edgerrin Cooper's helmet. He bounced off Cooper, and despite facing the wrong way, turned back around and gained yardage back on the play.

Bears goal-line pass catchers

Both Olamide Zaccheaus and Colston Loveland scored on 1-yard TDs, Loveland with a route so good he had no one near him and Zaccheaus with a diving catch near the sideline in the end zone.

Pass blocking on Micah Parsons

Parsons had no sacks. Bottom line.

Maybe he was too busy looking for respect to see sack opportunities.

Myles Garrett got another one on Sunday, though.

The Bad

Luther Burden's exchange

Burden and Keisean Nixon got into a verbal exchange and some "hand play" as they shoved at each other. In the end, Nixon got the penalty when both players probably deserved one or no one.

The problem is, Burden has a habit of taunting on catches and dosn't get called for it. Bears have been penalized for taunting for much less than what he often does. Ask Cassius Marsh.

Terrible tackling

Josh Jacobs scored the winning touchdown but on the march to his winner, the key run was a botched defensive play.

Montez Sweat and three other Bears had Jacobs cornered behind the line on third-and-2 and he still broke through for a 21-yard run to set up the TD.

Wrong coverage, bad coverage

The Bears made coverage mistakes but defensive coordinator Dennis Allen also got caught gambling too much.  He blitzed on both of Christian Watson's TD catches, leaving a fast receiver to exploit tough situations.

All three Packers TD passes came on third-down plays.

Rome's injury

NFL Network reported the foot injury that kept Rome Odunze out is a fracture.

That's the type of thing that could keep Odunze out an extended period. Williams better figure out who DJ Moore is and that he can throw to him.

The Ugly

The handshake

Ben Johnson and Matt LaFleur had possibly one of the quickest and disingenuous handshakes in NFL history.

It wasn't quite the Jim Harbaugh-Jim Schwartz exchange but it was colder than the weather at Lambeau Field.

Packers officiating comments

After the game, Matt LaFleur teed up the refs for not calling holding on plays when Micah Parsons failed to get to the quarterback. So did Parsons.

"I think it is a difficult job, but I guess I don’t know what holding is anymore because I thought that was a pretty clear and obvious hold," he said of one alleged holding on the Bears.

Parsons was a little more subtle.

“Five years of not getting a call, you eventually stop worrying about it,” Parsons said, according to The Athletic.

Then he went on to complain about it anyway.

There have been many coaches in the NFL fined for being much less critical of officials.

Just saying.

What LaFleur needed to do was be creative like Ben Johnson or Declan Doyle. When the

Bears coach and his offensive coordinator don't agree with a call they merely say they'll

submit it to the league so that they are told how they can better coach it next time.

That's their code for the refs stunk. They can't fine you for that and it gets across the message to everyone.

Based on the past, don't expect LaFleur to borrow something Johnson does.

Parsons' truth stretcher

Parsons said after the game he told Caleb Williams he wasn't going to get around his side and he never did.

This wasn't technically true. Williams ran right around Parsons' side but decided to throw instead of run once he got out there. Williams completed his 26-yard pass to Cole Kmet to ignite the Bears' first touchdown drive and also the 24-yard pass to Devin Duvernay on the final Bears drive by running around to the outside on Parsons' side.

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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.