Dolphins-Bears Week 9 Complete Observations

Checking out the key moments from the Miami Dolphins' 35-32 victory against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field

Here's what caught our eye during the Miami Dolphins' 35-32 Week 9 victory against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field.

-- We'll start with the inactive list, which was highlighted not by injured players, but by rookie fourth-round pick Erik Ezukanma again being inactive when the Dolphins decided to go with four wide receivers in the game-day lineup with River Cracraft out because of an illness.

-- As expected, LB Bradley Chubb and RB Jeff Wilson Jr. both were active and in line to make their Dolphins debut.

FIRST QUARTER

-- For the eighth time in nine games, the Dolphins won the toss and they again opted to defer.

-- As should have been expected, Chubb was on the field from the start and was there for the entire eight-play drive that ended with a Bears field goal.

-- Surprisingly, the Bears came out passing, with Justin Fields throwing on the first three plays.

-- Cornerback Kader Kohou had a nice open-field tackle to drop new Bears WR Chase Claypool after only a 1-yard gain on a reception, but then was beaten in the open field by David Montgomery on a running play that gained 7 yards.

-- Keion Crossen had good coverage dow the right defensive sideline against Claypool on a third-and-2, but got too handsy when the ball arrived and was flagged for a 28-yard DPI — a play that would have been called almost every time even though the contact was minimal.

-- Rookie linebacker Channing Tindall looked like he was used as a spy on Fields on a third-and-10 from the MIami 20 and helped limit him to a 6-yard gain to set up the Chicago field goal.

-- The Dolphins came right back with a 75-yard touchdown drive that once again featuring Tua Tagovailoa and the wide receivers own the middle of the field.

-- There was a 17-yard completion to Jaylen Waddle when he made a nice catch on a low pass, and then an 18-yard completion to Trent Sherfield on third-and-5 when the Dolphins ran three receivers in the same spot near the sticks before Sherfield broke out and went to the middle.

-- The big play of the drive was the 32-yard DPI against the Bears' Kindle Vildor when he never turned around after Tyreek Hill got behind him and reached the end zone. That penalty was a lot more obvious than the one called on Crossen, and it was followed by an insanely easy 1-yard run by Raheem Mostert up the middle for a 7-3 Dolphins lead.

-- After the Dolphins' touchdown with 7:33 left in the quarter, the Bears proceeded to kill the rest of the first-quarter clock by converting four third-down situations to move to the Miami 18-yard line.

-- The conversions included a third-and-8 when Tindall got caught leaning the wrong way when Fields scrambled up the middle for 12 yards after Jaelan Phillips applied late pressure.

-- Another conversion came on the last play of the quarter when Kohou found himself in a trail position when Fields completed a 10-yard pass to Darnell Mooney on third-and-10.

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SECOND QUARTER

-- The second quarter began with Fields escaping Phillips' immediate pressure on a naked bootleg and then hitting tight end Cole Kmet in the flat, where he pretty much waltzed into the end zone for an 18-yard touchdown that made it 10-7 for Chicago.

-- Trailing? No problem for the offense, which carved the Bears defense again on its second drive.

-- This drive began with Terron Armstead getting flagged for an ineligible downfield penalty, but that was followed by completions of 25 yards to Tyreek Hill, 26 yards to Waddle and the 3-yard TD pass to Hill.

-- There also was a roughing-the-penalty on Bears rookie Dominique Robinson, which was a lot less of a penalty-worthy play that a blatant offside on the Bears that wasn't called.

-- After giving up one first down on Chicago's next possession, we got our first huge play by the special teams all season when Jaelan Phillips broke through the line to block a punt — smother actually might be more like it — and Andrew Van Ginkel scooped up the loose ball and ran 25 yards for a touchdown that made it 21-10.

-- Chicago went on another time-consuming drive that featured a lot of runs and a lot of short gains.

-- The biggest play until the two-minute warning was a 17-yard run by Fields off the left flank after he faked an inside handoff and he got Bradley Chubb to bite inside and lose contain.

-- Right after that two-minute warning, on a third-and-8, Darnell Mooney beat Xavien Howard from the slot with an outside and Fields hit him for a 16-yard touchdown pass to make it 21-17.

-- The Dolphins began their two-minute warning by catching the Bears completely off guard with an inside handoff to Mostert, who easily gained 14 yards.

-- On third-and-6, Hill lined up in the slot then darted outside and behind the Bears secondary for an easy pitch-and-catch and 39-yard pick-up to the Bears 18-yard line.

-- The Dolphins got awfully casual with the clock from there and also were called for a penalty for too many men in the huddle.

-- The Dolphins missed a chance to add to their lead when Jason Sanders pushed a 29-yard field goal attempt wide left, so the half ended with a 21-17 Dolphins halftime lead. It was the shortest miss of Sanders' career.

-- The good news is that the Dolphins get the ball first to start the second half.

THIRD QUARTER

-- The Dolphins wasted little time adding to their halftime lead, needing just four plays to march 75 yards for another touchdown.

-- After a 22-yard Tua completion down the field to Tyreek Hill, who as usual was wide open, Jeff Wilson Jr. made his first big play in a Miami uniform with a 28-yard run over the left side.

-- The drive ended with Tua's 18-yard touchdown pass to Jaylen Waddle, who made a nice adjustment running across the end zone by coming back to the ball in front of a Chicago defender.

-- The Dolphins' 11-point lead didn't last long, though, because the next series is when Justin Fields had his 61-yard touchdown scramble.

-- It came on a third-and-5 after Eric Rowe made a nice open-field tackle against Darnell Mooney on first down.

-- On Fields' touchdown, the player with the best chance to bring him down was Jerome Baker, but Baker lost the half-step necessary to get that done when he twitched after Fields made a quick pump after he got out of the pocket.

-- The Dolphins came right back with another 75-yard touchdown drive, highlighted by Hill get wide open for gains of 20 and 18 yards.

-- Tackle Brandon Shell gave up a pressure after quickly getting beat, leading to an incompletion.

-- The touchdown pass was another easy pitch-and-catch as Jeff Wilson Jr. easily beat the Bears defender with a quick out move and then dove into the end zone after making the catch.

-- The Dolphins got a stop on the next Chicago series with a 35-25 lead, thanks in large part to a holding penalty on Bears center Sam Mustipher against Christian Wilkins.

-- The Dolphins' next drive began with a 16-yard completion to Hill off a rollout when he — as usual — got wide open in the middle of the Chicago secondary.

-- The drive ended on a sour note, though.

-- On third-and-3 from the Chicago 32, Tua couldn't handle a low shotgun snap from Connor Williams and had to fall on the ball for a 3-yard loss.

-- On fourth-and-6, after making the right call to go for it in windy conditions that made field goals tricky, Tua couldn't connect with Mike Gesicki, who didn't create a lot of separation on a route to the sideline and the Dolphins turned the ball over on downs.

-- On the first play of the next series, Xavien Howard had his first interception of the season nullified when he was called for holding intended receiver Equanimeous St. Brown coming out of his break. While there wasn't a ton of contact on the play, it happened in the middle of the field and more often than not what Howard did would draw a flag. The Bears were called for offensive holding as well on the play.

FOURTH QUARTER

-- Chicago completed that drive for a touchdown that cut the Dolphins lead to 35-32, thanks in large part to runs of 14 and 17 yards by Fields, who took advantage of Xavien Howard and Jaelan Phillips failing to stay outside after a play fake.

-- Phillips did have pressure on Fields earlier in the drive to force an incompletion.

-- The touchdown was a 4-yard pass from Fields to tight end Cole Kmet after Kmet was engaged with Melvin Ingram at the line of scrimmage and then broke outside with safety Jevon Holland too slow to get over there.

-- The Dolphins quickly got back into Chicago territory on the ensuing possession thanks to a 47-yard pass interference penalty on Eddie Jackson against Jaylen Waddle after Waddle got behind the defense and waiting for the ball to get there.

-- This drive also ended on a sour note after Mostert made a cut to the outside on a second-down run that gained 7 yards when it appeared he would have gotten the first down had he run ahead or cut inside.

-- Even then, the Dolphins still had a third-and-2 from the Bears 15 before Jeff Wilson was stopped after a 1-yard gain thanks in large part to Trent Sherfield getting beat on his block attempt.

-- And on fourth-and-1, after Mike McDaniel decided to go for the first down instead of a six-point lead, Tua badly underthrew a wide open Durham Smythe in the flat for an incompletion and another turnover on downs. Tua explained that he spotted Smythe not looking back right as he was about to throw and it's obvious he didn't set his feet, but a review of the film shows Smythe just looked downfield for a second before turning back to look at Tua.

-- Chicago got two first downs to move to the 42, including a third-down conversion on a 13-yard scramble by Fields after Chubb got pressure from the outside.

-- The Dolphins stopped that drive thanks in large part to a first-down sack by Melvin Ingram, who dropped Fields for a 5-yard loss.

-- The offense got the ball back with 3:04 needing a first down or two to ice the game, but failed.

-- After two runs by Mostert went for minus-1 and 0 yards, Waddle got behind the Bears secondary down the left sideline but Tua underthrew him, giving cornerback Jaylon Johnson the chance to catch up and knock the ball away while facing Waddle. This could have been a touchdown or at the very least a game-clinching completion.

-- Just before the two-minute warning, the Bears got a first down thanks to — what else? — a Fields run when he scrambled for 12 yards to the 42.

-- On third-and-10 from the Chicago 42 came the biggest play of the game and it was a very fortunate break for the Dolphins, who appeared to get the benefit of a bad no-call on Keion Crossen after he grabbed wide receiver Chase Claypool at the waist from behind and started pulling him before the ball got to him. By all measure, that should have been a DPI that would have given Chicago the ball at the Dolphins 22 with 1:29 left. Instead it became fourth-and-10.

-- On that fourth-and-10, Fields threw perhaps his best pass of the game when he rolled to his right and delivered a sidearm strike on the move to St. Brown just past the reach of Xavien Howard. But St. Brown let the ball goes through his hands, the Dolphins took over on downs, and their 35-32 had been secured.

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